Posted on 09/11/2011 1:17:38 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
With the opening of the fall political season and tonight's Republican candidate debate, expect influential conservative voices to clamor for fellow conservatives to set aside half-measures, eschew conciliation, and adhere to conservative principle in its pristine purity. But what does fidelity to conservatism's core convictions mean?
Superstar radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh has, with characteristic bravado, championed a take-no-prisoners approach. In late July, as the debt-ceiling debate built to its climax, he understandably exhorted House Speaker John Boehner to stand strong and rightly praised the tea party for "putting country before party." But then Mr. Limbaugh went further. "Winners do not compromise," he declared on air. "Winners do not compromise with themselves. The winners who do compromise are winners who still don't believe in themselves as winners, who still think of themselves as losers."
We saw the results of such thinking in November 2010, when Christine O'Donnell was defeated by Chris Coons in Delaware in the race for Vice President Joe Biden's vacated Senate seat. In Nevada Sharron Angle was defeated by Harry Reid, who was returned to Washington to reclaim his position as Senate majority leader. In both cases, the Republican senatorial candidate was a tea party favorite who lost a very winnable election.
The notion of conservative purity is a myth. The great mission of American conservatism—securing the conditions under which liberty flourishes—has always depended on the weaving together of imperfectly compatible principles and applying them to an evolving and elusive political landscape.
William F. Buckley Jr.'s 1955 Mission Statement announcing the launch of National Review welcomed traditionalists, libertarians and anticommunists. His enterprise provides a model of a big-tent conservatism supported by multiple and competing principles: limited government, free markets, traditional morality and strong national defense.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
"When I began entering into the give and take of legislative bargaining in Sacramento, a lot of the most radical conservatives who had supported me during the election didn't like it.
"Compromise" was a dirty word to them and they wouldn't face the fact that we couldn't get all of what we wanted today. They wanted all or nothing and they wanted it all at once. If you don't get it all, some said, don't take anything.
"I'd learned while negotiating union contracts that you seldom got everything you asked for. And I agreed with FDR, who said in 1933: 'I have no expectations of making a hit every time I come to bat. What I seek is the highest possible batting average.'
"If you got seventy-five or eighty percent of what you were asking for, I say, you take it and fight for the rest later, and that's what I told these radical conservatives who never got used to it."
Wise words to consider...
Typical of the Times, to print a bunch of half-truth. True, there was compromise involved in the creation of our nation. But it was not a compromise between liberalism and conservative principles. It was a compromise between two different degrees of conservatism.
Reagan and the Founding Fathers were playing with losing hands. They managed to win anyway.
How do you compromise with a party (dems) who want to destroy America at its very core.
If there must be compromise, let it be compromise for movement in our direction...not the liberal direction. The liberals call it “compromise” if they say they’re satified with 50% of what they want, and we get nothing we want.
Horse manure. There is compromise and compromise. Reagan faced a Democrat majority in congress and got at least half of what he wanted, including winning the Cold War.
Boner faced a loser in the White House and a majority in the Senate with many Democrats worried about their seats, and managed to lose about 99% of the debt battle.
And a good negotiator knows just how much to compromise. A poor negotiator compromises before the debate begins. That was Boner. He made it clear before the final crunch came that he was going to back down. And he did.
WTF What about Rubio,Paul and the rest of the Tea Party supporters who won in the biggest turn over in years.Remember what Thomas Jefferson said.” On matters of style swim with the current on matters of principle stand like a rock”
America already has compromise. They are called the Democratic and Republican parties.
This is a strawman. If we were or had been getting getting 75% or 80% there would be reason to rejoice. But the leadership of the Stupid Party hardly ever gets anything - who remembers the Continuing Resolution spending cuts fraud or the debt ceiling fiasco? We are now looking into the abyss culturally and economically, and we don’t have leadership strong enough, or a people with enough character, to do what needs to be done to save the country from catastrophe.
Compromise with today’s marxist/socialist democrat party is like agreeing to just a small piece of turd in the punchbowl.
There’s just a few problems.
When dealing with a nuclear Iran, you can’t afford to make a mistake.
When dealing with 60 trillion dollars in unfunded liabilities, you can’t afford to play around.
When you have 9% unemployment and 47% of young African Americans unemployed and people are getting killed near the border, you can’t just smile and make a deal and pretend everything will be just fine.
And I would add that Boner didn’t lose 99% of the battle because he is weak and stupid. He didn’t get to be Speaker of the House by being weak and stupid. He lost it because he is corrupt, and allowed himself to be bought off, and bought off enough of his troops to ensure that Obama won the battle despite all his problems.
That’s what his kind of ruling-class politician does.
We are here today because of Rush and he was referring to “compromising with yourself” which is always a bad deal. Angle was robbed of ver seat by union vote fraud and the other one was a true misfire. The Tea Party will learn and do better in the next elections. The writer is creating grey where black and white are still apt.
What I want to know is when’s the press going to deal with the myth of media objectivity?
Some issues can only be addressed by compromise. But when someone insists we can borrow our way to prosperity, there is no compromise with such fiscal and monetary madness.
60 million dead unborn babies don’t like compromise.
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