Posted on 05/09/2008 5:02:52 AM PDT by Invisigoth
Sen. John McCain as the Republican presidential candidate doing everything he can to show how liberal he is, to the point where it's very difficult to find any significant difference between him and the two Democratic candidates.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi running roughshod over House appropriation rules, trade agreements signed in good faith, and doing everything else in her power to run out the clock on this year until, presumably, a newly inaugurated President Obama or Hillary can sign everything President Bush would veto.
And last, but certainly most, a Republican Party that has gone completely supine and offers no opposition whatsoever. More often than not, they're joining in just to get a small slice of the spending pie.
Add it all up, and you get a veritable horror movie for conservatives. Perhaps, over the past 20 years or so, there never was as much support in the GOP as we thought for conservative ideas. But certainly in this election cycle it has reached its nadir. It doesn't seem like there is a single candidate, incumbent or challenger, who can run away from conservatism fast enough – Sen. McCain being the epitome of this trend. (That means that there is at least one thing for which he is a legitimate standard-bearer.)
(Excerpt) Read more at northstarwriters.com ...
Sadly, there has not been ANY conservatives in the house or senate in the past 4 years. Just a bunch of pork loving metrosexuals.
IMHO, there is just NO DIFFERENCE between the two parties. None.
Too late.
I did that right after the 2006 elections when they proved they were neither trustworthy or even particularly liked conservatives.
Still support individual candidates that are real conservative, but the party... Not one red cent.... Not one nice thought for them.
This proposed abandonment pretends there are no long lasting concequences to Democrat rule.
True conservatives would be effectively outlawed from political office, by way of policy and districting.
Wrong.
While McCain is not a conservative, you have to be smart enough to realize that conservatives have to live to fight another day. To not win this battle is a death sentence to the conservative movement.
There is good reason for discontent and even outrage, but abandoning ship a thousand miles from shore is less than prudent.
It’s still worthwhile to do whatever damage control is possible.
The Tux from TN is intelligent! ;-)
On the issue of judicial appointments alone, it is vital to elect McCain.
blah blah blah
To begin with, there are Supreme Court appointments. McCain has said that his appointments will be like Roberts. Clinton operatives have indicated that Hillary might appoint Bill Clinton. Obama's operatives have suggested that he might appoint Hillary Clinton. Whether so or not, their appointments will definitely be rabid radical Leftists and/or sociopaths.
And that's just one big difference.
A third party capable of splitting the vote is a viable solution. It would require the Republican party to adhere to a middle ground with Democrats and Constitutionalists on either end of the spectrum. Governing, especially in the Congress, would require coalition building.
Abandon the Republican party indeed. Creating a Constitution party would provide a locus for conservative thought and a platform for action.
Thats because conservatives have sat on their asses for 12 years and only cared about religon,guns and morals. The first two are protected by the constitution and the latter is irrevlent in politics.
Most conservatives are on the goverment tit anyway which is why they like to complain about irrelvent issues while Rome burns.
John
Scaremongering doesn't work anymore.
So many slow learners around. The Reps abandoned Conservatives in 2002 - this jerk just figured it out?
So you believe that McCain would nominate anyone who would overturn his signature legislation, like McCain-Feingold? Remember, your support of him now means your approval of his likely actions - and his rhetoric of late is vastly different than his actions.
Words or deeds? Which do you choose to believe?
You are so true, the conservitive movement will go on, but in a rebuilding mode.
There is one party in Washington. The federal government party.
Wrong, as long as the Republican party platform, and John McCain, for that matter, are pro-life...and the Dems are for abortion, there will be a difference, a BIG difference.
“Sen. John McCain as the Republican presidential candidate doing everything he can to show how liberal he is, to the point where it’s very difficult to find any significant difference between him and the two Democratic candidates.”
I don’t usually get this strident, but any writer who could believe this crap is a moron. Worse yet, he’s probably a Lib.
If he doesn’t see ANY difference in the GWOT, judges, abortion and taxes, he’d better get a new gig. This one is intellectually over his head.
Abortion ALONE is enough reason to vote for McCain over the other two. Any Conservative who sits this one out and willingly allows an abortionist to be elected had better look in the mirror.
Republicans didn’t give us McCain - a flawed nominating system allowed Dems to cross over in the early going, and the MSM took over from there. Changing the nominating process should be job one.
We didn’t get our guy. We have to deal with, not pick up our marbles and go home. The differences may not be as stark as we would like, but on four of the five major issues facing our country, McCain is on the right side. And four is better than zero.
Would you like to explain that rather outrageous statement further?
How about reconquering the GOP, by starting to support conservatives for office on all levels? Nooooo. That’s too reasonable for too many. They rather give up and jump into political oblivion. Cowardice is not a conservative value.
I have listed these three because of all the issues they are the most important today by a wide margin.
“So you believe that McCain would nominate anyone who would overturn his signature legislation, like McCain-Feingold?”
Yes, I believe he will nominate originalists rather than activists.
I would rather take a chance with McCain than to leave it to the CERTAINTY of what either Obama or Clinton would do.
“To begin with, there are Supreme Court appointments.”
You are right. The Supreme Court holds ALL the power in the US
when it comes to social issues of our daily lives.
As much as I hate McStain, I shudder to think of what a Hildabeast or OBoomBoom court would look like.
Neither does idiocy.
The biggest threat to the country is the $50 Trillion in unfunded Entitlements.
Where is the outrage amoung Conservatives about it?? There is none because they depend on the goverment as much as anyone and they dont’ want to rock the boat.
Conservatives let all these goofballs get elected to congress by sitting on their rear ends and not getting out to vote using silly issues like Guns, abortion to stay home claiming no one met their litmus test.
McCain is the closest thing to Goldwater we will every see again and has the potential to be a great president.
Check out Goldwater’s quote that I have posted a few times before.
“When you say “radical right” today, I think of these moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican Party and make a religious organization out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye.”
Well, thinks to so called conservtives we kissed our country goodbye in the 2006 congressional elections.
John
I did see the BOR interview of McCain and McCain tried to pull off a fast one with BOR, but the latter kept the former’s feet to the fire.
This is the same old "we need to work within the party to bring its back to its conservative roots" argument.
Just how conservatives are going to accomplish this by handing a victory to a party which increasingly marginalizes them is never discussed. The truth is the Republican party has made a conscious decision to move away from conservatives. If they get elected with this strategy, expect further marginalization.
Conservatives who are looking to the Republican party as a vehicle to success are misguided.
Maybe we need to take a step back to take two steps forward, and maybe the liberals of both parties have convinced enough people that there really is a free lunch, which means we have a lot of work to do educating people about the fantasy of expecting the government to take care of them.
I think we conservatives may have gone to sleep in the euphoria of the 2002 election, and did not notice that the Republicans in charge were not conservatives.
Reagan is dead, as is Buckley. We need to decide where to go from here. FR and other forums may be helpful in keeping us in touch with each other, but we also need to formulate strategy and tactics for local and national goals.
We need to decide if the GOP is salvageable as a vehicle for conservatism, or, in light of the fact that the Dems are running some more conservative candidates in selected local elections, and in light of the lack of principles in both parties, can we infiltrate both parties and take them over?
Someone needs to take the lead in this. In 1993, it was Newt Gingrich. He’s gone round the bend, so we can’t rely on him. Talk radio is a business, and we can only rely on it for information dissemination. Who will be the perfect bastard that Newt was, and pull us together and relegate the liberals to minority status in both parties. I really don’t see anyone, but, then, in 1993, nobody noticed Newt.
In 1993, the day after Clinton took office, Heritage and National Review ran a conservative summit (which I attended) at which many conservative leaders met with each other and with the rankers (like me) and formulated principles and strategy on which the 1994 victory was based. We need to do that again, no matter which of the three liberals takes office as President in 2009.
McCain would never vote YES to confirm a flaming communist liberal ACLU lawyer like this to the bench, now would he?
nah...
Not just for the movement, but for the country. Obama is a closet Marxist, and his S. Court appointments and Demon control of Congress will put every aspect of the Leftist agenda into force. We will move rapidly toward a one-party socialist state.
“How about reconquering the GOP, by starting to support conservatives for office on all levels? Nooooo. That’s too reasonable for too many. They rather give up and jump into political oblivion. Cowardice is not a conservative value.”
You hit the nail on the head. I’m not about to give up on the Republican party. I’m not crazy about the direction that the party is going, but it will be a lot easier to take it back than to create a new home for conservatism.
Plus four years of Obamunism, and the Republican party will be tripping over itself to woo conservatives back.
I just hope the country can survive that long.
“This proposed abandonment pretends there are no long lasting concequences to Democrat rule.
True conservatives would be effectively outlawed from political office, by way of policy and districting.”
We both know that logic will not prevail with the few handfuls of “die from self inflicted wounds” crowd. If three or four thousand people can change an election, let them have at it.
Newt is flawed, imperfect, and unpopular.
I would crawl over broken glass to vote for him in a split second.
I know a lot of conservatives - none of whom are on the “government tit.” Morals are the only thing relevant in politics because the sole issue is whose morals are going to govern. As for religion and guns being protected by the constitution, the free practice of Christianity in the public schools has been banned for 4 decades and that banning is being extended to the rest of the marketplace on a regular basis. I don’t own a gun but I am glad our founding fathers distrusted the power of government so much that they prohibited it from preventing gun ownership by the populace.
We’re a dumbed down population heading in the direction of post Christian Europe faster than I thought possible. Christian conservatives have had it shoved in their faces a few too many times. Like most Christian conservatives, I’ll vote for McCain because the alternative choices are unthinkable. However, like most of my friends, I’m done giving money to the Republican party. Here in Ohio, they are worse than the Democrats. They have run the state into the ground while implementing liberal policies. I’m afraid that no matter who gets elected President, we’re going to see the same thing continue to happen at the national level.
Why do I get the feeling this will be a “very interesting” thread to watch?
FYI: We already have one.
It's called the Constitution Party.
This is it in a nutshell for me. I swore that I wouldn't vote for McPain, but the thought of rabid liberal activist justices added to the SC makes me shudder.
This may be academic, as McCain is doing everything to handicap himself so as to appear above the fray.
This race is more depressing than Dole/Clinton or Ford/Carter.
I will continue to donate to those who are conservative, and running for office. I will not donate to the RNC. If I wanted someone who thought the Bush tax cuts were for the wealthy, that drilling in ANWR was detrimental to the environment and offered nothing, who believes hook, line and sinker in “global climate change, who wants open borders and amnesty, who opposes water boarding, who thinks conservatives need to “calm down”, who wants to restrict free speech when it opposes them, who wants to shut down Gitmo, etc., etc., etc., I would have voted for a Democrat.
Oh, morals aren't irrelevant in politics, exactly.
The politicization of morals is the wedge issue which has destroyed the Reagan coalition and banished the Republican party to permanent minority status.
As I stated before, I would rather take a chance on McCain rather than support the CERTAINTY of what either Obama or Clinton would do.
Yes I agree that many of our concerns are not being addressed, but to subject our nation to 4 years of Hillary or even worse Obama is criminal.
I think we have a lot of embedded trolls at FR.
Yes, and conservatives have essentially compromised their way into insignificance in the Republican party. If the nomination of John McCain doesn’t make that clear then nothing else will.
I agree my FRiend.
That statement is so gobsmackingly ludicrous that it doesn't rate an answer.
Interesting that you didn't mention Alito, though, since we realize that McCain snarked not long ago about Alito "wearing his conservatism on his sleeve" -- a comment he doesn't deny, but he just "doesn't recall." Either the candidate's advanced age is affecting his memory, or he really does despise conservatives, while pretending to be one when it's convenient -- likely some of the former, but by dint of overwhelming evidence, most certainly the latter.
The ONLY thing that keeps me GOP is the Judges issue....man this sucks!
OT: What is sort of funny this year. Many states scrambled to move there primaries to a much earlier date. As it turns out for the Democrat party is that was a mistake. Later primaries are the ones that could make a difference this year.
The whole primary / caucus system really sucks in my mind. Here is MN the caucus was nothing more than a popularity contest, and carried no weight. It was basically a straw-poll.
The most important thing to do in primary states, is to make them only open to registered party members. And maybe there should be rule that you can only change parties one a year, to prevent too much mischief. (i.e. Operation Chaos) After all that is what got McCain in.
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