Posted on 02/16/2007 8:30:44 AM PST by meg88
The GOP Should Dump Its Litmus Test By Michael Reagan FrontPageMagazine.com | February 16, 2007
The philosopher Diogenes is said to have wandered around ancient Greece holding a lantern and seeking to find an honest man.
My fellow Republicans, sans lanterns, are now wandering around the political landscape seeking to find the perfect Republican presidential candidate.
I don’t know if Diogenes ever found that honest man, but I do know that those Republicans are never going to find the perfect candidate, simply because he does not exist.
Some Republicans insist that the only perfect candidate would be a clone of my Dad, Ronald Reagan. Aside from the fact that there is no such thing, it’s important to recognize that Ronald Reagan, as he often admitted, was anything but perfect.
One of the criticisms about former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney focuses on his record concerning the abortion issue. We are told by the modern day Diogenes clones that he can’t be trusted to fight abortion because he once, more or less, supported a woman’s right to butcher her baby.
It may come as a surprise to these purists, but Ronald Reagan once supported abortion too. Yet nobody ever questioned his strong pro-life credentials after his conversion to Republicanism. They accepted his sincerity. Why can’t they accept Mitt Romney’s?
Romney’s record shows he should be totally acceptable to all conservatives, yet because of one dubious question concerning the validity of his conversion to the pro-life side, he is deemed unsuitable to carry the conservative banner.
The same is true of Rudy Giuliani. On every major issue, he is a solidly conservative and extraordinarily adept executive, but because he backs abortion and some form of gun control, America’s mayor -- the hero of 9/11 and the man who did the impossible by cleaning up New York -- is all but ruled out as a 2008 candidate.
Not one of the major candidates is free of some real or imagined flaw that offends some conservatives.
This is madness, and if it does not stop, the GOP is going to lose the presidential election in 2008. In the search for the perfect candidate we are going to end up with an imperfect candidate. Keep in mind the truism that agreement with someone on most issues and disagreement on others is seen as normal, but should you agree with someone on every single issue imaginable … well… to put it plainly, psychologists say you’re nuts.
I recently got a letter from a conservative Christian organization that asked me if the current GOP candidates are the best the Republican Party has to offer.
“Is it possible that GOP conservative ranks are this thin?” the letter writer asked. “Has the GOP nothing better to offer? Should not pro-family pro-life voters also want a low taxes and limited government candidate before they vigorously support him? Increased taxes and expanded government hurts everyone. Was Ronald Wilson Reagan an anomaly and did he represent the values of his party?
“These GOP candidates,” the letter instructed me, “are little better than Bob Dole, Gerald Ford, or [George] H.W. Bush. Did anyone notice they all lost?”
This makes me wonder if anybody can stand up to the litmus test these people are applying to candidates.
Ronald Reagan had one litmus test he applied to candidates. Were they Republicans? If they were he backed them all the way. He would let the party choose the candidate and he would support and vote for the candidate. He didn’t go sniffing around trying to find some flaw in their character or their past. Once nominated, they were his choice.
And nobody was more candid in admitting that he was anything but perfect than my Dad. He knew that like all men, he had his flaws and he spent a lifetime combating them. Had today’s GOP litmus test been seriously applied to him, he could not have passed the test.
The Democrats don’t have litmus tests. If the nominee is a Democrat, they support their candidate all the way, and if they lose it isn’t because they didn’t fight like demons for their man or woman.
If we want to win in 2008, Republicans had better wake up, and quit talking Ronald Reagan and start being like Ronald Reagan.
The bottom line is destroying the DNAZI.
Then we can worry about third parties and litmus tests.
I have a hard time keeping track of them all, myself. I'm tempted to start a searchable database, but I'd have scaling issues.
As for the gun grabbers doing "nothing" on gun control, you're already behind the times, my friend:
"H.R. 1022: To reauthorize the assault weapons ban, and for other purposes"
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1785142/posts
The guns rights people had a good run there for a few years but now the balance of power has shifted in D.C. Are you seriously telling me Giuliani wouldn't gleefully sign an "assault weapons" ban that a Rat Congress and Senate sent to him?
Joe Lieberman?
If Lieberman had made it through the primaries you bet they would have supported him.
Honestly - I agree with you.
No One - No One - will ever take that right away from me.
No President will ever challange the 2nd Amendment - no way.
FYI - a great new documentary is coming out:
http://www.secondamendmentdocumentary.com/
Make sure all your mates check it out.
Proof that Reagan was, indeed, wrong sometimes.
By the way, has Mitt Romney ever explained in detail *why*he changed his mind on abortion?
The second amendment has nothing whatsoever to do with hunting.
..oh definitley not.....being the the Beltway gives you alot of perspective....but then again....many and I'm not saying "you", in the beltway are far removed from what mainstream American thinks....I thought Rudy was a dead duck but he is totally charasmatic and one of the best speakers out there.....very influential.....
Yeah right. You liberal FReepers always seem to have a difficult time making much sense to us conservatives. Know wonder you zing me, but don't ping me. Best you stay away, chickenlittle.
Oh make no mistake
If it comes between Rudy and Hillary, I will hold my nose, vote for Rudy and hope for the best.
I imagine most everyone else with a brain will also.
Rudy took guns away from long-term permit holders.
No President will ever challange the 2nd Amendment - no way.
Rudy suppored a gun-control bill proposed by Bill Clinton in the aftermath of a shooting at the Empire State Building in 1997.
Rudy seems to think that if we all can go duck hunting, our 2nd Amendment rights are safe and secure. Meanwhile, he took guns away from long-term NYC permit holders - and you know how hard it was for those people to get them in the first place.
well if you are in CA, that you find rudy palatable doesn't surprise me, as with people from NYC. but my roots are in PA and OH where my relatives are, and they are equally unenthused about Rudy and while they worked for Bush [their first political campaigns ever, and i am talking people in their 40s, not young kids] would not do the same for a rudy candidacy. not only is rudy a very flawed candidate with a ton of baggage that WILL be used against him, i don't see him winning against Hillary. The lib dems i know, while not being enthused about her, will vote for her over Rudy.
Ditto.
I understand what you're saying. That's why I said we disagree, strongly. How much clearer could I be. Rudy wasn't a conservative in the 50`s, 60`s, 70`s, 80`s 90`s or here in the 21st century either. By any standards of 50 years ago, or 50 years from today. Got it now? I hope so. Thanks.
Let me guess - you did not live in NYC in the late 80's or the early 90's.
If you had - you wouldn't be so quick to crash on Rudy's moves.
NYC was completely out of control - I challenge you to identify one single law abiding gun owner in NYC whose arms were "taken away"..
No way - it did not happen.
I wonder if everyone here realizes that under Rudy, NYC residents had to apply for permission to own a SHOTGUN to keep in their home? Permits were needed and rather large fees had to be paid.
How many of you in a red state would like to be forced to apply to the government to have a permit to keep a shotgun or a deer rifle in your house, much less a handgun?
And the police could come to your house and seize your gun any hour of the day or night without due process.
Reading the post I responded to should answer that question.
Sorry Jake
It did happen..people with semiautomatic rifles..not just AR-15s and such..but Ruger 10-22 squirrel hunting rifles and other similar hunting rifles had NYPD detectives at their doors to ask them to get the guns out of the city.
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