This is exactly where the wheels are going to come off your whole effort! Most Conservatives of the Ronald Reagan/Maggie Thatcher variety don't believe in concensus at all! In fact, Maggie said that "Consensus is the abscence of all leadership!"
Consensus and "coming together," are strictly Liberal ideas/concepts and will probably never be fully accepted by Conservatives of any flavor, unless they'r CINO's.(Conservatives In Name Only)(Of which we have a rapidly growing number of on FR!!!)(much to my dismay)
Agreed. But that is the whole point here. We do not have a leader. The political C movement is leader-less, at this point in time.
Bush isn't the leader of the Political Cs. He is, I think, the leader of the Social Cs. But the Contract with America showed that only the Political Cs have the platform that can win a majority.
If we had a leader who embodied my beliefs, like a Reagan, I'd not be posting this thread, I'm sure. But we don't.
Since I'm not capable or willing to be that leader, I'm trying the next best thing. Trying to identify who and what the party faithful is, and wants. And get some kind of a consensus on what we can all get behind.
No one else is doing anything to appeal to smaller govt folks that I can see. The revolution of '94 is dying. I'm hoping to find out that the movment behind it is still here.
If you first insist on a consensus, there is no need to lead and no requirement to take responsibility for any bad results. Hence, consensus is nearly always the policy choice of the governing class.
"...so that we can come together to form a consensus on what we decide we all do agree on."
----This is exactly where the wheels are going to come off your whole effort! Most Conservatives of the Ronald Reagan/Maggie Thatcher variety don't believe in concensus at all! In fact, Maggie said that "Consensus is the abscence of all leadership!"----
I might be able to offer a perspective that ties both of these together. There is *right* and *wrong*. It is nice when we can all agree on what is *right* and at that point, we have consensus. A leader of course, should do what is right.
Ronald and Maggie both sought to do what was right, and people followed. That is what made their leadership so demonstrable.
Unfortunately, what we see happening today is often not what is *right* but what is convenient.
When Bush says we can not deport 11 million illegals, he is correct, but not *right*. The *right* thing to do is enforce the law (prevent alien entry and enforce against companies that hire them and stop giving benefits to them) and then many of them will leave voluntarily.