Posted on 08/05/2013 1:21:04 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Freshman Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and some other Republicans think they know why the GOP didn't win the last two presidential elections: They weren't conservative enough.
"If you look at the last 40 years, a constant pattern emerges," Cruz told ABC. "Anytime Republicans nominate a candidate for president who runs as a strong conservative, we win. And when we nominate a moderate who doesn't run as a conservative, we lose."
It's not a new thought, but it's dead wrong on several different levels.
First of all you have to pretty far in right field to think John McCain and Mitt Romney aren't conservatives. They are, by any rational definition of the term.
Granted, they aren't the most hardline conservatives ever to represent the party, and frankly they weren't great candidates. But no sane person thinks they're liberals, and few even think they're moderates.
Here's what they were: The best of the bunch in each cycle. They also won the nomination by appealing to Republican primary voters, a group that is notoriously conservative. Both, by the way, chose VP candidates who resonated with red-meat conservatives - Sarah Palin and Paul Ryan - and not many other voters.
Secondly, Cruz is ignoring the glaring fact that both of the Bush presidents were reasonable conservatives just like McCain and Romney. Between them, the Bushes won three national elections, and that ain't hay.
The only pure conservative Republican who won the presidency in modern times was Ronald Reagan, and he did many great things for America. But the country that elected Reagan in the 1980s is different from the one we have today.
It has fewer people who are attracted to the Republican themes of fiscal responsibility and traditional values. It has more people who think those concepts are silly and outdated. It even has more people who adore Big Government and see no problem whatsoever with taking more from the system than they put in.
The facts are clear to anyone who thinks honestly instead of ideologically. Outside of the South and Wyoming or Montana, it's hard for Republican presidential candidates to find a state they can carry. The GOP even lost Virginia and Florida in the last two, and North Carolina in '08. Former tossup states Missouri, Colorado and New Mexico are trending Democratic - and the GOP lost all three the last two times. Huge states like California, Illinois and New York are so deep in the Democrats' pockets you'd need a mining expedition to dig them out.
With an electoral map like that, a hard-right GOP presidential candidate in 2016 like Ted Cruz would get mowed down. Remember, he isn't running in deep-red Texas. We're talking about a national electorate where you have to appeal to women, minorities and senior citizens who want to make sure the Social Security checks keep coming. If you think you can win them over by sounding like Rush Limbaugh or Glen Beck, you are sadly mistaken. And just because some Republicans don't sound like the kings of talk radio doesn't mean they are sellouts or weasels.
A moderate Republican like Jeb Bush or Chris Christie is the only kind who can win, and even that won't be easy. If Republicans don't nominate an electable conservative, they are guaranteeing the victory of Hillary Clinton or whoever wins the Democratic nomination.
The cold, hard numbers are there, plain as day, whether anyone likes them or not. Ted Cruz is not the next Ronald Reagan. He's the next Barry Goldwater.
Here are some other editorials by the same guy:
He seems to be pretty far left.
Wasn't that already glaringly obvious?
Yes, but to be sure, more research always avoids a knee-jerk reaction to a single piece.
I love how liberal commentators tell the GOP what candidates they have to run in order to win. The sad thing is that the idiots listen to them. It’s obvious that these writers are scared of conservative candidates but that goes right over the head of the GOP pundits.
Like.
Hello. The GOP took Missouri the last two elections, and if anything my state is trending Republican and not Democrat.
First of all you have to pretty far in right field to think John McCain and Mitt Romney aren’t conservatives.
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I am so far in right field I am over past the foul line and against the bleachers.
If McCain is a Conservative I am Obama’s Daddy.
“A moderate Republican like Jeb Bush or Chris Christie is the only kind who can win”
Watch true conservatives turn their backs on this duo. They can push this meme all they want but it will not change the facts. NO MORE RINO’s and BUSH’S!
What exactly is a ‘far right wing candidate’? What views exactly are ‘right wing’?
Is it ‘extreme right wing’ to want people to only be allowed in the US if they apply properly for citizenship and really want to assimilate?
Is it ‘extreme right wing’ to believe that people should benefit in accordance to their efforts and talents and not have the government confiscate the fruits of their labor?
I’ll stop here, but this is a very long list.
He is a BUSH. Nothing more need be known.
Flak/Target.
Where is the Heritage Foundation when we need it?
What he said.
If A moderate Reoublican like John McLame or Mitt Romney is the only one who can win then it is not worth winning.
Far right candidates are anarchists. I don't believe we have any prominent anarchists drawing support.
Centrist candidates are conservative and right center candidates are libertarian. We need both in order to balance out the far left totalitarian socialists who control the democrat party.
Ted Cruz is a needed breath of fresh air for a dying "republican brand".
The The Beaumont Enterprise isn’t among the papers of record here in Texas....Ted Cruz won in a land slide when one considers he beat the #1 establishment shoe in for his senate seat. He is, in my opinion the next Ronald Reagan!!!
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