[Sola Veritas]

Instead of going into a blue flunk of Obama winning reelection it is time to stop whinning and get back to work. The positives that can come from this:

(1) Romney was NOT a conservative....he was merely the anti-Obama. Folks here on FR got way too invested in a candidate that they have known for YEARS was not a conservtive....NOT one of us. It amazed me how otherwise intelligent folks became invested in a poor choice that should NEVER have gotten the nod.

(2) Obama is going to mess things up really bad...especially the economy. Because of this, Conservatives will be able to pick up many more House and Senate seats in 2014 and 2016. If Romney had of been elected, we would have lost seats. Romney may well have hurt the brand of "conservatism."

(3) IF we conservatives can stop devouring each other and develope consensus, we can help ensure a REAL conservative is the candidate for the GOP in 2016. We need to start today on that. NO MORE RINOs picked by the GOP Establishment....in fact it is way past time to throw out the GOPe! They pushed Romney on us, he was a poor choice. They need to go, and future Romneys do as well.

(4) We still have control of the House.

(5) Things are bad, but IT IS NOT THE END OF THE WORLD PEOPLE! We haved survived worse. Somethings to make things better, they have to get worse first.

Sola Veritas

[Cincinna]

[B Knotts]

The GOP-E tried to play nice.

The RATS played dirty.

You can’t fight dirty with nice.

Until the GOP figures out how to:

1) Nominate real conservatives

2) Get down in the muck with the RATS and use every tactic (rhetorical or otherwise) available

they/we will continue to lose.

Look at how the RATS poisoned peoples’ minds against “the rich.” The GOP could have countered with a under the radar campaign against “the takers/moochers/looters.” It would work; you know it would. But, they don’t want to soil their hands.

We have to be done listening to them.

[Ingtar]

It does not matter if Romney was conservative or not any longer. He was perceived as conservative. I was already hearing the GOP Elites on FOX tonight saying, “This is what happens when the GOP nominates a conservative.” This is also why I believed we had lost as soon as Romney got the nod. He did not contrast well enough with the Left when people looked at his record.

Planning for the future should wait until emotion dies a bit. Emotion precludes Reason. If the House bends over as expected, all the planning in the world will not turn things around for a long time.

[cva66snipe]

Companies employing Union Workers need to start laying off Members starting at the opening of the workday this morning. It the Union balks? Off Shore. It’s time to break the endorsed and funded Union Socalism in the USA.

[wardaddy]

The GOP answer will not be more conservatism

it will be Rubio and more pandering and amnesty which got us where we are to begin with

[Hawk54]

Stop beating your heads against a brick wall. WE ARE OUTNUMBERED NOW. Simple as that. Remember the Alamo. Fight to the last man.

[Citizen of the Savage Nation]

Well the main thing that needs to be worked on is the ground game in Ohio, Florida, and Virginia. How do these states that are so dominated at the local level...at least in OH and FL...by Republicans, and yet keep electing a Marxist to the White House? That just should not have happened once, let alone twice.

[Figment]

I’ve planned all along for this. It starts tomorrow.It won’t be anything harsh or violent. It will be effective with the useless folks of my immediate vicinity

[kevkrom]

I'll go back to what I posted during the primaries.

We, as conservatives, allow ourselves to be fragmented by having a variety of definitions of what a "true conservative" is, and looking to fill our candidate spots with whomever checks off the right boxes on a list of policy positions, regardless of what kind of candidate they would make.

To extend on Bill Buckley's famous "vote for the most conservative candidate who can win", my revision reads "vote for the candidate most able to put a conservative agenda into effect". This encompasses a wider look that the Buckley rule, in that we are not just looking at "electability" (though that is a factor) but also at expected effectiveness once in office.

Effectiveness involves getting a conservative agenda enacted, which means getting Congress to go along with it (typically by convincing the public, and have Congress follow in order to keep their seats). To this end, you don't need a "true conservative" who either can't get elected or can't get anything accomplished once in office, but an "80% conservative" who can win and who can lead will move the general direction of the country the right way.

But that may mean having to compromise on a core issue or two in order to get the rest of the package. The whole "I'm taking my ball and going home" attitude of the "pure conservative" crowd is not helpful.

Now, what I mean by someone who can effect a conservative agenda is someone who fits -- as closely as reasonably possible -- the following criteria:

1. Has, at a fundamental level, conservative instincts even if there is some deviation from a pure "movement conservative" philosophy
2. Has shown that they can win an election at the state level
3. Has executive experience, preferably in government or military
4. Has private sector experience, preferably as a business owner
5. Has demonstrated the ability, as an executive, of implementing an agenda, all the more so if the agenda would normally be resisted by the organization
6. Has the appropriate charisma and "media skills" to articulate a message and overcome or bypass media filters

Now, it's highly unlikely to find someone who fits every single one of those bullet points to a "T", but that's the grading card I use, and suggest others use as well.

Using the recent primaries as an example, Romney certainly doesn't fit the bill well -- his conservative instincts are questionable at best, and while he has government and business executive experience, his agenda while in office was shaped by the legislature, not enacted in spite of it. There's also a lot of doubt that he was able to be convincing enough to sell his message to the public (admittedly, after the first debate, it looked a lot better, but then he drifted back toward milquetoast at the end).

On the flip side, Newt Gringich was likely the best fit overall, even if he wouldn't be the fist choice on most of the individual bullets. His biggest drawbacks on that card are his lack of elected executive experience (though admittedly, Speaker of the House is pretty good for a non-executive) and the lack of winning a statewide election. His conservative credentials weren't perfect (though far better than Romney's), but he also had a strong track record of shaking things up and getting things done.