"Losing is for losers!"
My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy weighs in with deadly effect against those misguided souls who think they can win by making their party lose.
You know. Like the very wing of the Republican Party which is talking about sitting out the 2006 election did when it sat out the 1992 election- and gave us all the gift of Bill Clinton.
Oh, and by the way... I haven't seen much publicity about the CNN poll which shows that 79 percent of those who watched the President's speech had either a favorable or a very favorable response to it- and that support for the President's policies on immigration rose from 42 to 67 percent!
By the way, that poll seems to have vanished from the CNN site. Note how it currently reports the story.
ADDENDUM: Tom Bevan at the Real Clear Politics blog reports that a Zogby Interactive snap poll after the speech showed the public split 47 percent to 47 percent on the President's speech.
It also showed the nation closely divided as to whether the President's plan would solve the problem, with 47 percent in the affirmative, and 49 percent in the negative.
Seven out of ten Republicans are said to have liked the speech.
You know. Like the very wing of the Republican Party which is talking about sitting out the 2006 election did when it sat out the 1992 election- and gave us all the gift of Bill Clinton.
Oh, and by the way... I haven't seen much publicity about the CNN poll which shows that 79 percent of those who watched the President's speech had either a favorable or a very favorable response to it- and that support for the President's policies on immigration rose from 42 to 67 percent!
By the way, that poll seems to have vanished from the CNN site. Note how it currently reports the story.
ADDENDUM: Tom Bevan at the Real Clear Politics blog reports that a Zogby Interactive snap poll after the speech showed the public split 47 percent to 47 percent on the President's speech.
It also showed the nation closely divided as to whether the President's plan would solve the problem, with 47 percent in the affirmative, and 49 percent in the negative.
Seven out of ten Republicans are said to have liked the speech.
Comments
On the other hand, in 1994 they wised up a little bit and gave us people that would would push for a Contract with America, welfare reform, and a balanced budget.
;)
Why the boarder and not spending? Or growth in federal departments that Republicians were once in favor of disbanding?
Of course, the gift of 1992 kept giving until 2000- and a year later was 9/11. The Republican Congress did- briefly- balance the budget. It passed a series of historic tax cuts. Unfortunately, in combination with the spending 9/11 necessarily engendered, the result was the deficit we now "enjoy."
But do you seriously maintain that we were better off with Clinton and a Democratic Congress? That 1994 vote give us thosetax cuts (in context, a mixed blessing), reform of the committee system- and, in tandum with the second Bush presidency, brought us potentially within one vote of modifying or overturning Roe v. Wade.
Of course, if the Democrats win control of the Senate this November, that's as close as we'll get.
Bottom line, Dan, is this: libertarians and movement conservatives need the Republicans to get anything at all done. Without the Republican Party, the Right is irrelevant. And the Republican Party is a coalition.
In coalitions, you don't always get everything you want, especially when circumstances conspire against you. But your alternative is the Democrats, and something very like Clinton.
It's that, or keep plugging. The next presidential election is only two years away. Don't blow whatever might yet be accomplished in the last two years of the Bush administration to make a point you could make more effectively in the primaries and caucuses in 2008.
The secret, I believe, is to channel those frustrations constructively, rather than doing something you'll regret later- like the Right did in 1992.
That's why the wink was there. :)
I've done my damage in the Republican primary when it came Ohio's senators suffering from Beltway syndrome. I did not vote for Senator DeWine. Senator Voinovich will not get my vote in the next primary.
The Republican Party is not getting another dime from me. Not when the last time they asked for funds, they did it in the form of a survey. Fill in the survey, send it in with a $100 check, and your vote gets counted. They'd rather have my money than my vote. Thanks, but no thanks.
I will be going to the polls. I will not vote for Democrats. When I get the opportunity, I will examine these guys on the "right" and analyze their statements. I will say that no one has an entitlement to my vote just because they are of a certain party.
The problem isn't "the Republicans." The problem is certain specific Republicans. Only a fool votes for anybody simply because of the party he or she belongs to!
While I am in a different ideological part of the Republican coalition from most of those who are threatening to jump ship, let's be real. The smart move is for people who disagree with the direction the Party has been going to roll up their sleeves and get active in the caucuses and primaries in 2008- and change things! Whining and moaning accomplishes nothing- and sitting on one's hands while the Democrats run the board in 2006 accomplishes less than nothing!
The thing to do in 2006 is to withhold your vote from Republicans you disapprove of, and enthusiastically support those you do approve of. Nothing will be accomplished if Speaker Pelosi turns the next two years into a radical hate-fest in which any Bush Supreme Court nominee is rejected and the nation's business is neglected because the Congress is intent on trying and failing to impeach and convict Bush for disagreeing with it on policy!
I've never understood people whose reaction to political adversity is to whine and give up. The thing to do is to go to war!
I will conclude by saying that even though I am a social rather than an economic conservative, there are RINO's who drive me crazy, too- and that angry conservatives need to remember two things.
The first is that the Bush deficit is a drop in the bucket compared to the Reagan deficit. In large measure, it is the result of the coincidence of those historic Bush tax cuts with the onset of the War on Terror.
The second is that while securing our borders and getting a handle on illegal immigration is absolutely mandatory, during the past six years- due largely to Dubyah's continuing efforts- the national advantage the Democrats have had in the Hispanic vote has dropped from 30% to 10%; with or without illegal immigration, the Hispanic vote is the key to electoral dominance in this country for the next several generations- and that the solution to the problem of illegal immigration needs to be placed in a context which will not reverse that process, will not prevent any possibility of conservatives achieving power in the foreseeable future- and will foster, rather than frustrate, attempts to enlist a critical and naturally socially conservative constituency on the side of the angels!