What do the election results mean to conservatives?

American Thinker ^ | November 09, 2008 | Bruce Walker

[vietvet67]

The results of the 2008 election mean a lot of things to a lot of different people.  What do those results mean to conservatives?  The results do not mean conservative candidates lose elections.  Obama got a big slice of the conservative vote, largely because he portrayed himself as a post-ideological as well as a post-partisan candidate - and McCain tried to do just the same thing.  Ronald Reagan in 1984 was the last man to run as an unabashed conservative, and he won by the last true landslide in an American presidential election.

President Bush, admired for his personal honor and deep faith, was respected by many conservatives, but he was hardly a conservative himself.  No man who nominated Harriett Meiers to the Supreme Court could be considered a true conservative.  Anyone who could embrace the vision of Ted Kennedy for our national education policy was not a true conservative.  Anyone who could create a new entitlement for prescription drugs was not a true conservative.

Bush was simply a decent man who was not a Leftist Democrat.  As McCain found out, being a decent man who is not a Leftist Democrat means nothing at all to the Left.  Both men, like Bob Dole and like George H. Bush, are good Americans, admirable people, and men blissfully unaware that the Left is not just waging battles on issues like more socialism but are rather waging war on our entire way of life.  Bush, Dole, McCain, and Bush Sr. were not wicked failures because they were not conservatives.  They were more like Chamberlain at Munich:  They did not grasp the true depth and nature of their adversary and, they thought, their adversary might be reasonable.

How far have "conservatives" come from Ronald Reagan's famous maxim "If you can't make them see the light, then let them feel the heat."  In other words, conservatives must lead.  Or, as Reagan also said "All they can do is hang us from a higher tree."  This homey, typical truth trumped all the mush of moderation that brought Republicans in such disrepute over the last ten years or so.  Courage is contagious and so is cowardice.  

When Republican "leaders" like Trent Lott sabotaged the impeachment trial of a sitting president because they feared political fallout, conservatives cringed.  We conservatives, after all, do not involve ourselves in the public arena because of the goodies we might get.  That is what Leftists do.  We intend to protect the sacred values of the Declaration of Independence, which are utterly nonpartisan (the founding fathers, of course, dreaded political parties) and we do this recalling that the signers of that document risked all in taking their stand for transcendent liberty.  Ronald Reagan, a Hollywood star with a starlet wife and lots of money, did not enter politics to get but rather to give.  He entered to lead and not to herd.  This is what conservatives used to do.

And this is the way conservatives used to talk:  "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.  Moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."  Barry Goldwater defiantly rejected the idea that Leftists could place him on some invented "Far Right."  He stood for specific things, which he recorded in books, and which represented an actual platform for conservative ideals.  John McCain, the other Republican nominee from Arizona, would never have embraced extremism, even in the defense of liberty.  The soft, warm, middle was his true home.  The safe, predictable consensus was his real party.

He was in the good company of pleasant and worthwhile citizens like Tom Dewey, Wendel Wilkie, Herbert Hoover, and Gerald Ford.  In a world at peace on a planet unscarred by a relentless ideological jihad on our values and our faith, these nice sorts would have made excellent managers of the republic.  But war was declared on us long ago, long before September 11. 

War was declared on us by militant atheists who sought to deconstruct all our values and to mask their crimes as science.  War was declared on us by active, pernicious agents of the Soviet Union who sowed the seeds of racial hatred, gender warfare, and every other discord they could inflame and poison - they were not in the business of calming and healing.  War was declared on us by jealous and irreligious Europeans, who view our faith in anything as hopeless naivete which it is their pleasure to debunk.  War was declared on us by radical Moslems, who saw the version of God which serious Christians and Jews embrace as too loving and too peaceful. 

War was declared on us, and the Left here joined the fight against us.  War was declared on us, and notional "conservatives" tried to lead us.  But, of course, they could not.  While Ronald Reagan embarrassed the establishment by calling the Soviet Union an "Evil Empire," our putative conservative nominee would not even raise the malignancy of Jeremiah Wright.  While Barry Goldwater nobly challenged federal grasping in 1964, his Arizonan successor called for Washington "solutions" to a Washingtonian financial disease forty-four years later.

What does this mean to conservatives?  It means we must choose leaders who believe, even if their cause seems hopeless.  It means that we must recall that liberty was not born in our nation in easy ways but at Valley Forge when Washington saw his men's bloody, frostbitten feet as he contemplated the loss of everything he possessed in life if he were to lose.  It means remembering that Goldwater was routed in 1964, but came back to the Senate in 1968 with everyone - liberals included -- respected his courage and dignity.  It means going back four years to the Reagan Funeral and seeing the long lines of thankful Americans who waited for hours just to say goodbye to the last true leader they had known. 

We have hope now.  Obama cannot end democracy in America and he probably cannot impose a melancholy quasi-official censorship.  Obama can only assume total responsibility for what happens to us over the next two years.  Please, conservatives, resist compromise!  Make stands upon principle, like Reagan and Goldwater.  Take the heart of Washington, the true leader of all conservatives, in fighting for what we believe even if the outcome is uncertain and the struggle is long.  Contemplate Churchill in 1940, when he promised to resist rather than parlay with evil. 

If we believe in God, then hope is ever certain.  If we hold sure and proven laws of human experience, then we know that failed ideas in practice also fail.  If we believe in the spirit of the American people and their nation, then we sense that though change comes in elections, the liberty to which we have become accustomed longer than any people in human history cannot be simply crushed. 

We fight -- even today -- for our lives and the lives of our children.  If we have not had leaders, we must find them.  Victory may seem far off.  But we can see it still.  As another American wrote almost two hundred years ago:  "Oh, say does that Star Spangled Banner still wave?  Ore the land of the free, and the home of the brave."  Francis Scott Key, like George Washington, were models of what conservative leaders must be.  We had these men once, and we shall have them again. 

Bruce Walker is the author of  Sinisterism: Secular Religion of the Lie, and the recently published book, The Swastika against the Cross: The Nazi War on Christianity.

[vietvet67]

Yup. Obama was our wake up call.

Hopefully we’ll answer the phone..

[hershey]

It means that conservatives should cultivate, encourage, and if need be educate Gov. Palin. The country will call on her, and she will respond. In the meantime, dems, Libs, and the MSM won’t forget her. They’ll run at least one story a day in which she’s portrayed as a dolt or worse. Clearly the idea is to make her such an object of disgust that she won’t dare surface on the national stage again, and we have to make sure that doesn’t happen.

[randita]

I read a breakdown of the election which surveyed people’s stands on issues and how they broke.

Those opposed to the Iraq War broke 9 to 1 for Obama.

Even people concerned about the economy split their votes pretty closely.

[AMNZ]

Friends in New Zealand are celebrating, telling me
“New Zealand got it right, U.S. got it wrong!”
NO MORE HELEN!

[freeangel]

If it doesn’t end up killing us, it should make us stronger.

[hflynn]

2010 will seem to be a century away.

[relictele]

When Republican "leaders" like Trent Lott sabotaged the impeachment trial of a sitting president because they feared political fallout, conservatives cringed.

Political fallout ?!?!? What better political opportunity is there than to cast out a president who is a member of the opposition?

[NCjim]

We MUST fix the Republican primaries -

1. They MUST be closed so that we alone control our destiny.

2. The early ones CANNOT be held in traditionally Liberal/Democrat states.

Otherwise we will get middle-of-the-road or worse candidates. And we’ve seen how successful RINOs are for us. Not! We need to purge the Republican Party and rid ourselves of the enemy within

[Edit35]

“What does the election mean for conservatives (or the GOP)?”

It means, as shallow as it sounds, that we MUST put forth ONLY articulate candidates who are interesting, dynamic, and can string two sentences together while explaining the benefits to America from strong conservatism.

All McCain said over and over and over is “Sen. Obama is liberal ....” or some such inane statement which NO ONE CARES about... not even a staunch conservative like me.

No one even knows what “liberal” means.... or “conservative” for that matter.

Voters didn’t reject the GOP because of conservatism.

They rejected the idea of a boring, frumpy, nasal-sounding, short (shallow but true), 72-year-old geezer who has been in Washington and on our TVs for so long everyone is bored to tears.

With McCain at the top of the ticket, ALL REPUBLICANS down the line were tagged with being loser boring same old same old candidates.

The GOP has a baaaad habit of giving deference to the oldsters in the party.... instead of allowing the young, strong dynamic candidates to step up to the plate.

It goes back to our conservative cultural upbringing in which we respect age, unlike liberal Democrats who laugh at and deride older folks.

Well, in national politics America DOES need a younger leader with pizazz .... no more BobDole’s or JohnMcCain’s.

Analysis Over....

[raybbr]

I’m thinking of all those guys who walk around having to hold their pants up with one hand and vote for Obama with the other.

I saw a woman leading her son into my polling place. He's one of those people who wear slippers all the time. Clearly mentally challenged. I guarantee he didn't vote for McCain.

[Taichi]

I believe there were some soft conservatives, people who have basic conservative idesa, who did indeed vote for Obama. They weren’t trying to betray a conservative ideology they simply looked at the alternatives and realized Gov Palin was the only one and she was running for VP. She is in fact the person I voted for and would willingly vote for her again or Gov Jindal.
That is the point of the piece, we have to support the true conservative, we have to find those people willing to lead, not necessarily another Reagan or a Goldwater, but a true conservative who puts the country and freedom ahead of everything else.
The facts are that Obama won because conservative either voted for him or stayed home to avoid voting for McCain, a de-facto vote for Obama, our task now is to give those people someone to believe in.

[wally_bert]

I am all for your ideas but how do we get the terminally ingorant leader types to go along with them?

[saganite]

I’m pretty sure they really mean Republicans when they say conservative since they prefer to lump us all together.

[sickoflibs]

RE “Name ONE REAL conservative that voted for the MARXIST?? Just ONE”

I voted fot McC one hour before poll closed but knew he lost and was relieved . Our only choice as a party R cannot keep going on down the path GWB has taken us with federal power, federal spending, borrowing, takeovers, and the stimulus welfare checks. He as leader was killing ANY conservative ideals and demoralizing us daily.

On the other side Pelosi Obama are the masters of cynical power politics. In 1995 republicans tried to fix things, democrats demonized Newt for deficit fixing bills, and now take credit for the Clinton economy and balanced budget. Pelosi took congress in 07 like with 95 and tried to do very little on purpose, send GWB huge spending bills loaded with crap, get him to sign them, blame them as part of Bush economy, deficit, but take credit for any handouts .

You see? We need to:

1) Clean house , principled votes, strategy
2) master cynical politics to lower dems approval(ever hear Bush say Pelosi economy???). I have a number of ideas on this.
3) Positive vision, what we will fix, what we offer

[joesbucks]

Ronald Reagan was one in a million. But while he allowed a social conservative platform, he himself never really advocated a social conservative position.

[NCjim]

That is indeed a challenge, and will be impossible unless we finally decide to win. I am praying that the ‘leaders’ of our Party will grow some. We need more fresh air like Palin but it will be an uphill battle. Just look at what the Party is doing to her - no wonder good candidates just say “no thank you”.

[Erik Latranyi]

Yup. Obama was our wake up call.

Hopefully we’ll answer the phone..

Is it 3am?

[bankcritic]

I agree, this is pretty much exactly what happened. McCain was not a good speaker at all and didn’t articulate why his stances were good for Americans. In 2000 Bush ran on a really conservative platform (no war, budget responsibility, lower taxes) and people really liked it, unfortunatly events didn’t quite turn out that he could follow through on his platform, but it would still have resonated with people in this cycle (Ron Paul ran on that platform but got sidelined by the MSM, he still had a lot of support among the grass roots though, I maintain that if it had been a younger, better looking man (or woman for that matter) running on that platform you’d have a different election result today). The Republican Party needs leadership that can actually get the point across to the people, not an old man who fumbled his way through the election cycle losing support every time he opened his mouth.

[outofstyle]

Name ONE REAL conservative that voted for the MARXIST?? Just ONE.

I think this is a great article. Your rhetorical question exposes the one misstatement in it. It appears that many people who identified themselves as conservatives did in fact vote for "the MARXIST." These are probably the same people who voted for Reagan because he was likable and witty. These are the undecided voters that must be persuaded every year.

The author made the point that we must choose leaders who are committed conservatives. The corollary is that, if we are to win, we need to find a conservative who is likable and charismatic as well. This is a sad fact.

[Condor51]

'What do the election results mean to conservatives?'

Uh.. Buy more guns and ammo.

(do I get a Gold Star now?)