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On the other hand, those of us who support Rick Santorum need to stop acting as if everything Gingrich has done has been a disaster. He deserves credit, as C. Edmund Wright correctly said, for the 1994 election takeover of the House of Representatives. Virtually **NOBODY** thought there was the remotest possibility of that happening. We're so used to the idea now that Republicans don't have to be a permanent minority working out coalitions with conservative Democrats to get to 50 percent margins that we've forgotten that Gingrich **DOES** deserve credit for a massive victory that upended virtually all of modern House of Representatives history. Gingrich opened the door to an ideologically based two-party system in the House rather than the older de-facto three-party system of coalition “go along to get along” politics we had for many years in the House of Representatives. Greatly reducing the old Southern Democrats as a political force is something for which Gingrich deserves great credit.

That sir, is the most reasonable post to me from any Santorum supporter during this entire process. In fact, if so many of the Santorum supporters, including RS himself, didn't walk around acting like that never happened, there would be a helluva lot less venom between the two sides. RS has criticized Newt about 100 fold that Newt has criticized RS - and that has indeed burnt the rear ends of many Newt supporters over the course of the campaign.

On that common ground you stated above however, you and I will get along great even in disagreement.

That would be an exceedingly bad outcome if we destroyed two flawed but acceptable conservative candidates and got a nominee who is much worse than either of them.

As far as this statement goes, I'll agree with it too.

Unfortunately the only time I see it lofted is when Santorum supporters finally stand up and start playing by the same rules Newt's supporters have been living by.

I can enter a thread where folks are trashing Santorum, and bring up things about Newt, only to have the Newt supporters tell me we shouldn't be attacking each other.

Say what?

And then there's the issue of one candidate who claims certain things that simply are not true.

One guy trashes Reagan for eight years, then claims he's the heir of Reagan's legacy. One guy actually claims to be that heir, after claiming the Reagan Legacy is dead. One guy claims this candidate saved the U. S. $5 Trillion because he wrote the Contract with America. The Contract with America was written by someone else, with input from a number of politicians in the Republican party, including that one candidate. And the United States only realized about $1.5 trillion during that time frame. And then one of his supporters claims that the Tea Party founding documents were based on a candidates Contract with America, when he didn't write it. And then this team thinks we shouldn't address things from his past. Don't make false claims and expect them to get a free pass. Sorry folks, if candidates want free passes, they shouldn't make false claims, and send their supporters out to trash other candidates.

107 posted on Tuesday, March 13, 2012 2:14:57 PM by C. Edmund Wright: “That sir, is the most reasonable post to me from any Santorum supporter during this entire process.”

Thank you also, sir... and I mean it.

I truly do believe that conservatives in this campaign run a deadly risk of biting and devouring each other to the point that we all lose.

I know it's hard for us as conservatives to compromise because we, unlike the liberals, really do believe in absolute truth. But if we don't do something very soon we have a disaster coming down the road — we as conservatives **MUST** find a way to accept half a loaf rather than seeing the whole loaf destroyed.

To DoughtyOne, I agree with your perspective as well. There is a contingent of people here on Free Republic who I think love to yell and scream and enjoy fighting — it's not most of the people and probably is a small minority, but it's a significant group because of their volume level. Rick Santorum was not their first target; other candidates have suffered from that same treatment. Well, there's a time and a place for that, and that time is when we're fighting the Democrats, not each other!

Rational debate has a place. Personal attacks do not; they simply embitter people who we need to be able to work with to win this fall.

I realize there has been fault on all sides. I'm not going to get into “he started it first” or “he said worse things than me.”

What I am going to say is it needs to stop or we're going to get Romney, and then we risk getting Obama re-elected.

Not one of us on Free Republic wants that, except maybe a few paid Democratic operatives or Romneybots who are trying to stir stuff up. I think most regular posters here can be taken at face value, so let's stop doing Mitt Romney's work for him by trashing each other, and focus instead on rational reasons to vote for one candidate or the another.

Mitt Romney has plenty of money. He doesn't need our unpaid volunteer help to destroy his opponents.

Since I live in Missouri, I have a caucus this Saturday; Republicans have rented the second-largest off-post venue in the Fort Leonard Wood area. I will go to a Republican club meeting tonight after a local planning and zoning commission adjourns that I need to cover. I live in a county that's known for bitter and divisive bare-knuckle politics, and I am grateful to say that we're not seeing **ANYTHING** in public meetings or private discussions like what I see in the broader Republican Party. I guess maybe we're doing something right in my county, and it's been a long time since I've been able to say that.