Posted on 08/29/2010 9:24:21 PM PDT by Lorianne
You're not going to want to hear this.
Nonetheless, you have to.
If you want to win - indeed, if you want to make any sort of serious inroad into the American Political Process, you need to read this, you need to listen, and you need to adopt this path.
If you do not, you will be marginalized into irrelevance, no matter what else you do.
Here it is:
You must discard - intentionally - all "wedge issues" as points of debate, discussion, or campaigning. You know what these issues are - they fall broadly into the category of religion in one form or another.
These are issues such as abortion and gay rights (in all it's forms, including marriage debates), but is by no means limited to these two. In short, if there's a religious basis for your position, you must not campaign on it, and indeed you must pointedly refuse to discuss it.
The Tea Party began as a protest over bailouts and handouts - that is, theft and corruption within our markets, government and economy. This is a winning position with 90% of the American Body Politic.
Any candidate who runs on these issues - and these issues alone, promising to stop it and lock up the scammers - all of them - wins.
As soon as you bring the other issues that everyone wants to talk about into this, you will lose.
Here's why.
These are called "wedge issues" for a reason.
What you personally believe is irrelevant to the political process. These issues are used by the two main political parties to get the electorate to divide on a 50/50 basis - thus leaving them having to persuade exactly one person of their position on some other issue to win.
You cannot win such a contest. At best you can force one of the other parties - the one that most agrees with you - to lose. The reason is simple - you will split that half of the electorate, which means the other party - the one that disagrees with your position on those issues - wins the election.
Drill this into your head folks:
If you allow these issues to become part of your campaign, you will not only lose you will cause the party that most-agrees with you to lose.
I know this is going to be unpopular, but it needs to be said. I've seen this happening in some of the local Tea Party groups, and it saddens me. The local Niceville branch here featured people talking about "natural law" as an important qualifying factor for political candidacy, as just one of many examples. There were times I felt like I had walked into a Baptist sermon.
The Tea Party and other political expressions like it are, of course, free to run on whatever platform they'd like, and to back candidates based on whatever they'd like. But if you're going to do this, then you'd be wise to try to take over the Republican Party instead of being "independent" or any other sort of "outside" influence, because it is the only way you can win with this approach.
The Tea Party infiltrating The Republican establishment is a long shot. Witness John McCain, who made a campaign spectacle out of bailing out the banks. How's JD Hayworth doing in challenging him? He lost, right? How'd that happen? The same way it always happens: Hayworth let the campaign's terms include those wedge issues, and then got tattoed by the guy with the bigger warchest and the ability to threaten people politically.
You either change the terms of the debate and the issues upon which the election is decided or you lose.
It's that simple.
(excerpted)
You seem to be talking about a broader scope of social conservatives, which translated means people of varying backgrounds with a similar mindset and similar goals.
No problem, just maybe I don’t want to attend your church. You OK with that?
I don’t believe in forcing anyone to be part of any religion LOL
Not saying that. That's for the primaries.
I'm saying nationalize the congressional races around the economy, small government, liberty, throw out Pelosi and Reid, dump Obamacare etc.
Run on the issues that have the best chance of landslide win.
Then you’re my kind of people. ;-)
Why do they have to mutually exclusive?
When you win you can control the agenda. As we all know now governing from a place with no power is not fun.
Whose version of Jesus Christ? Judaism’s? Thomas Aquinas’s? King James’s? Mohammed’s? Benny Hinn’s?
With RINOs controlling the agenda? No thanks. Been there, done that. Wouldn’t want to repeat it.
NO MORE RINOS!!
VOTE THE BASTARDS OUT!!
Rebellion is brewing!!
First, I just used abortion as an example of a wedge issue.
Second, you can’t elect someone who just stands for one idea, and doesn’t touch the rest. How the hell can you trust they will do what you want when they DO have to deal with the issues they never talked about during the campaign?
You know they will be asked questions about controversial issues and how they would handle them. They will either look like moronic democrats do when they give non-answers and stammer and stutter and deflect to another issue they DO want to talk about. Or they will eventually answer the question more or less, and bam! now your unity is gone.
All I am saying is the Tea Party, if it wants to avoid appearing this way, they need to become either a 1-issue advocacy group (which if you believe maximizing the common-ness and appeal to the broadest range of people) or you need to be more like a political party and have all the related ideas that the Tea Party touches on and have real beliefs and have real plans as to how to implement your plans when elected.
You can’t have such a group that exists that doesn’t offend people. You can’t have a group that is 100% in agreement in all ideas and issues.
to me it makes more sense to keep the message simple and strong and focused. It makes more sense for the Tea Party to advocate for just one central theme, that of constitutionally-restrained government in all 3 branches of the federal government.
Nice try at deflection, but I’ll go with Jesus Christ’s Jesus Christ.
We’re to read the word, not take the ravings of men.
He declared himself to be the only way, and then proved it.
We either proclaim him as he presented himself, or we are not his. There is no option to keep it hidden.
.
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness applies to every American. These are the "unalienable rights" and just because you and the radical left have decided an unborn baby is a nuisance does not mean you can deny them these "unalienable rights".
“I don’t care if someone is a flaming whatever that supports abortion and gay marriage, if they will vote against big government and throw the bums out in November, I welcome their vote.”
I agree in principle, much as Reagan felt when he said that he could be friends with anyone who agreed with him on 70% of the issues (bad paraphrasing on my part).
But your examples of abortion and gay marriage aren’t likely to be championed by anyone who’d vote against big government, as most (if not all) supporters of those policies WANT big government, to mandate their legality nationally rather than letting the individual states decide.
To win we should focus on the issue that unites the greatest number in opposing our common enemy.
Yep , that’s how it works. If we loos this time we TOTALLY loose the country. We better get together on a few main issues and stick together. They will do ANYTHING to stay in power. Starting in fighting between Tea Party groups is on the agenda , I can assure you of that.
Dangerous times are coming . The radical left will stop at nothing , even creating a national crisis to implement marshal law and postpone elections. If we start to bicker over 2nd tier issues we’ll loose everything
To hell with that noise. That kind of thinking is what got us here. If you don’t support the Republican platform you’re a RINO. Look it up. Small government, fiscal responsibility, God, family, country. It’s all there. Those who are ashamed, embarrassed or just don’t want to support it are RINOs and do not deserve our support. If they can’t support the GOP platform they cannot be trusted to defend our rights.
I am not ashamed or embarrassed about supporting God, family, country. Those who are can KMA as they exit FR!!
Rebellion is brewing!!
By the way, the cowards who cannot support Life & Liberty are not tea partiers. They are pushing the RINO/liberal anti-Christianity agenda. Eff ‘em. The tea party doesn’t need them. We’re getting along fine WITHOUT their advice!!
Give me a break!! The tea party is doing fine!! We don’t need a bunch of weak-kneed sissy cowards screwing it up now!! RINOs and their enablers can KMA!!
That's the challenge, yes, well put.
I think: The hard-core on this as a single-issue is small and we won't get their vote in any case. Beyond this is a spectrum. Or goal is to get as many votes as possible from this spectrum. The more we appeal to freedom and economics and common ground critical issues, the better chance we have. The more we blow up on wedge issues, the less chance we have.
To me it's coalescing around the big important issues, nationalizing them and staying on message. Our opponents will try to knock us off by thwarting this - because it is our best strategy for defeating them.
Got news for all you weak sisters. The tea party doers not have any organization, no structure, no leaders, and no one setting the agenda. It’s a leaderless mass of concerned citizens fighting to take our country back from the godless liberals and RINOs. Tea partiers know that our rights come from God, not man or government and it is through God that we will restore them. I’ve attended over a hundred tea parties all over the country and every Christian speaker that took the stage with a Christian message was enthusiastically received. Tea parties are for God, family, country!! We don’t need a bunch of whiny cowards to come in at this late date to try to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory! The tea party is doing fine without your cowardly advice!!
Damn the RINO naysayers, full steam ahead!!
Rebellion is brewing!!
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Fiscal conservativism without social conservative principles is not only not winnable, it isn't do-able. Only a fantasy in peoples' minds. Principles, character and morals are the foundation of human civilization. Capitalism without any morality is crapitalism - "made in China". Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness is based on God given principles. Read his comments.
Thanks for the ping. This is a very important discussion.
I’m a tea partier myself, and I wasn’t giving advice to the tea party - other than saying I’m against any hierarchy, national leadership, co-opting by parties, etc. I hope it stays local and grass roots.
I’m talking about the coming election and nationalizing the message, looking for a winning strategy. I don’t equate the Tea Party with the GOP and don’t wish to. I hope Tea Party candidates and workers take over the GOP, but it’s still two different things.
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