Yes, Reagan was great, but it's time to move on

Chicago Sun Times ^ | Feb 11, 2004 | George Will

[PhiKapMom]

In this winter of their discontents, nostalgia for Ronald Reagan has become for many conservatives a substitute for thinking. This mental paralysis -- gratitude decaying into idolatry -- is sterile: Neither the man nor his moment will recur. Conservatives should face the fact that Reaganism cannot define conservatism.

[oceanview]

alito would not have, there would not have been 60 votes for cloture, and there would not have been 51 votes for a rules change. so he would have not been confirmed.

[Delphinium]

Life issues can and should be creatively legislated at the state level, where they should have remained and where they desperately belong.

When was it just a state issue whether someone killed their children or not? When did this change? Are you talking about before the 14th amendment? Before slaves were freed?

[Spiff]

Thank you for saying what needed to be said. I applaud your post.

[meyer]

Consequently, those whose principles will not allow them to vote for Rudy (or McCain, or Romney -- the three frontrunners), but whose principles WILL allow them to sit idly by and let the Clintons back into the White House are worse than useless.

Bottom line is that as long as the party refuses to field anything close to a conservative, they will lose. It's not the voter's fault if they are confronted with the choice of a liberal democRAT or a liberal Republican. It's not the party, it's the person. I don't give squat what party someone is with any more. It's obvious that wearing the big "R" means nothing.

I'm one who is sick of people on this forum trying to blame the voter for their choice - we all get one vote and it is our own individual right to use it as we see fit. Some of the whining here reminds me of union leaders trying to dictate to the membership how they should vote on a contract. I'm not a union member, and I'm no longer a party member.

[LowCountryJoe]

Stop being so flippant, you have to know what I am suggesting here. Unfortunately, not everyone in this country agrees that terminating the life of a fetus is really murder. Because of this (and because of the sheer number of those who view an unborn life not as a life at all) less abortions would occur if it were a state issue. Are you really going to be so flippant as to deny that this opinion of mine has merit?

But then there is also the issue of terminally ill people that would prefer to "checkout" before their illnesses take them. Pro-lifers vehemently oppose this rational choice on what ground, I'll never know. There is only One Judge in these types of matters and it is not the pro-life types that wish to regulate behavior and the free will choices that the Almighty has granted to us. We have got to remember our places and realize that not everyone shares the same values and wants to be legislated upon the same ways...the only consistent and principled thing to do, then, is to back off each other and respect freedom.

[Hydroshock]

ping

[Richard Kimball]

I've said this about George Will many times. Will is what liberals want a conservative to be. An ineffectual bow-tie wearing Poindexter that is more than happy to eat crumbs from the liberal table, so long as they let him sit there and sniff haughtily that things would be better if conservatives were in charge, but secretly happy that he doesn't have to make any hard decisions.

He should stick to writing about baseball.

[LowCountryJoe]

Thoughts on Jonah Goldberg? how about the editorial board of the WSJ?

[EternalVigilance]

The party better stand for liberty first.

In the Declaration, life comes first, then liberty. For very good reason: It is absurd to even have a concern about liberty if some tyrant has already stripped you of your God-given, unalienable right to life. It's moot.

The right to life is NOT a state issue. It is a Preamble, Fifth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment isse. NO STATE has the right to legalize the murder of its citizens.

[EternalVigilance]

The only solution: embracing the 10th amendment -- as Rudi does -- and learning how to deal with the decision of the local people, largely free of the Washington DC leviathan.

This is a man who fails to understand even the most basic things about liberty. Witness his stupid quotes on the subject. They could have been uttered by any totalitarian tyrant in history. He is an enemy of the Second Amendment. Why do you think he will pay any mind to the Tenth? No one else in political life today is. Giuliani would seem to me to be THE least likely candidate to change that trend.

[EternalVigilance]

I agree with your #140 in detail, most particularly the last sentence.

[FreeReign]

The only solution: embracing the 10th amendment -- as Rudi does -- and learning how to deal with the decision of the local people, largely free of the Washington DC leviathan.

Rudy would appoint SC judges who support 10a and who would overturn Roe v. Wade based on such?

Has he made that pledge?

[LowCountryJoe]

Patrick Henry summed up my personal feelings on which the priority should be some two to three years before the Declaration had been written. That's just me, though, you might be different. Could it be possible that we're both right as they pertain to our own preferences?

[FreeReign]

I've said this about George Will many times. Will is what liberals want a conservative to be. An ineffectual bow-tie wearing Poindexter that is more than happy to eat crumbs from the liberal table, so long as they let him sit there and sniff haughtily that things would be better if conservatives were in charge, but secretly happy that he doesn't have to make any hard decisions. He should stick to writing about baseball.

Will plays the conservative part the MSM wants him to play.

His job now is to herd enough Republicans towards Rudy, causing a split of enough consrvatives away from the R party.

[freemike]

Uh, yeah,, nothing more to learn from Reagan. He's old news. Reagan was so last century! He's way back there with Lincoln, and the founders of the country! Nothing to learn from them either! They lived in backward times! We're living in the modern age! Reagan would be lost today! If he were alive he would look out the window and go "Wow, things have changed! I'm out of my league! Nothing I know would work in this modern time! Everyone is so far evolved above me!" We got cell phones and plasma TV's! Hillary?? He wouldn't know what to do! He'd just gaze at her in awe! He would be star dazzled! He would just gaze as though looking at a higher being! Why, he might not even be able to look upon any of our faces, they would shine so much, due to the nature of evolution and our technology! Yep! He is so last century! Sort of like the sun and the sky! Just so ancient and useless!

[servantboy777]

How I long for true statesmen of the caliber of Reagan.

[EternalVigilance]

Patrick Henry summed up my personal feelings on which the priority should be some two to three years before the Declaration had been written. That's just me, though, you might be different. Could it be possible that we're both right as they pertain to our own preferences?

If Patrick Henry could have looked into the future and seen an America that butchered 50 million of its own children...its posterity...he would have been marshalling his forces to go to war.

[LowCountryJoe]

Truthfully, I would rather have a better candidate who wasn't too comfy with gun control. But, he (Rudy) is the best all around candidate that I see at the moment. If the governor of my state were to run for the presidency [on your Marks, get set..], I'd be happier than a pig in sh__ and so would many others, I'd imagine.

[LowCountryJoe]

Truthfully, I would rather have a better candidate who wasn't too comfy with gun control. But, he (Rudy) is the best all around candidate that I see at the moment. If the governor of my state were to run for the presidency [on your Marks, get set..], I'd be happier than a pig in sh__ and so would many others, I'd imagine.

[LowCountryJoe]

Truthfully, I would rather have a better candidate who wasn't too comfy with gun control. But, he (Rudy) is the best all around candidate that I see at the moment. If the governor of my state were to run for the presidency [on your Marks, get set..], I'd be happier than a pig in sh__ and so would many others, I'd imagine.