Posted on 06/22/2002 9:46:05 AM PDT by quidnunc
This summer will mark the 47th year since I took my first Republican job: as public relations director for the party in Minnesota. Since then I have rarely strayed from politics, or my party. I served as a staffer to two GOP congressmen, to a GOP governor, as a federal appointee to Richard Nixon and as a corporate executive who supported in Washington and Springfield much, if not all, of the Republican agenda.
You can describe me as a conservative. Thus I am qualified to say that although I dearly love conservatives, they tend to be querulous, disagreeable and threaten revolt when Republican office-holders don't please them. So it is now with George W. Bush. Here is a president who has surprised us all with the firmness and resolve he showed after 9/11. I must tell you I voted for him with less enthusiasm than I had for many of his predecessors. But his administration has pleased me often — most notably on two issues: defense of America and social policy.
Yet, Bush has to get re-elected in a country that is evenly divided on philosophy. Thus he must occasionally — on matters that sometimes offend conservatives — dip into the other side's ideology for support. He has done so on three notable occasions: on the issue of steel protectionism, where he departed his free-market proclamations; on the signing of a campaign finance bill tailored by his enemies, and allowing his attorney general (in the words of Libertarian Nat Hentoff in the Washington Times) "to send disguised agents into religious institutions, libraries and meetings of citizens critical of government policy without a previous complaint, or reason to believe that a crime has been committed."
In a perfect political world, where conservatives are in the majority, these things would be sufficient to encourage a boycott of the polls. Either that or a protest vote for the Democratic opposition. But we are not in a perfect world. We conservatives have a president who didn't receive a majority of the votes, and has one house of Congress against him. He must make compromises to get re-elected. Conservatives who do not understand the nature of politics ought to stay in their air-conditioned ivory towers and refrain from political activity altogether. If they cannot adjudge the stakes in this election and the difference between Bush and an Al Gore or a John Kerry (D-Mass.) or a Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.), they are foolish indeed.
-snip-
To read the remainder of this op/ed open the article via the link provided in the thread's header.
It has to turn out this way because one of the two sides can't accept the fact that Bush does leftist things from time to time. Rather than admit reality and deal with it they twist everything in knots and call everyone names.
I don't care if the odds are fifty to one those who support Bush and slam us for supporting Pat, it doesn't make what Bush is doing right. If it were 50,000 Bush supporters to one Buchanan supporter, it still wouldn't make what Bush is doing right.
The first rule of civility is dealing with reality when you talk to others. Good luck with the supporters of the President. He is neither as good as they say, or as bad as some on our side say. But this man is not a conservative. He is a moderate to a leftward leaning individual. That's the way it is no matter how man putdowns can be mustered in the next thousand posts.
No my man wasn't elected in the year 2000. But if he had been, I'd have held his toes to the fire if he'd have pulled half the stuff Bush has. I can guarantee you that. I have taken him to task over his comments on the vote in Florida and issues concerning the middle-east. I have yet to see the Bush people deal with reality. Sad.
Touchy.
Wit is something I don't associate with you tpain. Nor intelligence either. But i do get a chuckle at your astounding stupidity and ability to step in crap at every turn.
I'm not trying to be picky, but I don't want him cast in a bad light either.
Hmm seems you have a statist streak of "Do as I say, not as I do".
Now, now, you are talking to a "real conservative" here. He has the "constitution" and is NOT afraid to use it. LOL
Complete BS
OK Tex. Since you failed to answer my question, along with Jim, and since you now shifted from the question, I will answer yours. We here in California did indeed have a plan called Proposition 187. The federal government stepped in and burned our ballots and declared our election unconstitutional. You know the rest.
Our government and it's globalist leaders have no desire to limit, or stop, secure, or end this titanic invasion of millions. They may put window dressing on it from time to time, but their real agenda is to eliminate our sovereighty, and our borders. This much is pretty clear to most.
For example, to this day, our government is allowing in almost 8,000 Middle Eastern men on visas into our country EVERY MONTH.
In light of all this, it's my opinion that when the American people have hadenuf of this open border madness, and this continued invasion of millions, and when it becomes volatile enough, only then will something happen.
As I stated initially, there are very few or no Republicans or Democrats standing behind Tancredo, and vocally expressing outrage at this insanity. And many on this forum and elsewhere, now attempt to drown out the dying voice of our independence and sovereignty.
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