Rush Limbaugh: Why Republicans Lost

Republicans lost control of the House, and perhaps the Senate, because they abandoned their conservative principles and in the end stood for nothing, Rush Limbaugh said today.

In his Wednesday broadcast, America’s top talker said that until Republicans begin asking themselves what’s wrong with themselves they are never going to fix their problems.

When things go wrong, Rush said, "you must look inward and ask first, ‘What did we do wrong? What could we have done better? What mistakes did we make?”

Commenting that although Republicans lost, "Conservatism did not lose, Republicanism lost last night. Republicanism, being a political party first, rather than an ideological movement, is what lost last night.”

The Democrats, he said "beat something last night with nothing. They advanced no agenda other than their usual anti-war position. They had no contract — they really never did get specific. Their message was one of ‘vote for us; the other guys have been in power too long.’”

Rush further admonished, "There was no dominating conservative message that came from the [Republican] top and filtered down throughout in this campaign.”

He added that if there was conservatism in the campaign, it was on the Democratic side: "There were conservative Democrats running for office in the House of Representatives and in a couple of Senate races won by Democrats yesterday.” He cited James Webb as an example.

He also said it was conservatism that won fairly big when it was tried yesterday, but it was Democrats who ran as conservatives and not their GOP rivals. He added that the Democratic leadership had gone out and recruited conservative candidates because they knew liberals could not win running against Republicans in red states.

Rush quoted Thomas Sowell as explaining that the latest example of election fraud is actually what the Democrats did — they nominated a bunch of moderate and conservative candidates for the express purpose of electing a far-left Democratic leadership.

"The Democrats could not have won the House, being liberals,” Rush said. "Liberalism didn’t win anything yesterday; Republicanism lost. Conservatism was nowhere to be found except on the Democratic side.”

The root of the problem, Rush said, is that "our side hungers for ideological leadership and we’re not getting it from the top. Conservatism was nowhere to be found in this campaign from the top. The Democrats beat something with nothing. They didn’t have to take a stand on anything other than their usual anti-war positions. They had no clear agenda and they didn’t dare offer one. Liberalism will still lose every time it’s offered.”

Republicans, Rush said, allowed themselves to be defined. "Without elected conservative leadership from the top Republicans in the House and Senate republicans are free to freelance and say the hell with party unity.”

Republicans in Congress, Rush explained, were held captive by the party’s leadership in the White House. They were put into a position of having to endorse policies with which as conservatives they disagreed.

"The Democratic Party,” Rush went on to say, "is the party of entitlements; but the Republicans come up with this Medicare prescription drug plan that the polls said that the public didn’t want and was not interested in. That is not conservatism. Conservatives do not grow the government and offer entitlements as a means of buying votes. But that’s what the Republicans in Congress had to support in order to stay in line with the Party from the top.

"It is silly to blame the media; it is silly to blame the Democrats; it is silly to go out and try to find all these excuses,” Rush said. "We have proved that we can beat them … we have proved that we can withstand whatever we get from the drive-by media. Conservatism does that — conservatism properly applied, proudly, eagerly, with vigor and honesty will triumph over that nine times out of 10 in this current political and social environment. It just wasn’t utilized in this campaign.”

Rush also blamed the failure to embrace conservatism on Republican’s fear of being criticized from those in the so-called establishment. Republicans, he charged, go out of their way to avoid being criticized, fearing they will be characterized as extremists and kooks.

As a result conservatism gets watered down, and the GOP loses the support of the nation’s conservative majority Rush stated.

Rush is very much right. I've had my problems with Rush as of late, but I made it a point to listen to him today.

Conservatism does not lose. When it comes down to brass tacks, I firmly believe that Americans want conservatism. If the Republican Party has lost, it has been insofar as the Republican Party has left sound conservative principle.

What I am going to say is going to make me quite unpopular around here. I'm certainly not a "troll" though... I've been here since May 2001 and was VK when VK was just becoming cool. I have no love of Liberals or Liberalism - I've never voted for a Democrat in my life.

I think, however, that it is of the utmost importance that we, as Conservatives, evaluate wherein we have deserted the Fundamental Principles of Conservatism. Now, I know that one's first impulse is to jump to questioning RINOs, moderates, and "Liberal Republicans"... but such thinking is every bit as much flawed as blaming the MSM or the Democrats. That's a "blame others" approach, and that's not what we, as Republicans, do.

The fact is, we, as the "Republican Base", have deserted Conservative Principle, at least insofar as the perception of the American people are concerned. Perception matters. I'm not saying that any of us have stopped being Conservative, but rather that we have not shown how what we have supported over the past few years has been connected to fundamental Conservative thought.

For example, Conservatism isn't about building governments in other countries. President Bush ran on that in 2000. Now, necessity arose due to 9/11 where we had to build governments in both Afghanistan and Iraq. While it was necessary, one cannot argue that it is traditional Conservative Principle, unless one argues that 9/11 spelled the end for such principles. As far as many Americans are concerned, we've been using approaches similiar to those embraced by the Democrats - "the Government solves problems".

Don't misunderstand me - I'm not saying that's what we've actually done, merely that somehow we've allowed that impression to get out to the American people. We've allowed the American people to get the impression that the Republican Party stands for nation building, warrantless wiretapping, imprisonment without trial, stealing candy from babies, ETC. That's NOT what we're about. Heck, it's not even what we've been doing the past several years. But that is the impression we've allowed to get out, and perception is everything. Somehow or another, the Democrats have trumped us in appearing to be the "conservative party" on these issues.

We have ourselves to blame here. Not the RINOs, not the "moderates", not the "liberal Republicans" or the "MSM"... we screwed up. I firmly believe that each and every person here is of a strong enough character to admit that fact so that we can take the blame on our own shoulders. We have got to act more Conservatively... and when we do, we need to make a better explanation to the American people WHY what we do is in accordance with true Conservative principle.

I made the comparison on another thread, and I'll make it again. This is equivalent to buying a brand new refrigerator, stocking it with food and beer for Thanksgiving, and having it break down the night before. Now, one can get p***ed off, and rightfully so, especially when one is cleaning up the mess. But eventually, the man with character realizes that he needs to fix the fridge and make new plans for the next night. Wallowing in problems and blaming others is the Democratic approach to problems - Republicans self-examine and fix the damn thing.

So let's fix this problem so it doesn't happen again in 2008!!!

"Bush and his advisers sent Reagan Democrats back to the Democratic Party."

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He sure as hell sent large chunks of blue collar Republicans a barrage of insults in the last two years with his utterly moronic "immigrants just do the jobs that Americans aren't willing to do" bullshit line.

Jobs like Carpentry, heating / HVAC / automotive repair / auto body repair..basically all the trades people got sick and tired of his BS line.

the dums don't help the blue collar working bloke...most blue collar guys I know are conservative. They just got tired of being berated by a POTUS with no clue or connection to the common guy. so, they sat home and ate cheetos and drank beer instead. This election was soooooooooo predictable. Really.

The party as a whole, starting with the President, did abandon many of (what many of us thought were) its principles, notably the idea of limited government, even if there are some guys who are exceptions. Add to this a war in which a decisive victory has not been achieved, and you've got defeat.

I thought we don't vote for Republican candidates simply because they have an "R" after their name and likewise, I would hope we don't vote against a Republican because they have an "R" after their name.

There is no valid excuse for the voters not supporting good conservative candidates such as Burns, Allen, Santorum and Talent -- none!

The WOT, tax cuts and judge appointments will all be hurt by this over the next two years.

Any hope at all of no amnesty and spending cuts post-Bush, have now been set back years.

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