Posted on 11/21/2005 7:20:45 PM PST by Frank T
Present and accounted for Sir!
This group of repubs are spending money like drunk sailors on shore leave. This group of repubs haven't the balls to challenge the dims on judicial confirmations. This group of repubs are not taking the battle to the dims, they are for the most part hiding nd trying to protect their future elections. This group of repubs refuse to take charge of protecting pur borders.
Time to look for a real conservative party.
Time to look for a real conservative party.
I was thinking the same thing however, we must not break ranks at this crucial point in time. The Libs. would love to see the Pubes split. Hopefully, the Libs. will be the ones to split. ( kooks Vs Mods)
I think the author got the whole Reagan/tax cuts topic wrong. Laffer argued, and was proved correct, that cutting marginal tax rates raises tax revenue. It happened. Unfortunately, spending increased more than revenue.
"I was thinking the same thing -- Republican Party of the 80's forward is much more conservative then in the past."
Certainly, for our lifetime. The issue now, post-Gingrich, appears to be fear about losing some seats in congress, rather than practicing what many GOP members were elected on. Coupled with a mostly unified opposition (Reagan could count on some Dem votes on some conservative initiatives), the balance of power on conservative issues then rests with a small group of liberal Republicans.
What's needed now is an organized drive to pop them out during party primaries, since gerrymandering makes it very hard for incumbants to get knocked out. Conservatives need to be unafraid to go against GOP incumbants.
As to if this is the most conservative the party has ever been, how would today's version rank against pre-New Deal Republicans?
Because that 20 year period of Democrat hold on the presidency, followed by decades of congress dominance, effectively shaped the GOP as a consequence. I think the party got less conservative, due to the need to get elected. The national consensus appeared very strong for government intervention in the economy and society, and candidates from Landon to Nixon were tended to be liberal.
On the other hand, there had to be some soft of strong core support for conservatism, the north-eastern wing of the party notwithstanding. For if not, why did so many white conservatives defect from the Democrats, and not the other way around?
soft of = sort of
Did you know that Ronald Reagan called libertarianism the "heart and soul of conservatism"?
Yes, I've seen that posted to FR before; but I stand by my opinion of them, regardless of that supposed quote.
Personally, I am tired of comparing Republican congressmen to drunken sailors. First, it is an insult to drunken sailors. Second, most drunken sailors only spend what money they have in their pockets. If Congress could accomplish this the country would be in much better financial shape.
Dave, your post is unintelligible.
I guess you don't know any...truth, that is.
Here's a quote: "... An evangelical conservative like George W. Bush is “libertarian” where most non-libertarian conservatives are not, and “communitarian” where most libertarian conservatives are not. But neither his libertarianism nor his communitarianism is simply assimilable to traditional conservative categories."
What I think they mean is that evangelical attitudes are more libertarian and individualistic than those of High Church or Catholic traditionalists, and more communitarian than those of secular libertarians. Anglican Tories and Ultramontane Catholics being rare in politics today, what we notice is the difference between Bush, and say, Barry Goldwater.
Radical libertarian Murray Rothbard made the "post-millennial pietistic Protestants," 19th century Evangelicals, villains in his understanding of American history, for their emphasis on enforcing virtue paved the way for the welfare state in his view.
I don't think much of Rothbard -- he's the sort of fellow who needs an enemy and will distort history to find one. I'm not sure that the "non-pietist" "liturgicals" or "salvationists" would have thought much of the roles he assigns them, but it is something to think about.
Public-minded evangelicals of a century ago did have a lot to do with getting the Progressive movement started, and something of that emphasis remains to this day. Religious convictions, though, can't be reduced to political positions, so much libertarian criticism of Bush which doesn't take his deepest convictions into account is beside the point.
I'm not so sure that the GOP is at its most "Lincolnian" now, but it is a pleasant notion. Some of the stands on abortion, stem-cells and euthenasia clearly are worthy moral stands, but if the party falters in other areas it won't matter much with the voters.
NOO!!
We cannot allow any non-bashing of Today's GOP!! WE MUST errr ummm act like we are the **ONLY** True Conservatives out there!!!
did I convince ya?
Let's hope so!
I personally think that it is not surprising, given how wacko left the democrat party has gone, that there have been oodles of liberals infusing the republicans in recent years. People really don't want to be communist, if given a choice, and I think we give them a choice as far as that goes. But it isn't a very good situation for conservatives. So yes, I think anyone who wishes to woo conservatives is in a very good spot right now.
Also, 9-11 caused a right-ward shift that is uneasily easing back to center in the absence of further catastrophe.
True or False:
The US Federal Budget, has increased yearly, a greater percentage during Bush/Republican Senate+House than during the Clinton years.
"Personally, I am tired of comparing Republican congressmen to drunken sailors. First, it is an insult to drunken sailors. Second, most drunken sailors only spend what money they have in their pockets. If Congress could accomplish this the country would be in much better financial shape."
There is no anchor, or drag, on what can be spent. Since the dollar is not tied to anything real, just the promise of government to pay it back, they have gotten around the problem of printing free money.
How this ends is when the people who are elegible to vote for a given government lose confidence. If there is some grand disillusionment, the government will not have the credibility to print more free money, what dollars are in circulation will not equal what is owed, and we'll all be in a lot of trouble. Hopefully you own valuable material items or property when that comes, and that the concept of private property is still honored.
And the way economic depressions have happened in the past, it's not possible to shield against, say, a country like England tanking economically. Global finances are intertwined.
"I personally think that it is not surprising, given how wacko left the democrat party has gone, that there have been oodles of liberals infusing the republicans in recent years. People really don't want to be communist, if given a choice, and I think we give them a choice as far as that goes. But it isn't a very good situation for conservatives."
There is a solution, though the mainstream press won't like it. Drive hard right. If the leftists have been able to coopt the Democrat party to the extent that they have, it means these liberal refugees into the Republican party *can* in practice be driven out of a political party.
What is needed is for conservatives to do what the new left is doing on their side, and squeeze out the "centre." Let them be disenfranchised, or run a third party candidate.
It's one thing to welcome a bloc of voters because they prefer the GOP as the lesser or two evils. It's quite another to let them obtain power in their new party without converting, politically speaking.
A principled Left against a principled "Right" will not play out in election coverage, but whether or not most Americans like it, such a showdown would be effective.
I suppose whether this can happen depends on when, if, and how hard we get smacked again. Although given that the President used 9-11 as an excuse for a return to Keynesian economics, the outcome isn't all that predictable.
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