Now this is amazing. That was a calm and well reasoned analysis. I don’t agree with all of it, but there were some valid points. As for Bubba changing? No, he didn’t change. But I don’t care so much about that. He signed bills that made positive change, even if he didn’t like them.
I want a tea party congress that will send government reducing, bureaucrat reducing, liberty increasing life changing bills and a President who will sign them into law.
Would I prefer a President who really believes in them and champions them? SURE. But at the end of the day, that doesn’t matter in my life as much as government getting out of my way.
The problem is when you elect a leader who isn’t apt to believe in it, he/she is probably apt not to do it (except in cases of immediate expediency). That was a huge problem with Giuliani’s Presidential candidacy. At least he didn’t audaciously switch positions across the board, but he did expect us to believe that he’d support causes, goals and appointees that ran counter to what he believed in. I mean, let me ask you, would you appoint people and support causes and bills that you personally oppose ? I wouldn’t. I know of few politicians that would, except for those of exceptionally low moral stature (the “I personally oppose abortion but...” types). Perry’s support and endorsement of Giuliani for President dovetails with that “trust” issue, or lack thereof.
I’ll add, too, that there are VERY few pro-small government Republicans in action. Too many go to DC or to a lesser office intending to get government out of our lives (or at least start the shrinking process) and they get assimilated into the bigger bureaucracy mindset. One big argument for term limits, although that would only result (with respect to Congress) in the staffers holding the reigns of power. If I thought Perry had that impetus within him, I’d be less tough on him, but everything about him tells me he’s just going to be another big-government manager. Another variation of Dubya. I think the media will paint him as such if he gets the nomination, and it will be difficult to refute. Just saying, “He’s better than Zero” isn’t enough. A ficus plant is better than Zero, but we won’t elect one.
I remember all the folks gung-ho last year about the “Tea Partier” in Nevada, Sharron Angle. Folks got mad at me because I told them she’d be the only candidate who would manage the impossible — to lose to the unpopular Harry Reid. I pointed out in the primary she rubbed folks the wrong way, that she pissed off the wrong people in the state, and she had losses under her belt and made a claim of fraud against now-Sen. Dean Heller that almost cost us a safe House seat. I got called the same kinds of names, that I was working for Reid, pro-establishment and the like, but it didn’t matter. I was proven right. I did the same thing in 2006 with Katherine Harris when I warned she was the most divisive politician in the state of Florida and would lose in a landslide. Same attacks, same nonsense. I was right again. When you’ve been through the wars day after day and you build up the kind of credibility, it’s why I’m confident in making my claims when it comes to politicians. Even when they may stand for most of what we want (as Angle and Harris did), sometimes some are, for some reason or another, the right person to pick up the banner. Again, another reason why I oppose Perry.