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The GOP establishment trap
THe Washington Times ^ | 10/2/2011 | Brett Decker

Posted on 10/02/2011 10:36:10 AM PDT by SueRae

The whisper campaign has started already: Herman Cain can’t be elected president. It doesn’t matter that a poll this week by Rasmussen Reports shows Mr. Cain barely outside the margin of error in a head-to-head match-up against President Obama. In Republican offices in Washington and in state capitals across the nation, party functionaries are talking down one of the most attractive new personalities to emerge in national politics in years. This self-destructive behavior has less to do with electoral pragmatism than it does establishment control of the political process.

Party officials tend to be afraid of the new guy - especially if he’s outspokenly pure on thorny issues - because they like to go with the most predictable option, which typically means an incumbent or party regular. This is construed as playing it safe, but candidates who are spun as a “sure thing” often can’t win, especially during volatile election cycles when voters are anxious for new blood. As Rush Limbaugh reminded listeners on his Thursday show, new conservative star Marco Rubio wouldn’t be in the U.S. Senate today if Florida activists hadn’t rolled the GOP machine, which had gone all-out to nominate squishy Gov. Charlie Crist. Once jilted, the governor tried to get hitched to the Democrats and ended up limping along as an embarrassing, sour-grapes independent candidate.

In the Rubio case, Republicans fought the Tea Party, and the Tea Party won. It’s a lesson that needs to be learned if the elephants don’t want to ruin a grand opportunity to gain ruling control of Congress and the White House next year. The GOP’s conservative base is bursting with enthusiasm, but this activism isn’t motivated only to overthrow Barack Obama but also to elect politicians who are serious about cutting down government to save America from looming bankruptcy...

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
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This is going to be "We the People's" Presidential election, not the Parties' and certainly not the medias'.
1 posted on 10/02/2011 10:36:13 AM PDT by SueRae
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To: SueRae

Anyone who is for the complete replacement of the tax code cannot be allowed to win by the establishment. There are too many interests. Too many people who used hot shot lawyers and accountants to get the special breaks they wanted.


2 posted on 10/02/2011 10:41:33 AM PDT by ari-freedom (I'm a heartless conservative because I love this country.)
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To: SueRae

RINOs want to perpetuate the credit fiasco. Look at this economist’s take on it:

http://confoundedinterest.wordpress.com


3 posted on 10/02/2011 10:44:15 AM PDT by whitedog57
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To: SueRae

The RNC called me for a donation the other day. I told them to stuff it and ditch the RINO’s. Same as I have been telling the for the last 6 or so years. If they put someone up like they have been I will set this election out and batten down for the revolt that will surely follow. Guns food and ammo will be my top priority. The GOP needs a serious flushing.


4 posted on 10/02/2011 10:44:55 AM PDT by jimpick
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To: SueRae
“This is going to be “We the People's” Presidential election, not the Parties’ and certainly not the medias’.”

Yeah, I with you. If the Tea Party folks and other conservatives and independents stay focused on the issues and not allow themselves to be swayed by the media then Cain has a shot. However, if the Republican Rain Makers such as Karl Rove, the Bushes, NE Country Club Republicans, etc, are able to use their influence to persuade the conservative and moderate electorate to dismiss Cain as unelectable, then he won't win. So, the balloon is still in the air. We'll see...

5 posted on 10/02/2011 10:48:03 AM PDT by snoringbear (Government is the Pimp,)
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To: SueRae

After the fiascos the GOP Establishment engineered in 2006 and 2008 plus the way they scewed up what should of been 2 Senate wins in Colorado and Nevada in 2010, they should sit down and shut up in 2012.


6 posted on 10/02/2011 10:48:31 AM PDT by MNJohnnie (Giving more money to DC to fix the Debt is like giving free drugs to addicts think it will cure them)
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To: jimpick

Agreed, 100%.

My tagline says it all:


7 posted on 10/02/2011 10:49:23 AM PDT by EricT. (Is a country that would re-elect Baroke Hussein Owebama really worth saving?)
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To: SueRae

“...but candidates who are spun as a “sure thing” often can’t win...”

This is ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL. McCain was the PERFECT Republican candidate. He worked across the aisle time after time, stuck it to conservatives - in short did EVERYTHING PERFECT - he was the perfect moderate, a voice of reason in troubling times. Then what happened...

...they (the establishment) saw he didn’t have a prayer against the most radical candidate in US history, so they put Sarah on the ballot. Initially that helped a lot, but then the media got to work on her (and McCain), and by the time November came, those “independent” voters trickled away, turned off by Sarah...and it was over.

In the end, the Republicans lost, in part, because they were FORCED to put a conservative on the bottom half of the ticket, just to get some enthusiasm going...and the bottom half of the ticket became the issue with independents (although McCain would have been clobbered anyway). The same thing nearly cost Bush-41 his first election (with Quayle on the bottom half of the ticket).

The idea that we can run a moderate, like Perry, and then hope to balance him out with a conservative is INSANE. We’ll end up in the same mess as 2008.


8 posted on 10/02/2011 10:53:22 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: BobL

Romney’s theory is that McCain failed because he was older and inarticulate. Perry is also an inarticulate RINO. Christie is articulate but more than overweight. But maybe a stunning RINO would work? And if he fails, it wouldn’t be because he was a rino but because he’s Mormon.


9 posted on 10/02/2011 10:58:51 AM PDT by ari-freedom (I'm a heartless conservative because I love this country.)
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To: SueRae

Just about any candidate with the right politics can be elected provided they don’t do something stupid that will alienate conservatives and independents. A good candidate has a thick enough skin to blow off sniping from the right, the left, and the establishment, and he doesn’t get distracted from getting his message out, even at the risk of looking occasionally like a hypocrite. A loser is petty, insecure, and keeps an enemies list, even if he gets elected. Facts have more staying power than perceptions do. Another type of losing candidate is one who is the kind of ideologue that is more like a ticking time bomb than a real candidate. There have been lots of also-rans who deserved better because they help to shape the GOP agenda instead of trying to become the leader of a new cult.


10 posted on 10/02/2011 11:01:33 AM PDT by yup2394871293
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To: ari-freedom

“Romney’s theory is that McCain failed because he was older and inarticulate. Perry is also an inarticulate RINO. Christie is articulate but more than overweight. But maybe a stunning RINO would work? And if he fails, it wouldn’t be because he was a rino but because he’s Mormon.”

That’s hysterical. But I think Perry is a more stunning RINO than Romney, especially with that hair. But we would lose the Mormon excuse.


11 posted on 10/02/2011 11:02:23 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: ari-freedom

Putting another RINO in office is just a way to set us up for more stagnation at best, followed by another Obama.


12 posted on 10/02/2011 11:04:07 AM PDT by yup2394871293
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To: SueRae

Cain scares the established political leadership because they haven’t been able to co-opt him.
They have read his words , but don’t understand (or want to understand) his message.
They want one of thier own hand-picked candidates, who will follow the same BS line of the last eight -twelve years.

Expect to see more bogus allegations of bigot , racism , defeatism from the liberal mainstream media .

Did you ever notice Cain reading from teleprompter ? No ! And you won’t because it comes from the heart, and his very foundation; it’s called “commitment to principles “ something that the political leadership understands , but is fearful that it can’t control .


13 posted on 10/02/2011 11:04:47 AM PDT by Tilted Irish Kilt (Move Along ,... Nothing to see here ...)
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To: jimpick
The RNC called me for a donation the other day.

If you donate to the RNC or the DNC, you are donating to the same group.

The DNC has endorsed and supported, through the MSN, every so called, Republican, candidate since Reagan. Did any Conservative want McCain? NO. But the DNC did. And they got him.

Am I the only one to notice that whether or not ‘Republicans’ or ‘Democrats’ control the system, EVERYTHING ALWAYS STAYS THE SAME. This is why they are going to boot Obama out on his ass. He is a freakin nut. He is off the status quo reservation according to both establishment aristocracies.

What about that great Republican majority we gave them a few years back. What did they do with it? Secure the borders? NO Did they revise the tax code? NO

They did NOTHING of any consequence except reward their friends.

The whole DNC vs. RNC ruse is a good-cop/bad-cop scam. No matter who wins, the status quo will continue and everything will keep going the same as it is now just at a slower and more controlled rate than with Obama.

Illegals will keep flooding the country, government will keep getting bigger, and taxes will keep going up. That is what the establishment wants.

14 posted on 10/02/2011 11:05:34 AM PDT by 240B (he is doing everything he said he wouldn't and not doing what he said he would)
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To: BobL

“That’s hysterical. But I think Perry is a more stunning RINO than Romney, especially with that hair. But we would lose the Mormon excuse.”

but you don’t need to be a conservative to see that Perry has debating problems. There’s a reason why all these rino’s were crying and begging for Christie to save them from the other rino’s.


15 posted on 10/02/2011 11:08:25 AM PDT by ari-freedom (I'm a heartless conservative because I love this country.)
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To: ari-freedom

Debating problems, you are being really kind here. The man cannot put two thoughts together and form a sentence.


16 posted on 10/02/2011 11:12:50 AM PDT by org.whodat (Just another heartless American, hated by Perry and his fellow democrats.)
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To: BobL

Rick has the conservative goods, the record to prove them and the screaming match leveled at him will become suspect, only after we finish courting candidates without the goods whose rise is based only on how well they throw rocks at Rick Perry. The proof that conservatism is alive and actually on duty is in only one candidate whose got the record to prove it. Rick’s got and they want it. Overeach and the fiction flacking with half truths will eventually meet its Waterloo. Voters catch on to the killing field over time.


17 posted on 10/02/2011 11:13:43 AM PDT by RitaOK (TEXAS. It's EXHIBIT A for Rick, who needs to pound the fiction flackers back into the Stone Age.)
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To: Tilted Irish Kilt
Cain did a good job today w/Christianne Amanpour (I don't care if I misspelled her name.) She of course carefully framed questions around homos in the military, his opinion of Christy entering the race, etc, etc, with no question that could possibly make Zero look worse, and kept interrupting when he answered her inane questions.

I would only add, as background to the FL Straw Poll, that FL republicans last year nominated a CEO businessman and business founder Rick Scott over establishment republican Bill McCollum, of Clinton impeachment fame, for the governorship. He won.

If FL is an example, the time and mood of the country may be right for a non politician to become President.

18 posted on 10/02/2011 11:28:35 AM PDT by Jacquerie
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To: Jacquerie

I used to thing GBeck was wring about Republicans and Democratics being the same. That was until I supported outside beltway type conservatives. Then I began to see right thru kristol, rove and safely krautenhammer


19 posted on 10/02/2011 11:47:20 AM PDT by Donnafrflorida (Thru HIM all things are possible.)
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To: yup2394871293
Putting another RINO in office is just a way to set us up for more stagnation at best, followed by another Obama.

I fear that you are right. I am not sure that our country will not avoid a prolonged depression with another RINO and then another Obama.

I want to scream. If I am put into the position of having to vote for another "McCain", I am gonna rebel.

20 posted on 10/02/2011 11:47:34 AM PDT by VRW Conspirator (The unemployment problem only can be solved when Obama is unemployed.)
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