Posted on 07/12/2008 12:24:50 PM PDT by flyfree
HUDSON, Wis. Senator John McCain in a wide-ranging interview called for a government that is frugal but more active than many conservatives might prefer. He said government should play an important role in areas like addressing climate change, regulating campaign finance and taking care of those in America who cannot take care of themselves.
I count myself as a conservative Republican, yet I view it to a large degree in the Theodore Roosevelt mold, Mr. McCain said, referring to Roosevelts reputation for reform, environmentalism and tough foreign policy.
The views expressed by Mr. McCain in the 45-minute interview here Friday illustrated the challenge the probable Republican presidential nominee faces as he tries to navigate the sensibilities of his partys conservative base and those of the moderate and independent voters he needs to defeat Senator Barack Obama, his Democratic rival.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
theodore roosevelt was a progressive, i.e. liberal socialist.
Less TR and more Calvin Coolidge, please.
Teddy Roosevelt believed in Global Warming?
Who knew?
You sure your not thinking of FDR?
Teddy wasn’t particularly “conservative”, either. Belligerent, yes, conservative, no.
LOL!
McCain and Teddy hold a lot of similar positions. I wouldn’t call either “progressive liberal” though. Moderate Conservative, yes.
BS. You are talking about Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
"A hyphenated American is not an American at all. This is just as true of the man who puts 'Native' before the hyphen as of the man who puts German or Irish or French before the hyphen. Americanism is a matter of the spirit and of the soul. Our allegiance must be purely to the United States. We must unsparingly condemn any man who holds any other allegiance." Theodore Roosevelt... 1915
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The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrongdoer.
Theodore Roosevelt, speech at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (July 27, 1917)
Another reason I won’t vote for McCain. TR was a fascist, in the true sense. Read Jonah Goldbergs’ book “Liberal Fascism”.
Well better Teddy than Franklin.
Clinton said she identified with FDR
No, I’m not.
p. 92 “liberal fascism” by jonah goldberg:
“teddy’s new nationalism was equal parts nationalism and socialism. ‘the new nationalism,’ (teddy) roosevelt proclaimed ‘rightly maintains that every man holds his property subjet to the general right of the community to regulate its use to whatever degree the public welfare may require of it.’ this sort of rhetoric conjured fears among classical liberals (again increasingly called conservatives) that teddy would ride roughshod over american liberties. ‘where will it all end’? asked the liberal editor of the new york ‘world’ about the rush to centralize government power. ‘despotism? caesarism’?”
teddy roosevelt was a big government guy.
goldberg’s book is a good read. i highly recommend it.
Here is a passage from Jonah’s book:
Since the dawn of the Progressive Era, reformers have constructed an army of straw men, conjured a maelstrom of myths, to justify blurring the lines between business and government. According to civics textbooks, Upton Sinclair and his fellow muckrakers unleashed populist rage against the cruel excesses of the meatpacking industry, and as a result Teddy Roosevelt and his fellow Progressives boldly reined in an industry run amok. The same story repeats itself for the accomplishments of other muckrakers, including the pro-Mussolini icons Ida Tarbell and Lincoln Steffens. This narrative lives on as generations of journalism students dream of exposing corporate malfeasance and prompting government-imposed reform.
The problem is that its totally untrue, a fact Sinclair freely acknowledged.The Federal inspection of meat was, historically, established at the packers request, Sinclair wrote in 1906. It is maintained and paid for by the people of the United States for the benefit of the packers. The historian Gabriel Kolko concurs: The reality of the matter, of course, is that the big packers were warm friends of regulation, especially when it primarily affected their innumerable small competitors. A spokesman for Big Meat (as we might call it today) told Congress, We are now and have always been in favor of the extension of the inspection, also to the adoption of the sanitary regulations that will insure the very best possible conditions. The meatpacking conglomerates knew that federal inspection would become a marketing tool for their products and, eventually, a minimum standard. Small firms and butchers whod earned the trust of consumers would be forced to endure onerous compliance costs, while large firms not only could absorb the costs more easily but would be able to claim their products were superior to uncertified meats.
This story plays itself out again and again during the Progressive Era. The infamous steel industryheirs to the nineteenth-century robber baronsembraced government intervention on a massive scale. The familiar fairy tale is that the government stepped in to control predatory monopolies. The truth is almost exactly the opposite. The big steel firms were terrified that free competition would undermine their predatory monopolies, so they asked the government
to intervene and the government happily obliged. U.S. Steel, which was the product of 138 merged steel firms, was stunned to seeits profits decline in the face of stiff competition. In response, the chairman of U.S. Steel, Judge Elbert Gary, convened a meeting of
leading steel companies at the Waldorf-Astoria in 1907 with the aim of forming a gentlemens agreement to fix prices. Representatives of Teddy Roosevelts Justice Department attended the meetings. Nonetheless, the agreements didnt work, as some firms couldnt be
trusted not to undersell others. Having failed in the realm of economics, Kolko observes, the efforts of the United States Steel group were to be shifted to politics. By 1909 the steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie was writing in the New York Times in favor of Government control of the steel industry. In June 1911 Judge Gary told Congress, I believe we must come to enforced publicity [socialization] and government control . . . even as to prices. The Democrats still clinging to classical liberal notionsrejected the proposal as semi-socialistic.”
Just what in tarnation is "Moderate Conservative?" It's "moderate" and in my book I'm into getting rid of "moderates" in the repub party. Why? Because they're nothing but liberal condoning dipstix!
Ok i can see if it is a sarcastic comment...
I think by environmentalist it is meant that he was one of the greats that advocated conservation of resources, but not the conservation that the eco-liberal-nutbags call for today... he called for responsible stewardship of the planet and its resources... if I am not mistaken he started the National Park service and deem some of our great natural wonders national parks to protect them.... i may be wrong on that last part....
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