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.
Buchanan didn't even come close, but there are "idolity" threads that pop up when he releases one of his 1,000 page books.
Like I said before, "it all depends on whose ox is being gored".
Somewhere I have a copy of "The Late Great State of California", an anti-Reagan book from when he was Governor.
You stated that perfectly!
Didn't you know this is now called GWBushRepublic? (The site formerly known as FreeRepublic.com just wasn't catchy enough...)
My bad.
Kind of like it was in the Soviet Union, eh? You *will* vote, and these are the candidates you will vote for -- all of which have already been carefully screened.
Tuor
Give me liberty or give me death.
Yes, Luis, of course, we are entering a time of unparalleled technological advances in our brave new world. Our technology will solve all the problems of the world, and the world will worship at our feet. We will overcome all, and our like has never before been seen in the world.
I used to feel the same way. On Sept. 11, 2001, my view on that issue changed.
This is a MYTH! The country is conservative. The 1994 Congressional election and Reagan's two landslide victories proved it.
"Thus he must occasionally--on matters that sometimes offend conservatives--dip into the other side's ideology for support.
Doesn't work. Triangulation works for Democrats, because the country is basically conservative. Those on the left really have no where else to go. The last election was the first in which this is not true. Bush lost the popular vote by a wide margin. He scraped out an electoral victory only because Nader took enough votes away from Gore. Liberals, Nader, and Democrats are not likely to make this mistake in the 2004 election. If Nader runs, he won't get many votes and is unlikely to hand the election to Republcans as he did in 2000. Triangulation and running on a moderate or left leaning platform is the kiss of death for Republicans. It is precisely why they have remained the stupid and the minority party. When you lose your base, you lose the election.
"He must make compromises to get re-elected."
This is the tried and true formula that the Democrats and the media have repeatedly used to get the Republican to commit political hari-kari. It always leads to eventual Republican losses. If not in the current election, then invariably in the subsequent election when the conservative base is disillusioned and stays home or votes for other third parties. Contrary to his comment ("protest vote for the Democratic opposition"), I think it is rare when true conservatives are capable of voting for a Democrat in this day and age. Don't fall for this stuff Freepers. Even if you are inclined to accept it or even believe it yourself; it is flat wrong. Never compromise principles. Good intentions pave the road to hell, not the highway to success. Just as you recognize the counterfeit nature of the "compassionate conservative", moderates and liberals recognize and prefer the real mcCoy when voting their socialistic preferences. Conservatives don't trust luke-warm conservatives and so-called moderates and liberals don't either. Half-hearted conservatives lose the conservative vote and they don't get the moderate or liberal vote. This is a dead-wrong losing strategy. Conservatives only win when they run on an aggressively conservative platform. The reason we don't win more elections, is because the media keeps convincing Republicans to adopt this very strategy.
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