Rumbling on the Hard-Right

The Washington Times ^ | December 30, 2003 | Stephen Dinan

[GunsareOK]

President Bush is beginning to anger certain hard-line conservatives, particularly over fiscal issues, the way his father did in the year before he lost to Bill Clinton in 1992.

It's not clear how deep the dissatisfaction goes, and whether it will translate to damage at the polls in November.

[Texas_Dawg]

WHile I will hold my nose and vote for Bush next year, I don't have any illusions that he's really a conservative.

I don't know... maybe you're just not very intelligent. Who knows? Must be something like that though.

[VU4G10]

"The Bush Administration has announced they are giving amnesty to illegals ??? When you make a statement like that, I am sure you can provide a link to the official announcement!"

Just pick a word: "Regularization,’ ‘Legalization,’ ‘Permanent Status,’ and ‘Earned Adjustment.’

[KEVLAR]

I guess that a good portion of us who read and post at FR do not meet your high standards for being conservative.
Your calling folks socialists, loons etc. does not change the reasons some are unhappy with the presidents handling of certain issues. If your name calling is any indication of what makes a conservative, you can count me out.

[goodnesswins]

I doubt ANYONE here supports Pres. Bush 100%, but we don't drink enough "koolaid" to vote for someone else which will ASSURE we have a LIBERAL in office. Just not quite that masochistic.

[theFIRMbss]

>It's not clear how deep the dissatisfaction goes
>>Not very.

I hope you are right.
But I'll tell you, my parents
are both working class

Republicans, and
so are their friends. These people
are television

and newspaper types.
My parents and all their friends
completely swallowed

the media's line
about Bush -- he's dumb, hated,
ruining the world...

No matter how I
explain to these people that
TV and papers

show a tiny part
of the political world,
their generation

grew up believing
mainstream news was all there is
and by keeping up

with the mainstream news,
they were informed and involved
and ready to vote...

I'm sure the future
belongs to netizens. But
I'm afraid enough

of the TV crowd
is still around to fracture
Republicans bad...

[e_engineer]

National socialist? Possibly. Conservative? Not a chance.

Name calling shows the weakness of your position.

It is Bush who fails the test of conservatism with his stand on illegal immigration, his willingness to violate both the 1st (CFR) and 2nd (AWB) amendments, and his outrageous growth of government.

[Texas_Dawg]

"The far right old school exremists are irrelevant and will be ignored, because we do not need them. And ANY DEBATE OR RECOGNITION of their CONCERNS can only lead to problems, so screw them."

Hear, hear. More power to him. The Nazis need to be (and are being) routed out of the GOP so that true conservatives like GWB can run the party again.

[Texas_Dawg]

Name calling shows the weakness of your position.

It's not name-calling at all. If you happen to support the tenets of national socialism, then yes, you are a national socialist.

[Texas_Dawg]

I'm sorry, but your parents just aren't conservatives then. They sound more like populists.

[At _War_With_Liberals]

"The war is the only issue that prevents Bush from facing a primary opponent. "

And the admin and the RNC shamelessly used Saddams's capture and Xmas to effectively BURY the announcement of amnesty.

And FOX and The Wall St Journal have buried the issue. The Rat media buried it because they FAVOR it.

The Wall St Journal printed a position editorial advocating ANY amnesty plan Bush chooses, on XMAS eve- to bury it.

[At _War_With_Liberals]

" just listened to a radio program where the caller was a supposed hard-line conservative but is "angry" at George Bush. This sounds like a DNC plan, albeit very transparent, to attract illiterate conservatives. "

It's an RNC PLAN.

[LLBeet]

Were Bush omniscient and omnipotent, I would be very disappointed in him. But since he is neither, I would vote for him rather than see our country dragged down to become a second-rate socialist nation at the hands of the Democrats. We are living in dangerous times, with enemies from both the outside and within our borders. We do not have the luxury of looking for a 100% pure conservative President. Life, and politics specially, is full of compromises, and as long as we can achieve most of our main goals, such as preserving freedom, growing the economy, and defeating fanatical terrorists, we should support Bush and his Administration. The thought of a Dean or Clark as our President is just too ghastly for me.

[luckydevi]

How So?

The growth of government under his watch is depressing.

Newflash: Bush is not a conservative.

[Mr. Bird]

It's a simple calculation for me. The winner of the '04 election will come from either the Dem or GOP party. While I have been frustrated with several of Bush's actions as president, I have absolutely no intention of acting (or failing to act) in such a way to help the Democrat.

I loved Keyes in '00. I voted for Bush.

[Texas_Dawg]

I guess that a good portion of us who read and post at FR do not meet your high standards for being conservative. Your calling folks socialists, loons etc. does not change the reasons some are unhappy with the presidents handling of certain issues. If your name calling is any indication of what makes a conservative, you can count me out. I hope you don't think FR represents mainstream, traditional conservatism. Some here might, but FR is full of radical reactionaries that are not very conservative at all. Is it everyone here? No. But it's a solid percentage.

[edsheppa]

Mr. Viguerie was widely quoted [in 1983], too, criticizing the incumbent's "leftward drift" on spending and the growth of government.

And we all know how poorly Reagan did in 84.

These holier-than-thou one-note doomsters make me laugh.

[Wild Irish Rogue]

" Just pick a word: "Regularization,’ ‘Legalization,’ ‘Permanent Status,’ and ‘Earned Adjustment "

Again-where is the link to any official announcement of a Bush plan to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants ??

[North Coast Conservative]

LOL....yeah, no conservative would ever say that.

I think you are wrong. But the way I heard it was:

"We survived eight years of Bill Clinton. We can survive again if we have to in order to get our point across."

Gun Control, (AWB)
Immigration Control
The Pill Bill
Same Sex Marriage

are issues that I believe can torpedo this presidency, just as No New Taxes did for his father.

Bush/Cheney'04 is worried about the undecideds who they feel will determine this election. They are addressing the decidedly huge Democratic advantage in the Get Out The Vote effort with "Voter Registration", "Voter ID", and the "72 Hour Plan". They want to outhustle the hustlers. However they assume that all of the Hard Corps Right that they are alienating will stay with them.

I see more and more evidence every day that will go to the Constitution Party as a protest vote. They may not vote for Dean, but the result may be the same.

Can they attract more voters by looking like Demoncrats than they turn off?

I will be looking for answers to that at CPAC next month.

In God We Trust…..Semper Fi

[Texas_Dawg]

The growth of government under his watch is depressing.

Newsflash: Our deficit as a percentage of the GDP is very manageable.

Newsflash: Our electorate is split 50/50 in the middle of a war that the overwhelming majority of the world and 40% of the US despises.

George W. Bush is one of the most conservative Presidents America has ever had.