Posted on 01/07/2008 2:03:00 PM PST by jmc813
There’s an obnoxious and destructive term that’s begun to do real damage to the Republican Party. That term is “RINO,” or “R.I.N.O.” – an acronym for “Republican In Name Only.” Angry conservatives use the term to attack purported moderates in their own party. Recently, Mike Huckabee and John McCain have been attacked as “RINO’s” –Governor Schwarzenegger of California regularly draws that denunciation. Those who make war on RINO’s, however, ought to confront an obvious question: would you really prefer that such people drop the Republican designation? How does it help if politicians or office-holders with whom you disagree leave your party and join the opposition? When alleged “RINO” Jim Jeffords of Vermont left the GOP and joined the Democrats, it gave them control of the US Senate. When another RINO, Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, lost his Senate seat in 2006, it also gave the Democrats control; if Chafee had won, we’d still have a Republican majority and GOP committee chairs. The truth is that no successful political party has ever been built on ideological purity. You can construct a majority coalition by bringing people into your party, not by driving them away. It’s childish and self-destructive to wage war based on some notion of “real conservatism” with those who want to align themselves with your side. Ronald Reagan himself used to say that “if somebody agrees with me 70% of the time, rather than 100%, that doesn’t make him my enemy.” Democrats understand this principle--- they never attack “DINO’s,” Democrats In Name Only. In fact, they understand the usefulness of such figures: they put forward several conservative Democrats in key Congressional districts in 2006, and those “DINO’s” helped them win a majority in the House. If Republicans continue to express contempt and hostility for those they consider “RINO’s,” they’ve got to get ready for “DIMO’s” – Democrats In the Majority Only.” It’s time, in other words, for sane GOP partisans to call off the silly and suicidal RINO hunt.
Whew.... I like Michael but he really jumped the shark here.
If you have to abandon most of the planks of your party platform, what have you built?
Welcome to FR.
In fact, every time I call him out on an open thread for being a troll he quits posting on that thread for awhile. Hmmmmm......
Right now, I don't see any difference between Ahnold and Bustmente. I'd rather have voted McClintock just as now I'd rather vote Hunter. But this is not an Ahnold thread so we'll have to save it for another, more appropriate thread.
Nuff said!
If you watch barryg he runs around on threads pushing one guy, dissing another. Anything to to cause trouble.
He needs to get a new schtick. Where is the Viking kitties these days?
How does it do us any good to have Republicans that are liberals and Democrats that are conservative???
Limbaugh says "moderates" are liberals... I agree with Limbaugh...
I love that. And you probably cry the loudest when you lose, too. Because alot of us "yo-yo"s won't bother to vote for liberals with "R" behind their names. So you and Hugh Hewitt can push liberal "Republicans" if you wish. You ain't the pied piper and I won't be following. But, at least you can be a smug loser.
I don’t mind RINO’s when they get elected from liberal states (where the Dems would have won if they didn’t run). I do mind when they open their mouth and start denunciating the commander-in-chief, and actively try to sink conservatives, like Jeffords did.
For President or other executive office, there is no way I would support a RINO. Look at the damage Arnold did to the Republican party in California. Look at the damage that George Ryan did to the Republican party in Illinois. If liberalism is to be advanced by the President, I don’t want that president to be a Republican. At least let the consequences of liberalism befall a Democrat! If Jimmy Carter were a Republican, would that make any of us feel better about his policies?
That is it in a nutshell. Him and all the other beltway boys...
If the GOP gives me some apologist for illegals in the general election, I will write in "Bullwinkle" and leave the Republican party... and no, faggots can't get married either...
The point I was making is that when Lieberman deviated from the Rat dogma, they threw him to the wolves.
I don't know. I tried to get the mods to notice but I didn't get very far. :^(
With his support of the Bush amnesty plan, Medved showed himself to be intellectually dishonest and no longer worth listening to. A man with as supposedly an encyclopedic mind and knowledge of history as Medved has would know that another amnesty in 2007 would be just another ring of the dinner bell for the worlds poor, the same thing we stupidly did in 1986. Since Medved clearly knows this, he is a liar, and I've stopped listening to him. Morevoer, Mikey, (if he were still honest) would know from history that whenever this country's conservative party strayed from its principles, it sickened and died, exactly what's happening to the GOP today. (History repeats itself, Mikey, and it t'aint pretty.)
Yep.
I agree. Sorry if I misunderstood. But Medved is hard center/soft liberal on many issues, amnesty to name one.
If he’d said we need to stop criticizing and denouncing those who slightly disagree with us, I’d say he was right. But what he’s saying is that we shouldn’t be labeling and denouncing those who claim to be of our ideology...but whose words and deeds directly conflict with the tenets of that ideology...just because of the label (Republican) that they wear. Not only is Medved being hypocritical, being a conservative MEANS standing on principle. It is the left who will elect anyone who can bring them power, regardless of word vs. deed. That’s why NOW never condemned Slick Willy or demanded an investigation into the accusations of harassment and outright rape.
If a ‘conservative’ is going to stand up and say we need to socialize our economy because it’s the conservative, Christian thing to do, he’s going to hear it from me, loud and clear, denouncing and repudiating both claims.
What, exactly did the DemocRATS win? They have accomplished zilch towards their agenda.
If McCain and Huckabee were in their natural party, the Democrats, we would be facing the prospect of a President McCain or a President Huckabee as a worst case scenario instead of a best case scenario. Then it would be Republicans who could crossover and vote for the rinocrat to help undermine the Democrat Party instead of vice versa.
Also, our Republican senators and representatives will rubber stamp the liberal agendas of a rino president when they would have to stand in the way of a Democrat president offering up the same liberalism just to keep the Republican voters back home happy.
Ted Kennedy and John Kerry would be thrilled to change their party affiliation to Republican if we let them. It would guarantee that a true conservative will never hold those seats in the Senate. Any of the liberal Democrats would gladly do that. Would they be RINOs if we let them do that, Medved?
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