Posted on 01/31/2006 11:05:56 AM PST by robowombat
Bush is kicking away his base By Phyllis Schlafly
Jan 30, 2006
The conservative movement that elected Ronald Reagan twice, George H.W. Bush once, and George W. Bush II twice, is essentially a movement of grass-rooters who don't like to take orders from the top and who revolt when they believe they are betrayed or bossed by those they elected. That's why the grass roots abandoned the first George Bush when he reneged on his "no new taxes, read my lips" promise.
The tough political tactics used by union bosses and Democratic machine bosses simply don't sit well with conservative Republicans.
Resentment against the current Bush administration is still festering about the combination of threats and bribes that pushed through close votes in Congress to pass the costly Medicare prescription drug bill in 2003 and Central American Trade Agreement in 2004.
Maybe the intra-party divisions between fiscal vs. Big Government conservatives that lay behind the former battle, and between pro vs. anti free-traders in the latter battle, were evenly balanced enough that the Bush administration alienated only a handful of Republicans. But in demanding a guest-worker plan that smacks of amnesty, the Bush administration is taking the unpopular side of a party division that is at least 80-20.
In December, the House passed a border-security bill authored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.. The bill rejected support for Bush's guest worker/amnesty plan. Since 88 percent of Republican House members voted for this bill, that should have been a wake-up call to the president.
Shortly thereafter, Arizona Republican National Committee member Randy Pullen gathered enough signatures to present a resolution to the Republican National Committee at its Jan. 19-20 meeting in Washington, D.C., which endorsed border security measures and opposed any guest worker plan.
A competing resolution endorsing border security plus a guest worker plan was floated by the RNC's Bill Crocker of Texas. After he realized the strong tide against guest workers, he began negotiating a compromise with Pullen, and one version of the compromise eliminated guest workers.
When the RNC resolutions committee met Jan. 19, the chairman, Idaho's Blake Hall, brought up the original Crocker resolution that included guest worker language. An attempt by one committeeman to substitute the Crocker-Pullen compromise was ruled out of order, and then a motion to remove the guest worker language was voted down 5 to 3.
That evening, the Bush administration sent in its big guns, Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., to insist that RNC members support the guest worker plan or else they would be labeled disloyal and disrespectful of President Bush. Republican Party chairman Ken Mehlman made the rounds to regional caucuses to demand approval of Bush's guest worker plan and defeat of the Pullen resolution.
At the RNC meeting on Jan. 20, the Hall-approved resolution was incorporated and passed as part of a package of nine resolutions in order to preclude a specific vote on the border security-guest worker issue. The Pullen resolution did not come up.
This donnybrook happened on the same day that the New York Times reported that 18,207 illegal immigrants from nations other than Mexico have been the beneficiaries of the Bush administration's scandalous "catch and release" procedure in the three months since Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff promised to "return every single illegal entrant - no exceptions." Catch and release means that the illegal immigrants from nations other than Mexico are not deported. But after they are apprehended, they are released on their own recognizance with instructions to reappear a few weeks later, with everybody understanding that they will disappear into the U.S. population.
Also on the same day, Lou Dobbs reported on CNN-TV that Mexican troops are crossing our southern border twice a month in uniform, in military vehicles and carrying military weapons. The Bush administration's response to this invasion is don't ask, don't tell.
It's bad enough that President Bush is pursuing a vastly unpopular guest worker-amnesty plan, but the administration's bullying to prevent debate and a vote by the full Republican National Committee was intolerable. It forecasts the sort of intimidation we can anticipate in the upcoming Senate debate about Bush's guest worker plan.
Why are President Bush and Karl Rove so tone deaf on this issue? Some speculate that the Bush administration is in the pocket of big business lobbying interests that want the cheap labor made available by the government's failure to enforce our immigration laws.
Others speculate that Bush and Rove are hallucinating that Hispanics will vote Republican. That won't happen; Hispanics vote 55 to 75 percent Democratic because, since they are mostly in the low-income sector of our economy, they vote for the party that promises the social benefits of the welfare state, not for the party that pretends to support fiscal integrity and small government.
The administration-imposed RNC defeat of the majority view of Republicans is bad news for the 2006 congressional elections. Bush is alienating his political base and creating what one RNC member calls an "enthusiasm deficit." In the words of the old adage, elephants (i.e., conservative Republicans) never forget.
Phyllis Schlafly is the President and Founder of the Eagle Forum
"Out of these troubled times, our-objective-a new world order-can emerge-Today, that new world is struggling to be born, a world quite different from the one we have known- " -Former President George Bush September 11, 1990
You need to ask what Bush I what he meant. From all the evidence I can see with Bush II, it appears pretty much like what I said.
You think Schlafly rightfully whacks the RNC for their dictatorial, anti-conservative grassroots actions in this article, you should hear her speech about the 1994 GOP Convention. Same old crap from the top down. After this recent RNC stunt, I called the RNC comment line and gave them a piece of my mind. The night after that I got an RNC telemarketer calling and asking for money. I don't think he'll be able to hear out of that ear for a week or more. Screw 'em. Screw them all. I will donate money and support to local conservative candidates and the RNC can go to hell. The sooner the grassroots can toss out the big government loving, border erasing, country club elitist pigs running the party, the better. As a state committeeman, I voted for Randy Pullen over a RINO. I am happy that Randy Pullen tried to stand up to the power bosses. I'm sick that Pullen was not supported by the national committeeman from almost every other state.
Thank you, I'm honored, yet humbled, to share that plank with you.
I am not running for elected office nor do I write pouting columns falsely proclaiming that POTUS is "kicking away" his base.
Mrs. S is very astute, as she has proven, quite often. Even Rush warns of the peril your G.O.P. faces from voters in upcoming elections a/c illegal immigration.
Y'all are not the base.
Yes we are.
You're unappeasables who never fail to bitch and complain every time he scores a huge win.
No, we're rather like Thomas J, who always celebrated the victory, but kept focused on the big picture.
I know, you're right. This was in context of what would be entered it the "race" section of an arrest warrant.
He was more aggressive and vicious against Reagan during his GOP primary when he coined the phrase "Voodoo Economics." Against Clinton he was a...pussy cat -- with ALL the ammo in the world to beat him.
Bush WAS a patsy in '92.
What about them?
You're too preoccupied to see the big picture.
I guess I'll have to do a search just in LA County only. Of course, LA County ain't the end all to be all.
I'd agree Bush 1 was soft, but his son is nothing like him. W's like his mother who never, it appears, runs from a fight worth fighting over.
Get back to me when you want to talk using some facts and logic.
I forgot to ping you to #449.
............ you just stop!
I disagreed with you on Schlafly, period! That was it!
Then you started your eternal hate and namecalling CRAP, as usual!
YOU STOP what you started. Stop now!
So we can deduce from this that you either 1.) Voted for Perot (who handed Clinton the election in '92 and '96) or 2.) Stayed home in protest (which seems to be standard fare for those who don't get their way).
And it spawned a beautiful friendship between the two. In fact, they're "like family" now. Touching, ain't it?
As for this 'losing his base' nonsense........
President Bush has an 88% approval rating among Republicans. We ARE his base, and he hasn't lost any of us.
Phyllis..........I admired you greatly. Don't make me lose that admiration with this stuff, OK??
All your base are belong to us...
Enjoy the speech........
In Chicago we have LOTS of illegals and not all are from Mexico. In my neighborhood the majority of illegals are from Poland. Then there are lots of Irish, Russians as well.
This "race baiting ninny" (pretty hilarious since most of the panicked are panicked because of Mexicans) does not deny a problem merely scorns the loons wanting to shoot them or build a wall.
We're all the base, it's just that the "purist" are trying to push out the rest of us.
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