Posted on 09/13/2007 1:10:10 PM PDT by SmithL
Los Angeles (AP) -- In a year when Republicans are slouching toward a post-Bush era, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says he has a winning strategy for his party — be like me.
California's popular governor is known for his kaleidoscopic political stripes, and that's his point. He said Republicans could face a future of Election Day misery unless the party makes a decisive shift to the political center and claims issues usually associated with the Democratic agenda, like global warming and health-care reform.
"We are dying at the box office," the actor-politician told party activists, lamenting a decline in Republican registration that has cost the party 370,000 voters in California since 2005. In a speech clearly intended to have national relevance, he said, "Our party has lost the middle."
Schwarzenegger's blunt warning left some of the party faithful asking if he is a Republican at all. But far from proposing radical notions, Schwarzenegger entered a national debate about the future of the party that has been taking stock of President Bush's ebbing popularity, a rapidly diversifying population and election losses last year that put the House and Senate in Democratic control.
His speech came at a time when the leading Republican presidential candidate in national polls is a former Democrat who supports abortion rights, gay rights and gun control — not exactly foundation stones of the right. Rudy Giuliani, who as New York mayor talked about transcending party labels and endorsed liberal lion Mario Cuomo for governor in 1994, could hardly be described as a conservative's conservative.
"The Republican Party got a big shock in November 2006 and it's trying to figure out what it means and what to do about it," said William A. Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
You can tell he’s gone over to the dark side when the AssPress actively campaigns for him.
Translation:
“The Republican paady will cease to exist unless it becomes the Democrat Paady.”
What’s he running for next, the DNC chair?
Did they stop? LOL
This is a statement only a clone of Bill Press could write. Yep, an off year election and the party in the White House lost seats. Now there's a headline.
This whole thing is goofy. Schwarzi, good grief, you're a hack governor doing a hack job. Quit trying to tell the rest of the party what to do.
Get the budgets under control. Use that veto pen. Get busy developing a sound fiscal policy that won't leave us paying for your deficits decades after you're out of office.
And for God sake, quit appointing leftists to positions of power.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
In deciding whether to vote for Giuliani in the primaries, I ask the question to CA Freepers - Looking back, was it better to recall Gray Davis or just let him rot California away?
Arnold Schwarzenegger says he has a winning strategy for his party — be like me.
you mean sell out?
that Muscle headded Moron is the Biggest Rino Traitor in California.
arnold fails to realize that people are pissed because this administration has not been conservative enough
arnold HAS to play the middle in CA
he has not choice
but nationwide....they want a REAL conservative.
Arnold has always been about Arnold getting more power/money/fame.....he is smart & ruthless....and even he got his butt handed to him by the uber liberal CA legislature.
We don’t get another Reagan. Schwarzenegger was the best we could do, but during veto season, he shows us why he is better than Gray Davis, Cruz Bustamante, and Phil Angelides.
Ahnold sucks. He is Gray Davis with charisma and much huger deficits. Steroids shriveled his gonads and gave him man-breasts. He is thoroughly defeated and led around by the nose by his socialist wife.
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