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.
Maybe you guys could take it on the road. Just imagine what you could do if you added tpaine? Smart, Paine and the Ass......Smart Pain in......well you get it.
Only problem is that you would spend all your time apologizing for your partners.
Sorry Tpaine but you are just a convenient target. Nothing more.
I disagree. I got the heave ho when I wrote an article predicting that Congress would use the events of 9/11 to encroach upon our freedoms.
I was re-instated finally but I still have emails from PTB calling me a traitor for daring to suggest that Bush or the republicans would do such a thing.
I'm not alone. This kind of "shaping" is destructive to free speech and the principles that make a "Free Republic."
We also agree about the judicial excesses being engaged in with Jose Padilla.
I heard a Colonel for the USMC (ret.) who is now a professor of law in Georgetown University (how's THAT for a resume???) on the radio today. He specializes in Military Law. He was aghast at the bizarre contortions the US govt is engaged in to hold him, indefinitely, without charges. Looks like we are in some pretty good company.
Spoken with all the sincerity of a gentleman and scholar. LOL
I am stuck on BandAids.
What authority? A bottle of Shiner Bock?
Ironword.
Nay. It wouldn't work, Southflanknorthpawsis. That coalition would be over in a NY minute!
Get a room.
Yes it has been...but it's now Monday and I'm beat.
Sleep well...MUD
Ahh the DOG hikes his leg. LOL
We have a forum.
We're exhibitionists, when it comes to liberty.
Yeah I have seen their character references for you.
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