You have excellent goals for visiting this site and they are aligned with my goals, except you are clearly a little more reasonable then I am. We each have a different style, actually a good thing.
As to reasonable right versus far, far right - I’d say that at this point in America, the reasonable right includes all those who will vote for McCain with the far, far right those that will not vote at the POTUS level or write-in someone that is no longer running or has never run. I believe that there is a lot on the table this time around - I’m not 100% pleased with the choice but I do know that McCain continues to maintain some core values that are important to conservatives and appears to be ready to listen to conservatives - but in the end will go his own way just like Bush has done on a few issues. Basically, McCain and Bush are about the same, expect McCain has a real interest in pork/ear mark projects and just may do something good in that area.
Those here, on the far, far right do not want to compromise anything, yet compromise is going on every minute of the day in each of our lives and surely in a political life at all levels. Those conservatives are a bad as the far, far left in my view and coming up against them here is like dealing with bullies in the school yard. I can play at that level, also.
You and I seem to be in agreement here.
I was disheartened to see McCain become the clear front-runner. I do not want to vote for McCain, let alone donate to his campaign, but I will do so, despite being angry about this being my best choice.
There are several areas where I think McCain will be reliably conservative: trade, health care reform, and the WoT. McCain stands in great contrast to Clinton and Obama on these issues. He would likely be more conservative than GWB on his response to the financial/credit crisis and on earmarks.
He would be less reliable on SCOTUS appointments, but he won’t appoint another Ginsburg or Breyer, unlike Obama or Clinton.
I’ll have to hold my nose and overlook his history on immigration “reform”, campaign finance “reform”, and McCain -Lieberman.
I tend to think of those who refuse to support McCain as absolutists rather than extremists. Absolutists have a place in the party (but then, I also think that Ron Paul has a place in the party). They might be affiliated with a particular cause and view certain policy positions as non-negotiable.
This is understandable, but my view is that one must be more pragmatic in a Presidential campaign. The last several elections have been close. If Perot hadn’t run in ‘92 and ‘96, these elections would likely have been even closer than ‘04. The electorate does not have a conservative consensus as in 1972 or 1984 or a liberal consensus as in 1936 or 1964. McCain will actually inject some interesting dynamics into the race. It’s possible he could get a (slight) majority of the Hispanic vote, a large chunk of Jewish voters, and a majority of Catholics.
For this reason, I think that in the long run, McCain could be of great benefit to conservatives. He could realign the political map favorably to conservatives who run as Republicans.
Conservatives should also extract very specific commitments from McCain now. That means we have to negotiate and compromise, which is not always easy for principled people to do.