Posted on 02/04/2008 3:51:31 AM PST by Man50D
I have good news and bad news for you as you gather this week in the nation's capital for the 35th time for the nation's largest annual political meeting.
Let's start with the bad news: The conservative movement is dead.
It has, as Rush Limbaugh would say, assumed room temperature. It is deceased. It has checked out. It has departed this earthly plane. It is gone, over, completed, finished.
It died young. Conservatism as a movement was not much older than the Conservative Political Action Conference, founded in 1972. It began in earnest with the failed Barry Goldwater presidential campaign in 1964. It reached its pinnacle of power and influence during Ronald Reagan's presidency from 1980 through 1988 and was resurrected briefly in 1994 when Republicans, led by Newt Gingrich, took over both houses of Congress.
It was euthanized by President George W. Bush.
That is the short, bittersweet history of the modern conservative movement – one that championed so much of what is right, but did so with tactics and strategies that were so wrong.
I've been warning of this impending doom for a number of years. Check out my 2003 book, "Taking America Back," for a detailed prophetic explanation of why conservatism never had a chance.
For the purposes of this brief missive, however, let me summarize: No political movement, relying on popular support, can ever succeed without the following:
a definition of success
an offensive agenda for achieving that success
a long-term battle plan for cultural renewal, not just short-term political victories On the first score, conservatives have not been successful at painting a picture of what they want America to look like in the future. They can tell you they want less government.
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
It’s just pinin’ for the fjords.
I don’t know. We had people in the Super Bowl thread last night screaming victory for the Patriots with less than three minutes to go in the game.
Why the Libs have won in a nutshell.
Exactly. The Conservative movement was Schiavoed when it was at its weak point.
Huh? This on the right thread???????
Everybody let that burn in real good. I have stated right here I made up my mind to vote FDT in March 2007 and that is exactly what I am going to do. No more with this "a vote for so-and-so is really a vote for that candidate over there. That is a steaming load of B.S.
The article may be correct on conservatism, but it is wrong on details. Bush, for example, has opposed new embryonic stem cells. Free enterprise is alive and well and free trade has lifted the world's living standards (developing more than developed). The details are not murky, but the grasp of economics by people like Farah is questionable.
Free trade bashing bump.
Sorry, this whole “blame the GOP” for a lack of conservatives candidates is a load of horse hockey!
Expecting conservative candidates when nobody (including Reagan) can live up to the standards some conservatives set. I argued and cajoled on the Pennsylvania boards with those calling Rick Santorum a liberal and ‘not conservative enough’.
It is this mentality that sets conservatism back.
Liberals have used incrementalism very effectively for the last 50+ years.
Conservatives want their leaders to change gov’t overnight. If that change does not happen in the first 100 days of a ‘conservative’ administration, they are ready to throw those leaders to the wolves.
Liberals bide their time and take small bites.
Conservatives have an “all-or-nothing” mentality.
The GOP is not the problem. Conservatives are the problem.
Conservatives need to learn to play the game of politics for the long-haul.
“You can thank the Republicans “hold your your nose and vote for the lesser of two evils” strategy for the advancement of Socialism within the party and the nation. The effort to expand the voter base by appeasing those who are not Conservative to win elections at all costs has certainly helped the party achieve that goal. The GOP has slid far enough to the left giving us candidates such as McCain, Romney, Huckabee, Giuliani, Paul and thereby incrementally aligning its political ideology with that of the Socialist Democrats so that they essentailly have formed one party we should call the Repubricrats.”
IMO, it all has to do with FEAR of Hillary. Thing is, IMO, it will be Obama we are up against and he’ll be even tougher to beat.
As bad as FEAR of Hillary is driving Republicans, the desire for any kind of ‘change’ is driving Dems to a man they perceive to be a JFK-like candidate.
You nailed it! I've been saying that we cannot allow RINOs to force us to accept them because in the long run it will destroy everything, but people were always quick to attack. Well here's the result: no conservatives left in the field, a probable McCain nomination, and a party that's returning to the Bob Michel play nice with the RATS permanent minority status. Yes, it could still turn around, but it's difficult to see where the conservative leadership is to do it.
“Check out my 2003 book, “Taking America Back,” for a detailed prophetic explanation”
________________________
Can Farah ever just make a point without trying to sell a book?
And let's not take Farah with us.
Did incrementalism create McCain, Huckabee, et al or did the "all or nothings" drive the true conservatives away and leave us with these psuedo-conservatives?
>>>Conservatives have an “all-or-nothing” mentality. The GOP is not the problem. Conservatives are the problem.
One question that Conservatives must eventually ask is whether the religious tests imposed by the anti-Abortion monomaniacs, the “Values Voters”, and the alleged “Social Conservatives” are (a) at odds with the guidance implicitly provided by our Founders in Article VI of the Constitution (should Article VI be at all relevant to political parties?), and (b) destructive in that they superimpose a set of moral strictures and “issues” over the broad political and social goals intended from the outset of America government (”life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”).
Does Conservatism equate to anti-Abortionism, church attendance, and refraining from cussing? Is is that cheap? Is the Republican Party a functionary and tool driven by that moral code?
It’s pretty clear that Conservatism has come to mean much that it isn’t and was never intended to mean, and that the Republican Party has taken off in unknown directions unshackled from the Conservative principles that have guided it for at least 65 years.
But since we at odds about what Conservatism is, and the Republican Party is merely an unprincipled tool of whatever “issues” drive the day, then it should be no surprise that things are off course.
You have to really admire those liberals.
I don't; but you do.
I think what fails is determining that the term "long haul" actually means "short haul." Folks need to ask themselves, if they no longer believe in all this "long-haul" stuff, did it work with regard to, say, President Carter?
Absolutely right. I’ve been saying this for years. Yet many instinctive conservatives liked to adopt an anti-intellectual attitude, saying that conservatives simply didn’t like academics, and putting their faith in the myth that the internet and talk radio made traditional media obsolete. It’s now clear that the control of the media and education by Leftist “change agents” and their strategy of getting control of kids and molding their minds has permanently changed America. The most radical ideas of the New Left are now mainstream culture.
"[T]he only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments."
-- Benjamin Rush (On the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic, 1806)
"Nothing is more certain than that a general profligacy and corruption of manners make a people ripe for destruction. A good form of government may hold the rotten materials together for some time, but beyond a certain pitch, even the best constitution will be ineffectual, and slavery must ensue."
-- John Witherspoon (The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men, 1776)
Or try John Adams:
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
I don’t think it’s dead, but Farah has certainly done his part to turn off the sensible people who could be convinced to espouse conservative principles.
Conservatism can be popular, because it is based on what works in the real world.
But the more it seems to be driven by kooks, the less likely smart people are to even consider it.
Conservatives, after Reagan, mostly failed to keep educating the public. The only exception was Gingrich in 1994 with the Contract with America.
Conservatives have sat back as we listen to Rush, Levin, etc thinking “these guys are doing the preaching, we don’t have to do it anymore”. Our elected officials stopped preaching to the public and stopped defending conservative principles.
Did the GOP allow many ‘moderates’ into the party?! Yes. Many were here to start (country-club Repubs), but many joined after the Reagan and Gingrich revolutions. That is good. That is what builds majorities.
However, instead of educating these newcomers to conservatism and ensuring a conservative future, we pandered to them (the easy road). We thought ‘hey, they joined us so they must agree with us’.
I blame a lack of conservative participation in the GOP as a main culprit of the party’s slide on principles. Conservatives, by nature, are not activists (except on things like immigration). We have not infiltrated the party leadership. On the state and national level, the GOP leaders are those who were with the party in the 1970s and 1980s....the country-club set.
Conservatives did not displace them in enough places to transform the party. Instead, we stayed home, tolerated the occasional moderate and listened to Limbaugh thinking everything is coming up roses.
It wasn’t until we had majorities in both the Senate, House and White House (2002) did we realize how little control of the party we retained.
Conservatives are less coherent than liberals. Too many are one-issue conservatives (many of the newcomers) that tolerated moderate swings on other issues. Too many are “all-or-nothing” conservatives that would have problems with a Reagan candidate today.
I am not advocating supporting McCain for the sake of the GOP. I am not advocating conservatives abandon the GOP.
I am advocating conservatives take control of the GOP from top to bottom, from national to state to local. The party is ours for the taking, and ours for the never-ending forging into a conservative party.
You see it happen on the State level all the time. Republicans swoop into power on a pro-growth, anti-tax platform, and slowly but surely become co-opted by the Establishment. My greatest objection is to the attitude that, every time it happens, folks like Farah (and some FReepers) act as though it’s the first time they’ve seen it.
Conservatives were driven from party like lepers. Conservatives are considered an embarrasment by the GOP.
We were driven out because we participated too much.
President Bush betrayed the conservitives when he started to act like a liberal/Dem.
Goodness, how did Farah get his letter to conservatives out of his Y2K bunker?!
What a nut!
Conservitives like the NE Patriots sat on their laurals at the end when they should not.
Thank you for these quotes!
Perhaps you should read one of the quotes listed in your profile and heed its words.......
"A political party is a mechanical structure created to further a cause. The cause, not the mechanism, brings and holds the members together"
-----President Ronald Reagan
When was free trade bashed on this thread?
I disagree with all of that, but now I realize he may not have been referring to free trade.
Nope. I think *public* religion and *public* culture - when injected into the political sphere - are exactly the kinds of dangerous practices that the Founders sought to prevent, and repeatedly advised us to to avoid.
The Constitution and indeed the very conception of this nation put those facts right in front of your face, but you don’t want to see them.
Tell me this: would Jefferson vote for a Mormon? Would Washington have voted for a minister who ran for president on a religious platform? Is Article VI of The U.S. Constitution directed exclusively at sitting politicians, or is it directed at YOU and ME and all American citizens?
I know why my Huguenot ancestors came to Boston and New York in 1680. It wasn’t for economic opportunity. It was to escape religious zealots.
And by the way, my first Huguenot relative in America was minister of the first Huguenot church in Boston.
But he was not a politician and never ran for any political office.
You are right..
One of my favorites. Tell me how it applies to our conversation.
“Does Conservatism equate to anti-Abortionism, church attendance, and refraining from cussing?”
What are you talking about? I don’t know about the other items in that sentence but if you don’t have Life, you can’t have Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.
Why is it so difficult to figure out that someone can a social conservative, a fiscal conservative and a national security conservative?
D’uh!
I have American Huguenot ancestors too. They were the survivors. Some over in France were massacred. That’s what the others fled from: false doctrine and persecution from a corrupt, govt.-established church. The Founding Fathers knew all about that problem, which is why they didn’t want a national established church. However, the quotes I gave (which you seem to have ignored) show that they felt religion, and specifically the Christian religion, was necessary to survival of an American republic. They were not against religion, even to the point of zealotry, as long as no sect controlled the govt. and destroyed freedom of choice.
To answer your question, the Bill of Rights is entirely directed against the Federal govt. It says what the Fed. govt. cannot do. One thing specified is that Congress shall make no law concerning an establishment of religion. The language was very carefully chosen specifically to allow States to keep established churches which several of them had at the time. Hardly an anti-religious attitude, was it? The Founders knew all about the bloody religious wars in the mother countries, so they didn’t want to repeat the mess caused by govt. established churches. That is all. They were positive about Christian religion and values, In fact, the said the Republic wouldn’t last without them. That was prophetic.
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