How much is President Bush and Bushies to Blame for this Loss?

opinion | 11/7/2006 | brianbaldwin

[rrrod]

My guess is a few hours LOL.

[Coldwater Creek]

I hardly call a 1% win over a Ford a joyous victory! I am extremely dissapointed that the margin was not huge!

[Howlin]

It makes you wonder just who the Republicans In Name Only are, doesn't it?

[Natural Law]

"Who do you think will be the new leader of the GOP?"

For the next two years it will still be Bush and Rove. The question is will they have learned anything by this debacle. I do look for a struggle at the grass roots level for the direction of the party. Hopefully, a conservative will emerge. Right now I am putting my money on the resurrection of Newt. He has shown he knows how to beat the left without becoming compromised in the process.

[Dosa26]

I hardly call a 1% win over a Ford a joyous victory! I am extremely dissapointed that the margin was not huge!

Waddya mean? Ford singlehandedly exposed the threat that a nuclear Australia would pose. /s

[cynwoody]

Sixth Year Jinx

		Senate			House
Year	President	Δ Dem	Δ GOP	Δ WH	Δ Dem	Δ GOP	Δ WH
1998	Clinton	0	0	0	5	-5	-5
1986	Reagan	8	-8	-8	5	-5	-5
1974	Ford	5	-5	-5	49	-48	-48
1966	Johnson	-4	4	-4	-47	47	-47
1958	Eisenhower	15	-13	-13	49	-48	-48
1950	Truman	-6	5	-6	-29	28	-29
1938	Roosevelt	-6	6	-6	-71	80	-71
1926	Coolidge	7	-6	-6	12	-10	-10
1918	Wilson	-6	6	-6	-19	21	-19
Mean				-6			-31

[Coldwater Creek]

LOL, Actually I don't know what we will do without a Ford to bash.

[LuxMaker]

Right on, brother.

[A CA Guy]

Well I think you are completely wrong.
Bush has been good on the war and the economy.

What could not be overcome his both history and the 24-7 slamming of the war and this Administration by the press.

Do you think Democrats could have in any way gotten more than 40% of the vote this election without the press acting as an arm of the terrorists and Democrats in opposing the Administration the last two years?

Then historically, in a 6th year like this, the other party usually picks up 45 seats in the house and some in the Senate.
By historic averages, the Democrats did poorly.

Had they not had a press giving a billion in good press to them and over a couple of billion on free bad press to the Republicans and Bush, there would probably have been gains for Republicans in both the Senate and Congress.

Sabotaging of the war effort by Democrats and the press along with other negative press efforts on the Administration is what came into play here IMO.

[SUSSA]

The new leaders on the Republican side of the isle will be more conservative. Congress will learn from this even if Bush doesn't. They have to run again. He doesn't.

Whenever there is a big loss by either party, the party moves back to its base. Republicans move right. Democrats move left.

The big question now is can the base overcome the party establishment and nominate a conservative in 08. If not we'll have a Democrat president and both houses of congress.

[TomasUSMC]

without becoming compromised in the process

---

You did hear about his little secretary he was having an affair with didn't you, while he was in congress?

Well anyway I don't know about bringing him back. I am hoping for a combat veteran, pro-life, and anti-gay.

[unsycophant]

<< Is it too early to say that the blame for this loss rests squarely with President Bush and the “Bushbots”? >>

Is it too late to say yes?

[umbagi]

It makes you wonder just who the Republicans In Name Only are, doesn't it?

I was late to this thread because I've been trying -- with no little difficulty -- to exercise adult restraint in composing an email reply to a good friend, a self-proclaimed Republican and conservative, who's gloating ad nauseum about "the lesson Bush has been taught today."

The guy's a veteran, has a PhD. from a respected school, built a multi-million dollar business from scratch, and bitches to high heaven about taxes, the minimum wage, welfare, crooked politicians -- and President Bush!

His first email tonight after the returns started coming in could have been written by Chuckie Schumer. I hope he enjoys watching the fruits of his labors against his own interests...

No, I take that back; tonight, I'll cherish the consoling thought that he'll be as miserable as his choices will make me in the coming days and months. I'll pray for forgiveness tomorrow.

[Howlin]

No real Republican gloats about being happy about higher taxes and federally funded stem cell research and tax cuts and minimum wage and a million other things.

Let's see how smug he is when you point out that this "victory" was orchestrated by Rahm Emauel, Hillary's butt boy, and that she will be our next president.

[umbagi]

He's a McCainiac, convinced that the Leader of the Dwarves is our only hope against Hillary.

It's sad, watching old friends as senility sets in...

[Sir_Ed]

I'm just curious what you consider extremes.

The GOP is going to move to the Left, and I'd really like to know if abortion, for example, is not that big of a deal to your wing of the GOP, or gun control?

Ed

[Howlin]

They going to move to the middle; the GOP is more than just the extreme right wing in this party. You all don't seem to understand or like that part.

My wing of the party is pro-life and against gun-control.


We just realize that the people we vote for aren't going to agree with US 100 percent of the time.

A thought lost on you one agenda people.

[Sir_Ed]

Rudy left his wife, too.

Ed

[ZULU]

With the facts staring you right in the face, you Bushbots STILL don't GET it.

True, somethings - like Foley, were beyond Bush's control.

But an intelligent, articulate President who was true to the values which put him in office twice would have been able to minimize the effects of an inevitable fluctuation in power in Washington.

Bush was and is right to a great degree on the war against terror, but has failed miserably in foreign policy objectives. Even there, such as the failure to employ "profiling" he has been wanting.

He turned what SHOULD have been a quick blitzkrieg in Iraq, followed by another in Iran and Syria, into what he said he would never do - nation-build. His attempt to create a "democracy" in an artificial tribal state dominated by a murderous sectarian religion, an area in which democracy never existed before, was simply too much for the American people to absorb in lives lost by American soldiers. Bush's military actions in the Middle East were initially correct, but he showed his "family values" by following in the footsteps of his incredibly inept - and far from conservative - father. Our continued presence in Iraq as targets of sectarian lunatics without taking an active initiative against those terror states supporting them is illogical and counterproductive. Now with the Democrat victory, America will do what it always does when the Dems take over - cut and run - and give the Muslims moral support in their ideological battle with western values and society.

Bush gave us one conservative Supreme Court justice, but had to be strong armed by his own constituents into giving us another.

He reeled from one foolish decision to another - failing to destroy Hezbollah when given the chance, defending the Dubai Port deal until forced to abandon it, digging his heels in over amnesty for illegal invaders when the overwhelming majority of Americans opposed it, and failing to step up to the plate and put mavericks in his own party like John McCain in their place when they crossed him.

The sad part of all this is the Dems will find they will be dealing with a far more compliant, "moderate" Bush than ever before, a man who never before used the veto when he should have, will not use it now. My prediction is they will never impeach him. He will be far more valuable for them as a negative portrait of what a Republican president should not allow himself to become - a portrait which can only help them in 2008.

Rove's master plan of pandering to illegals in the hope that the Hispanic vote will be secured has been exposed for the failure it is.

Finally, Bush's total ineptitude in intelligently articulating what his POSITIVE policies were, led to a fatal communication gap with the electorate.

It will take ANOTHER Newt Gingrich to fashion a populist, conservative Republican policy to regain control of Congress and America and undo the failures of the Bush Administration in connecting with the Republican base, securing the Reagan Democrats, evangelical Christians and conservatives.

The only "good" thing about this scenario is that most RINOs up for election like Tom Kean Junior, won't be in office to help a chastened Bush and the Dems achieve their social objectives - objectives which can only assure a Republican victory in 2008 if the Republican national leadership develops some backbone, and puts the blame where it properly lies, instead of putting on the traditional defeated Republican sackcloth and ashes, and blaming their ostensible but in fact very NON-
"conservative" values for this defeat.

Its time for the Republicans to regroup, re-assess the damage and the reasons for it, and learn from their tactical mistakes which contributed to this defeat. Its time for Bush's own party - what's left of it - to take STRONG and VISIBLE stands against the inevitable Bush-Democrat initiatives which will follow this defeat - like the amnesty for illegal invaders.

I, for one, hope NEVER to see another Bush in national office. They are all closet liberals who are closer to RINOs philosophically than they ever were to mainstream Republicans.

The Democrats never waver in their loyalty to their extreme left-wing base, although adopting the masque of a conservative appearance in areas where it would benefit them in the midwest, west and south. Unless the Republicans "come home" to their own base, abandon the philosophies of the Lincoln Chaffees, Rudy Giulianis,
John McCains and Tom Keans, the Republican party will become dead as a dodo and their constituents will coalesce around a new party after 2008 - one which more adequately expresses and defends traditional American values and opposes liberalism and European socialism.

[umbagi]

Please -- let's not see this thread degenerate into a Terri thread.

I'm pro-life in all respects, but must agree with Howlin on this point; Johnson beat Goldwater, in large part, over his "extremism ... is no vice" comment, and I suspect a well-populated Bell curve would show that 84% of voting Americans aren't voting the extremes, either way...