Pajamas Media

104 Comments

1. quasar:

Adam, You have perfectly described why the path should be cleared for Sarah Palin to emerge from the fog with ranks being closed behind her. Sometime in the very near future it’s gonna be “lead, follow or get the hell out of her way”!

May 13, 2009 - 2:24 am 2. Derek:

It’s rare that I read an article on this topic (on this site) that doesn’t make me laugh.

I really like the breakdown of what made Reagan an icon for conservatives. I think that’s a valuable lesson. Too many times an article like this goes down the drain of pretending it’s the 80’s again. You didn’t do that, you extracted the broad principles that made Reagan iconic. That’s something that can be applied universally.

Politicians are trying to replicate Reagan’s platform and voting coalition. You can’t win doing that. This isn’t 1980. But you CAN learn from his character and from how he governed.

May 13, 2009 - 3:32 am 3. Carl:

Reagan here, Reagan there, everywhere you look there is Reagan… we need more Reagan – - Yea!!

How many votes does anyone think that Obama would have pulled if he, his party and the media went around babbling Kennedy, oh great Kennedy, we need more John Kennedy and that’s what Obama stands for?

Zero!

Zero votes because 75%, or more of the voters do not know who or what John Kennedy is, nor do they care. Obama won the election because he went straight at these voters saying, “I am the one! I will give you what you want. I will take care of you!”

The Republican Party needs to connect with young people with current, easily understood ideas, phrases, principles and people that they identify with, like and trust. Ronald Reagan does not fit that profile. Period! That does not mean that any conservative values are forsaken! Hello?

It is not that difficult to do. George W. Bush had the concept mastered immediately following the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks. The man had the strong support of 90%+ of the nation because his actions directly represented what the people wanted and what the nation needed.

Then he (and a motionless GOP Congress) turned around and pissed it all down the drain by trying to turn our country into a dumping ground for illegal Hispanic aliens.

Sara Palin has it. Instantly she energized, connected together and rallied the young, middle age and old across an entire nation enough to vote for the absolute worst possible candidate the GOP has ever ran for it’s presidential candidate.

Alas, we lost the election and shortly thereafter Sara was tossed under the bus. Not one prominent member of the GOP had the guts, courage, integrity and political skills to defend or stand up for Sara..

No they were busy chanting, “Reagan, we need Reagan…….”

May 13, 2009 - 4:17 am 4. BPT (Australia):

Is “rebuilding” the Party the best way to look at it? I mean – all things considered – I think the Republicans have a pretty good track record.

May 13, 2009 - 4:31 am 5. Edward A:

The Rush-publicans are will lead to the ever-shrinking GOP. All one hears today is how the GOP is fading as a national party. America needs to have a strong opposition party, if the GOP can’t be the one, let them move on and another party formed.

May 13, 2009 - 5:13 am 6. Manxman:

Reagan? Time to bury that old man and move on. He is nowhere near as “conservative” as his worshippers make him out to be. He got by on personality – not substance.

May 13, 2009 - 5:30 am 7. sheesh:

I thought Reagan was dead. Maybe I’m wrong on that. Meryl, can you clear this up, please?

May 13, 2009 - 5:33 am 8. Cato:

“Unlike leftist interests such as labor unions,
environmentalists, and “community activists,” the
livelihood of most middle-class conservatives is
not tied up in who runs the government.”

This is certainly what most of us believe now and have always believed. However, the real point of the last election and the predations of the current regime upon the rule of law is that it by taking that attitude, we have allowed those who are activist, but not the ones who pay the bills, to dominate political decision-making.

Already, those who get more from government than they pay – the 50% who pay 3% of income taxes and the myriads of government and union employees – are very close to a majority of the voting public. In some states, they are a majority. If we don’t get out there and work like hell for conservative candidates dedicated to making sure the burden of taxation is borne by all, and to utterly eliminating public sector unions (and a large percentage of public sector employees), it will be over for the US as a constitutional republic under the rule of law.

May 13, 2009 - 5:36 am 9. Sk8 Punk:

Great Post. But how are these messages going to resonate with new voters? When are conservatives going to take the time to realize that the youth vote is primed on so many levels for the Reagan message when it is given a context that is critical and meaningful to them: technology. I am a young techie and follow about 10 tech blogs daily. Obama pulled a threat level post on Wired.com within two days of his election. Take the Reagan message, “government isn’t the solution, government is the problem” to the issues facing technology and conservatives can start winning again. This is a huge issue with youth and one that resonates deeply with them. Why isnt anyone on the right getting the message?

May 13, 2009 - 5:37 am 10. BackwardsBoy:

The GOP currently diplays to its supporters a glaring lack of strength. For example, when, since the election, has any Republican called for us to start exploring and utilizing our own natural resources as part of a comprehensive energy policy? This was a hot-button issue just a few months ago and Republicans seem to have forgotten it.
The GOP will return to relevance when it decides to support the issues that matter to the majority of Americans: keeping good paying jobs here, a sensible energy policy that’s not guided by fairytale theories, and reduced interference in our daily lives by senseless regulations, fees, and taxes.

May 13, 2009 - 5:51 am 11. Ed Wallis:

Carl #3,

I don’t think your concern re: Reagan/Palin makes either mutually exclusive. If anything, I believe I have heard many speak of the charisma of the latter being comparable to a degree of the former. Furthermore, the “genuineness” of each has been elevated, as a desirable feature of a conservative candidate.

I agree with you that “the message” which needs to go out to connect with young people should be one “with current, easily understood ideas, phrases, principles and people that they identify with, like and trust.” To that end, my suggestion would be “Pursuit of Happiness/Freedom” versus “Big Brother Government/Taxes”.

May 13, 2009 - 5:53 am 12. Carl:

Re: Sk8 Punk:
“Take the Reagan message, “government isn’t the solution, government is the problem” to the issues facing technology and conservatives can start winning again.”

I rest my case. A young man that understands how to mathematically add conservatism + Reagan = GOP wins….

May 13, 2009 - 5:59 am 13. sheesh:

Forget Reagan. Focus on mustard. And Miss California. Better yet, Miss California slathered in mustard. Now that’s a winning ticket – “Prejean and Dijon 2012.”

May 13, 2009 - 6:00 am 14. mamma:

Excellent, excellent article and analysis. Most of the Republicans in office in my home state vote no differently than the majority of Democrats. And you are right- they aren’t worth my time or my money. When we try to run a real conservative, Herman Cain, the Republican Party dumped him. I know because I was at a dinner party with big Republican donors. He wasn’t part of the “in crowd”; they wanted to stick with the same old completely useless candidates. They refused to back a black conservative candidate. Talk about having no vision!
I don’t see much difference between hurtling towards a fascist state at 100MPH or ambling along at 25MPH.
I say throw them all out and start over. I can’t believe McCain got as many votes as he did.I voted for him because I knew what faced us if Obama won, and I love Sarah Palin.
The Republicans don’t support their own conservative members. Look how they treated Toomey – to keep that classic piece of political detritus- Specter- in Congress. Explain that brilliant move to me. For the past few elections the Republicans have been doing this all over the country- protecting the Washington insider and dumping the real conservatives. Thereby destroying the party. They can take a few bows for helping to destroy the country by effectively removing any one who would stand up to this fascist takeover. I am beyond disgusted with the Republicans. They are a bunch of Quislings.
Getting mad at the Democrats is like getting mad at shark for biting you- taking away your liberty is what leftism is all about. But the Republicans- what are they doing but taking up valuable space?
Obama is nationalizing everything and what do I get from the Republicans? Newsletters about keeping taxes low and starting new , government sponsored, rail lines. Low taxes wont mean much when all our property rights are gone, fellas.We’ll be paying 70% of nothing. I don’t need cheap transportation to Charlotte right now- I need my freedom of speech and religion, thank you very much.
Ok- I will take a breath and go have my coffee now. I think I have made myself clear. The Republican party needs a few more Republicans.

May 13, 2009 - 6:00 am 15. Bill:

“I thought Reagan was dead”

So is Karl Marx, but that isn’t stopping the Democrats.

May 13, 2009 - 6:02 am 16. sheesh:

6. Manxman . . .”Reagan? Time to bury that old man and move on . . . he got by on personality.”

You better watch your mouth, boy, lessen we have to take you over to the “Myths About Guns” post and teach you the meaning of respect.

May 13, 2009 - 6:41 am 17. Sapwolf:

Yes, the base must be secured first and principles communicated. Then the candidate steps forward. That person is Sarah Palin.

I won’t even vote for anybody else, at least until somebody else steps forth to speak big-tent libertarian/conservative vision. That’s how you get my interest.

You want a sensible starting point, read Manly’s 11 principles of conservatism over on Manly’s Republic. That is what we stand for. Simple and big-tent and a distincly different philosophy than the Dems.

Product differentiation.

Oh, and make those open primaries ‘closed’.

May 13, 2009 - 6:49 am 18. Войска ПВО:

9. Sk8 Punk writes:

“Great Post. But how are these messages going to resonate with new voters? When are conservatives going to take the time to realize that the youth vote is primed on so many levels for the Reagan message when it is given a context that is critical and meaningful to them: technology”

This is also a GREAT post. As an old techie, I would agree with SK8. Also, the zen of this situation is that the young techies will grow up (as in get older), marry, have a family, and ultimately face the reality that our unresponsive, pathetic government is rifling their wallets for its specious and wanton spending.

May 13, 2009 - 6:51 am 19. Sapwolf:

“Life, Liberty, and the Puruit of Happiness”

That should be the GOP’s slogan. It’s not rocket science.

May 13, 2009 - 6:54 am 20. Spider79:

One problem with the GOP resurgance keeps coming to the forefront in my mind. Why on earth would an honest, hard working, intelligent person want to enter modern National politics?

The first time I got lectured to by the likes of Barney Frank, Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi or Arlen Specter, I promise my response would lead the evening news.

May 13, 2009 - 6:59 am 21. Pastor of Muppets:

Sarah can’t win. She’s far too divisive. She will only get conservative votes. She cannot secure the amount of liberal, moderate and independent votes necessary to win a national election. Whether it’s fair or not, the Dems will just keep looping her interview with Katie Couric, and America will remember why they don’t want her to be president. Additionally, this is shaping up to be a pretty tough year for the Alaska governor; her popularity has nosedived in the last few months. If she can’t even maintain a modest level of support in her home state, how is she going to win a national election?

May 13, 2009 - 7:10 am 22. uburoisc:

Sara Palin did not belong on center stage as a VP candidate; she was woefully unprepared. By the time Reagan ran in 1976, he had already become a very polished public speaker and a 2-term governor of a large state. Sara Palin isn’t a bad candidate, but she needs to establish a solid record on a national level before anyone is going to take her seriously. McCain picked her because she was a women, and he was behind in the polls, not because she was remarkable in any way.

I think the article has it about right, the GOP can’t have Reagan back, but the party should pick its leaders for their conservative priciples. The ideal candidate’s responsibility is to persuade people to adopt their ideas, not try and sell socialism lite. The economics of socialism do not add up, and a great conservative candidate will master the numbers and then explain why it won’t work to the people before it is too late and the whole thing collapses.

May 13, 2009 - 7:11 am 23. Fred Beloit:

Say, Sheets, aren’t you going to be late for class down at the old HS? Better get a move on or you’ll miss the daily indoctrinations.

May 13, 2009 - 7:13 am 24. Fred Beloit:

It looks like the Repub powers in Florida have decided to go the moderate/RINO route again and run another Specter for the Senate. Bad news, bad news. Not that he will lose necessarily, but that he might win.

May 13, 2009 - 7:22 am 25. JED:

“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” works for me. I would add, “and get your federal hands out of my wallet.” Add again, “let us kick that can of political correctness down the road.”
Violations of the rules of law, politicians and hacks being above the law, yielding American sovereignty to foreign interests, and popularity as the principle of leadership can not be on the platform. Include in that protection the abuses of power with possibly fatal trillion dollar social experiments. Government is the referees and not the players. I think that the freedom to gain or go extinct has been working since 1776.

May 13, 2009 - 7:30 am 26. Bilgeman:

#8 Cato:
“…and to utterly eliminating public sector unions (and a large percentage of public sector employees),…”

A larger version of the PATCO strike would be quite do-able, and infinitely beneficial.

Maneuver the AFSCME and the SEIU into declaring a strike, and then set the deadlines for the rank and filers to return to work or face permanent replacement.

With unemployment hovering at around 10%, and in some places even higher, filling the jobs of those who decide to go down with their unions shouldn’t be an insurmountable task.

Seeing as how little public goodwill civil servants have engendered, I reckon that the only persons left manning THOSE picket lines will be the contracted schlubs from ACORN.
The rank-and-file will have jumped ship, and the union leadership will be shopping for homes in Brazil, (or another non-extradition treaty nation).

While I have been a union rank-and-filer for over twenty years, I am opposed to public-sector unions. What outside organization can offer more job protections than the civil service system already does?

The public sector union scam is just another racket whereby the citizens’ tax dollars are indirectly funneled to the coffers of one political party.

May 13, 2009 - 8:01 am 27. Bilgeman:

#21 PoM:
“Sarah can’t win. She’s far too divisive. She will only get conservative votes. She cannot secure the amount of liberal, moderate and independent votes necessary to win a national election.”

Say, chum, you DO realize that nobody heeds your advice here, right?

If you’re not a troll, then you really should be collecting a few greasy ducats from Soros’ oily fingers, because you sure are doing a creditable imitation of one.

“If she can’t even maintain a modest level of support in her home state, how is she going to win a national election?”

Are you at all familiar with the career of Richard Nixon?

May 13, 2009 - 8:06 am 28. billslayer:

I hate to say it but Palin is not smart or articulate. We need a speaker as articulate as Obama who is absolutely willing to call him out to his face when the debates happen. McCain was far too compromised and afraid of the media. Moreover we need someone who is not compromised by some sort of readymade scandal or his political record.
You know what? The democrats are going to hang themselves, but we can’t let that be our only hope, we have to have a confident fearless and certain demeanor ourselves about our beliefs and a leadership that reflects that.

May 13, 2009 - 10:07 am 29. Captain Obvious:

Okay.

Why am I not seeing in these comments the first name that pops into my mind?

In the 2008 primaries, the GOP showed us conservatives that anti-Christian bigotry trumped proven leadership in a Democrat-dominated state coupled with the ability to dominate any debate where he was allowed to speak. Mike Huckabee should have been the candidate who could have given us a GOP win. Party bigwigs joined the MSM and picked a guy who didn’t look in the final analysis like he really wanted the job. So we have a freshman senator who wants our nation to divest itself of its power, character and freedom to join some kind of global thing.

I’m one of those who only came on board with the McCain campaign after he picked Sarah Palin. Huckabee, Palin, and like minded-leaders need to get together and give us a party we can support. I’m through with the Republican party.

May 13, 2009 - 10:23 am 30. Bill:

What we need is someone like the brilliant British Tory MEP Daniel Hannan- a fellow who can slice and dice both NuLabour and the EU with an elegant straightrazor.

The GOP (distinct from conservatives) is a political party: and for that party, at this moment, the important message is simple and the truth: the Democrats have gone completely off the deep end. Voters don’t *for* candidates or parties nearly so much as they vote *against* them. Mr Hopey-Changey was just the feelgood front end for Bush-fatigue, and McCain lost principally (not solely) because he was painted as “McSame” and “Bush III.”

Now the combat boot is on the other foot. All the GOP has to be is The Party That Isn’t Totally Batshit Insane, when the Obamanauts’ Monopoly-money house of cards implodes.

May 13, 2009 - 10:33 am 31. tmouser:

“Sarah can’t win. She’s far too divisive. She will only get conservative votes. She cannot secure the amount of liberal, moderate and independent votes necessary to win a national election.”

As a strong Sarah supporter, I have to agree with this somewhat. Only because she and the rest of the Republicans have allowed the extreme religious right to hi-jack their party and completely alienate them from liberals, moderates and independents. While I firmly believe in freedom of religion, the (extreme) Christian Right has to realize the louder they shout others down with their fundamentalist principals, the more they sound like an intolerant hate group and it’s destroying the Republican party. America has a very diverse population, and while most still hold Jesus as their Lord and Savior, most do not want Jesus as their leader in the White House. Church and state *must* be held separate.

May 13, 2009 - 10:33 am 32. Self-hating Boomer:

The Republican Party reminds me of the motley crew of the Wizard of Oz. You have a lion with no courage, a bleeding-heart tinman reputed to have no heart, and a scarecrow convinced that he has no brain, all bamboozled and intimidated by a humbug of a blowhard opportunist who has no power other than to bluster.

The only one with anything on the ball is the dog. My question is where’s our Toto? We need a scrappy and irreverent little dog to pull the curtain back.

May 13, 2009 - 11:14 am 33. goy:

Bravo, Adam. You have quite succinctly characterized the current situation threatening our Republic. Democrats and moderates are actively attacking or compromising away the Republican Form of Government guaranteed by our Constitution. Without conservative leadership, soon, we are destined to become France.

And Reagan was about leadership. A big part of leadership is the ability to communicate and connect with the public, but it’s not the only part, and what makes Reagan a mythic figure to some today is the fact that he had that ability as well as shrewd economic, business and political sense. His judgment… like that of most human animals… was not perfect. That he achieved what he did with the same failings we must all overcome is another reason why he’s respected now.

Today, however, there is no leadership. On either side. Of all the conservative political figures, only Sarah Palin looks remotely like a leader. That she has been relentlessly attacked by the leftists is sufficient evidence that she is a viable new face of the GOP. If she were not, they would not waste precious resources on demonizing her.

BHO is also not a leader. He has a well-honed ability to communicate and connect with the public, but apart from the political thug tactics he learned while coming up through the Chicago Democrat Machine, that’s as far as it goes. Without a sycophant media operating full-time to actively hide his complete lack of experience and anti-American sentiments, he would be running some unfortunate neighborhood’s school board on Chicago’s South Side today.

.

28. billslayer: - We need a speaker as articulate as Obama who is absolutely willing to call him out to his face when the debates happen.

In an extemporaneous debate on the issues, moderated by someone whose future book sales did NOT depend directly on who was elected, Sarah Palin – blindfolded, chewing gum and wearing headphones filled with Death Metal – would run rings around uh… uh… uh… uh… uh… Obam… uh… sans teleprompter.

Why do you think the lefty whores in the entrenched, Fifth Column media keep up the attacks on Palin? They will continue to do so, because they know she threatens the leftist momentum they’ve been carefully nurturing since the day Al Gore lost the 2000 Election by failing to carry his own home State.

May 13, 2009 - 11:33 am 34. PJ:

I used to be Independent. I turned Republican because of Reagan. He made me feel good about things. Then came his sidekick Bush Sr. I thought welllll….Then came Dubya and it was…What The F…! They turned the party so far to the right that I didn’t recognize it any more. This happened within the first year of his first term. He cured me of Conservatism and even Republicanism. NEVER AGAIN! Religiousness was a joke with him. A farce. So long as they let Bozos the likes of Limbaugh control the party, they deserve what they get.

May 13, 2009 - 12:03 pm 35. Northern Light:

The thing about Ronald Reagan was that he was an admirer of The New Deal and often quoted FDR in his speeches.

If Reagan was alive today some people would call hiim a RINO.

Rush is wrong to denounce the moderate Republican idea of a “listening tour”. In a democracy political leaders should listen to the people now and then. Communism is the political system where leaders tell the people what to think.

Having said that, it is really funny when a group that wants to hear from Americans beyond the Beltway has their first meeting in a pizza parlor INSIDE the Beltway. Oh, and why does it seem silly that this group wants us to believe they are the new blood the Republicans need when one of them is the 73 year-old loser of the last election and another one is named Bush? If Jeb Bush is commited to rebranding, perhaps he should change his last name.

May 13, 2009 - 12:03 pm 36. cncfox:

Adam, I took the time to read this but once again I do not see where the party has any realistic understanding of why it lost. I mean no disrespect when I say that this party will never resurrect itself worshiping at the alter of a past president. It won’t. When the base wants to only define the path in total conservative ways, don’t you think that might be a good deal of the problem? There are too many blind, single issue minds all “wamixed” together for open minded moderates to take. I think the only solution is for you all to start your own little conservative party, become a shrill obsolete minority and then when you get tired of being irrelevant maybe the the best and brightest will return with some degree of tolerance, common sense and reality in your thinking patterns.

May 13, 2009 - 12:09 pm 37. California Conservative:

Adam….you hit the nail right on the head. Great thoughts and ideas about what is needed to reinvigorate the Republican Party. Keep the good ideas coming.

May 13, 2009 - 12:18 pm 38. urbanleftbehind:

#35,

You could have Jeb Bush change to his wife’s name, but natch, you’d lose the base right there.

May 13, 2009 - 1:14 pm 39. urbanleftbehind:

–wife’s maiden name–

May 13, 2009 - 1:15 pm 40. ratatosk:

As long as the republicans continue to push non-conservative ideas, they’ll continue to look like a mass of two-faced hypocrites. It is impossible to believe that the party which held power in Washington for several years was, in any way conservative.

THAT more than anything else, is what is killing the GOP. If at least some senators, congressmen or governors had decried the Bush Administration as it ran in the opposite direction of conservative values… maybe there would be something worth trusting there. But, no. Some governors said NO to Obama’s money. Good for them. WHY WEREN”T THEY SAYING NO TO BUSH once shit started going wrong?!?!?!

Not Huckabee, not Sarah, not Mitt, not Rush, not … Well, not anyone currently in the big leagues. They were all banging the “Let’s all support our President and his wacky vision of Bizzaro-Conservatism. For anyone to have a shred of trust, they’ll have to rise up out of obscurity, not out of the crew that stood by and watched the ‘neoconservative’ wing turn the GOP into a ‘nonconservative’ party.

May 13, 2009 - 1:31 pm 41. Fred Beloit:

The modestly self-named Northern Light #35 says, “If Reagan was alive today some people would call hiim a RINO.”

I must disagree. No RINO would fire the members of a striking government union, now would he/she. Pull the the other one, Light.

May 13, 2009 - 1:41 pm 42. billslayer:

We need to identify and say clearly why some have this longing for a return to Reagan. He was magnetic and articulate and his ideas succeeded. We threw that all away when we co-signed on Bush’s spending and his ridiculous thinking on invading Iraq. Yes, I’m going to catch some flak for that, but if you want to move forward we need to purge our ideological ranks of Bush’s heresies. Does that mean we give an inch to the libs? No, it doesnt.
And NO, NO and more NO! Palin is NOT intelligent or articulate. I know this bc I’ve watched and listened to her speak. Pinning any hopes on her is silly.

May 13, 2009 - 2:05 pm 43. David Thomson:

“The thing about Ronald Reagan was that he was an admirer of The New Deal and often quoted FDR in his speeches.”

Ronald Reagan did not possess a deep understanding of FDR and the New Deal. Recent scholarship is starting to change things. We now clearly understand that the New Deal made things worse. FDR’s relentless attacks on investors delayed the economic recovery. This foolishness ceased once WWII started. Roosevelt realized that he had to stop harassing the capitalist class if we were to defeat the fascists in Europe and Japan.

“…and his ridiculous thinking on invading Iraq.”

Invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Saddam would have remained a menace to the Western world. We have also introduced a true democracy in the Middle East. This increases our nation’s safety.

May 13, 2009 - 3:07 pm 44. shaui-jan:

two years is a long time.all the republicans have to do is hammer obama(cakewalk) and cut out the dead wood.
if they cannot accomplish this,they deserve what they get.
palin’s viable,she was obviously mishandled and left unprepared.i doubt she would let that happen again.the left cannot stand letting her go,a big sign.
as far as intelligence goes,look at biden.he’s smart…he’ll even tell you so himself.
but have you ever heard more ignorant remarks,uttered en masse,from a cognizant human being before?
btw…if you want to see reagan at his best,check him out on youtube stumping for goldwater.

May 13, 2009 - 3:38 pm 45. G Alston:

#43 — Invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Saddam would have remained a menace to the Western world. We have also introduced a true democracy in the Middle East. This increases our nation’s safety.

Saddam was no threat, koolaid drinker. He was boxed in, going nowhere, and a threat to nobody outside Iraq. What would have increased our nation’s safety was using that money to build 250 nuclear plants.

Energy = wealth, stability, and security. (E = ws2)

May 13, 2009 - 5:00 pm 46. Northern Light:

#41 Fred Berloit. I would have made a different choice in defending Reagan’s credentials.

Ronald Reagan was a former member of the Screen Actors Guild. He often mentioned that he was a former union leader.

He was also a liberal Democrat until the 1950s and as I said an admirer of FDR and the New Deal.

I said that some people would call him a RINO because there seem to be people who would declare anyone without perfect conservative credentails as a RINO.

Could a current Republican say nice things about the New Deal without someone calling him a RINO?

May 13, 2009 - 5:17 pm 47. sheesh:

44 shan-jaya . . . From your mouth to Rush’s ears.

May 13, 2009 - 6:22 pm 48. cannedjam:

Bottom line. The republican party does not need to look to the past, other than the recent past, and only to say “we are sorry for screwing up”.

The party needs to clean house, remove any members who have veered from the simple path of personal responsibility, smaller government, and honesty, and stay on task.

The Party needs to keep to a simple message of we were wrong in the past for going off message, this economic collapse was a wakeup call, you deserve better, we get it, and we will fight for your personal freedoms. That is it. That is all that is needed to regain control. Obama will hand this to the Republicans as long as the party has the discipline needed to offer a viable alternative.

May 13, 2009 - 7:46 pm 49. JackH:

The Republican party has to die. As a Conservative I am taking a contrarian approach and joining the Democratic party. I will support pro-life and gun rights Democrats and slowly subvert the leftits from within. As long as I deliver votes I will have a voice. Blue-Dog Democrats like Jim Webb will be a significant voice.

The Democrats know how to handle coalitions. The Republicans do not.

Good luck, look forward to working with you in the future, assuming you ever decide what you stand for.

May 13, 2009 - 8:01 pm 50. shaui-jan:

sheepsh;so then…. where is my check?
still in shallow end i gather.didn’t you get the memo?muppet contructed a straw monument so gigantic,that it eclipsed anything seen since ‘burning man’.you’ve got a lot of work ahead of you,so don’t be timid.head right over to’the united hates of america’post and make me proud.it’s untouched,troll free.remember,im rooting for you.usa!usa!usa!

May 13, 2009 - 8:45 pm 51. KenJ:

I get a bit tired of Republicans taking their cues from the MSM. They say we’re in trouble, we say, “you’re right”. They criticize one of ours, we say, “you’re right”. Can’t you clowns understand there was no way we were going to win the last election? The GOP is not broken. This country is broken. We have citizens who live in TV land. Someone on TV says something, it’s gospel truth. Obama was made an Idol. They pressed, and pressed and pressed. Accept the basic truth: there was no way we were going to win. It was so obvious yet we have steadily thumped on the “we’re broke” theme. Quit saying we’re broken and need to be fixed. We need to find away around the MSM and the idiots who get their 15 second sound bites each night. We need to stop eating our own.

May 13, 2009 - 9:14 pm 52. Jayson H:

LOL. I think I see what’s going on here. A lot of pretend conservatives are blogging on here and are acting like they’re fed up with the Republican party so they are leaving to join up with the Democrats. No real conservative worth their salt would ever go over to left wing controled Democrat party unless he was a true turn coat RINO or a Democrat pretending to be a Republican. Very funny, ha ha, your silly!

May 13, 2009 - 9:48 pm 53. Wally Lind:

It’s simple, you get more votes, you win (except when you have close ones, and slimies like Al Franken). To get more votes you have to appeal to the most voters. That doesn’t just include the 33% who gave Bush their approval. It includes moderate republicans and independents. Don’t listen to the likes of Rush Limbaugh, he said he wasn’t a republican and he meant it. He did everything he could to defeat the republican nominee in 2008. I like many of his positions, but he is not a member of the GOP, and should have no say in who get’s the republican presidential nomination. EVER! Rush, butt out of my party or pay your dues!

May 13, 2009 - 9:49 pm 54. Bilgeman:

#46 Northern Light:
“Ronald Reagan was a former member of the Screen Actors Guild. He often mentioned that he was a former union leader.

He was also a liberal Democrat until the 1950s and as I said an admirer of FDR and the New Deal.”

Not exactly…he was the President of the Screen Actors Guild, and while ne had certeinly supported FDR and the New Deal, I think his Liberalism was something he “wore” for the sake of his film career.

He was also an FBI informant, fingering communists and their stooges out in the film and screen industry…so just how “Liberal” could he have been?

I believe tha the main thing that made Reagan as effective as he was was that he had come out of Leftist union politics, and knew exactly where the fissures were that marked the alliance/modus vivendi betwwen the Soviet agents and Organized Crime.
And he also knew how both groups were in cahoots at screwing over the average Joe that they both claimed to represent.

May 13, 2009 - 10:14 pm 55. BOB DOLE:

The pathetic CIRCUS ACT aka the GOP actually needs to DIE. The old long-gone GOPs of the PAST would be totally digusted with what the GOP has become. ALMOST all intelligent educated people are leaving GOP in droves. What is left is uneducated trailer trash, inbreds, racists, bimbos, religious nuts,bigots and assorted other human waste.I think in the next major election a third party will get more VOTES,for sure.

May 13, 2009 - 11:11 pm 56. jmmx:

CNN article noted:
“Huckabee called it sad that Jeb Bush thinks the party needs to move past Reagan and equally upsetting that “it doesn’t plan to listen much to the Republicans who became Republicans because they believe in the sanctity of life, traditional marriage and express support for the Second Amendment.” ”

To me this is odd. As an older American, I remember conservatism being about reducing national debt, law & order, abhorrence to government intrusion into peoples’ private lives, and avoiding unnecessary foreign entanglements. That the membership of the Republican party is now defined as in the quote above illustrates precisely the reason it will be a long time before it can rebuild.

The fact is that most Americans believe in Free Choice on abortion, and have been able to see that Reagan almost tripled the national debt (a simple fact), that W also more than doubled it, and that all power to the corporations – also know as the trickle-down theory has not improved the lives of most Americans.

In short – as the Republican party abandons it’s core traditional agenda, it has equally abandoned its own the centrist members. There is here a great irony. For decades the conservative think tanks poured great capital into creating the myth that the Democrats have moved so far to the left that they had left majority of Americans behind. The D party was always a very diverse and quarrelsome place. It is part of the liberal nature. But that they had really moved radically to the left was never really true, but the repeated message did move many Americans further to the right – abandoning the D party.

The great irony here is that now the Republicans are truly stepping into trap they falsely painted for the Democrats: THEY have become dominated by the far right fundamentalist agenda, and have left many of their traditional members behind. This is a situation that they will have incredible difficulty in overcoming for a couple of reasons.

First – they party thrived for decades on winning by fostering an atmosphere of fear and divisiveness in the country. In order to motivate people to be activists and to work for the party, they fostered a constant state of political crisis. This in its self kept pushing pushing pushing its own member to the extreme so that now the Republican core is very far right.

Second – The very nature of the fundamentalist is that he/she is RIGHT and all others are wrong. There exists only black and white, no middle ground. This fundamentalist intolerance does not allow for any kind of mixed party – you are with us or you are against us. This is why the poll cited in this article notes only 21% Republicans while 35% conservatives.

Just an observation from the outside.

May 14, 2009 - 1:40 am 57. Ken J:

“That the membership of the Republican party is now defined as in the quote above…..” This is exactly what I talk about in my last post. We let the media and others define who we are. The above statement does NOT reflect the sole philosophy of the Republican party. It’s one aspect of it. If only purists can belong to the Republican party, then we have already lost. We have gay organizations, we have Republicans for Choice, just as I am sure there are Republicans for gun control. Don’t let the media and liberals define who we are. We need to stop bickering and start campaigning.

May 14, 2009 - 4:14 am 58. Ed Wallis:

Jayson #52:

EXACTLY. More of the Alinsky “show up at a Republican rally dressed as KKK members tactic” cowardice.

They can’t persuade in a civil manner and so revert to sabotage.

Such losers.

May 14, 2009 - 5:21 am 59. Jayson H:

Wrong!!! Reagan didn’t tripled the debt, the Democrats in Congress did. They didn’t control spending like they are doing now. Check your facts your way off.

Hey Jmmx your a fake and a hack. Your using leftwing Democrat talking points. Your no conservative but liberal.

May 14, 2009 - 6:44 am 60. Middleman:

I love how you guys keep harping about Palin. The Republican Party bosses pull this tart out of her igloo, doll her up, and you fall for it hook link and sinker. She’s junk Americana.
Smile and do something front of the camera, good or bad, and suddenly you’re a pied piper to be followed or emulated.

I hear she just signed a book deal. Shelve the book between the autobiography from the fill-in-the-blank high profile murderer and the slag who secretly release a porno tape of herself.

May 14, 2009 - 6:49 am 61. Fred Beloit:

Nor Light #46
“I said that some people would call him[Reagan] a RINO because there seem to be people who would declare anyone without perfect conservative credentails[sic] as a RINO.
Could a current Republican say nice things about the New Deal without someone calling him a RINO?”

Response: From WIKI:
“His start in politics occurred during his work for GE. Originally a member of the Democratic Party, he switched to the Republican Party at the age of 51, in 1962. After delivering a rousing speech in support of Barry Goldwater’s presidential candidacy in 1964, he was persuaded to seek the California governorship, winning two years later and again in 1970.”

Reagan probably did admire FDR when he was a Lefty, Light. No surprise there. But after he grew up, he supported Goldwater for President. No conservatives would ever call him or anyone else a RINO after that, now would they?

May 14, 2009 - 7:04 am 62. Northern Light:

Reagan still admired FDR after 1964. Perhaps America had moved so far to the left between 1932 and 1964 that it was possible to be a former FDR supporter and still support Goldwater.

Read his acceptance speech at the 1980 Republican Convention. He quotes FDR’s acceptance speech from 1932 in glowing terms.

I won’t bring up his fiscal record because, as someone else has pointed out, he was dealing with a Democratic congress. I won’t mention amnesty because he later said he regretted it. I won’t bring up astrology because I have never felt that a person’s spirituality is anyone else’s business. But I still say that no current Republican could praise FDR without being attacked.

May 14, 2009 - 7:26 am 63. jmmx:

@ Jayson H – 59:

Yes – please DO get your facts straight. The fact is that the congress actually TRIMMED Reagan’s proposed budgets or the deficits would have been even worse. Most of his budgets were pushed through with solid Republican backing and the support of a minority of Dems. So PLEASE – do not blame those budgets on the Dems. (Which is another problem with Republicans, I think a lot of Americans are getting tired of their failure to take responsibility for anything they cause.)

Finally, yes I AM a liberal. I thought that was rather clear form my comment “Just an observation from the outside.”

These are my observations of the situation that the Republican party finds itself in – that it is totally dominated by a right-wing philosophy that is way out of step with the American people. These are my observations as one American. You can take them or leave them.

May 14, 2009 - 8:05 am 64. jmmx:

OH yes – As for a hack..

Maybe I am. Probably a matter of opinion.

But this does bring up another problem with the fundamentalists. You rely so much on name calling. “Oh – he is just [a liberal, a RINO, a pro-choicer, a socialist, a blah-blah] so don’t even listen to him.” Like the children with the fingers in their ears.

A lot of conservative Americans are getting tired of that too.

May 14, 2009 - 8:13 am 65. Clayton E. Cramer:

What just amazes me is how out of touch the national leadership of the party is. There are a whole bunch of hot button issues on which the Democrats are EXTREMELY vunerable, and where we could detach a significant number of “Reagan Democrats” from the party:

1. Illegal immigration drives down the wages of unskilled and low skilled workers–many of whom are black. Emphasizing that enforcing existing laws, at the border, and against employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens, in order to drive up wages for Americans who most need the help, would give a slight populist tone to the party, and cause many poorer Americans to rethink their reflexive voting for Democrats.

2. Stop banging the drum for tax cuts. The highest marginal tax rates aren’t all that bad, and reducing tax rates for people making $200,000 a year just increases the amount of money that they can (and do) give to Democratic candidates. Emphasize reducing unnecessary (and sometimes destructive) spending. Earmarks are a tiny part of the problem, but good PR. Emphasize the crookedness of Murtha and friends, and you’ve got an issue that many ordinary Americans can relate to.

3. Emphasize that a lot of money has been shoveled from the taxpayers to people that aren’t poor through the bailouts, and that the screeching from the Democrats (and Secretary Paulson) was simply a corrupt deal to take care of their friends. Pledge the Party to never again let “emergency” become the excuse to make rich people richer.

4. Remind people that the very wealthy contributed very heavily to Obama’s campaign–and that they were expecting to get something back. Run TV ads with Bernie Madoff’s face, and lists of who he funded. Ditto for Norman Hsu and for Stanford.

5. Remind Americans that when Democrats wanted sexual orientation added to the hate crimes list, they refused to clarify that this didn’t include pedophilia–and use the video of Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-FL) saying that he wanted all the paraphilias protected. This is one of those areas where it seems like GOP really does stand for Gay Old Party–or maybe they are afraid of upsetting the mainstream media. So what? The MSM will never be our friends–ever.

May 14, 2009 - 8:45 am 66. Clayton E. Cramer:

“The fact is that the congress actually TRIMMED Reagan’s proposed budgets or the deficits would have been even worse.”

They trimmed his proposed military spending–and Reagan and Congress fought endlessly over his attempts to reduce domestic spending. In some cases, his proposals were attempts to see that the money was spent better, such as making block grants to the states for community mental health programs, rather than have the federal bureaucracy’s sticky fingers hold on to a lot of the actual spending.

May 14, 2009 - 8:59 am 67. Ed Wallis:

Clayton #65,

A thought about your point #3 (variation on a theme…):

Play the class warrior card in reverse – sensitize Americans as to how much of their HARD EARNED but QUICKLY CONFISCATED money is being shuttled off by the Dems to the lazy and undeserving. Hit hard on patronage-as-a-Party-platform.

May 14, 2009 - 9:15 am 68. shaui-jan:

jmmx;trickle down economics…huh?try this for a mental excersise.sit down and figure out how much say a loaf of bread or a gallen of milk is taxed before it reaches the consumer.from the time the seed is bought and ferilzer is puchased and all the hundreds of individual trasactions that take place before it hits the shelves.remember,at each one of these transactions,there is a tax.or a fee or both.
the people who provide these goods do not pay these taxes,they just add them to the cost of the product or service.the last person in line pays them,the consumer.
who is hardest hit by this?the poor,the people just scraping by.
so your answer is to raise taxes even more and then sprinkle some crumbs on the empoverished and proclaim ‘you’re doing it for the little guy’?
i have a name for the policies you prefer it is called,’trickle down serfdom’
as someone who spent his childhood and young adult life at the very bottom of the economic ladder i say ‘thanks but no thanks.’so please stop trying to’help’oh,and bone up on some basic economics.anyone but j.m. keynes or krugman will do.
#60 middleman.i do not know where to begin when it comes to your glaring hypocricy.(your an obama fan right?)no need to even comment on your lack of imagination when it comes to smearing.except next time…..try harder.

May 14, 2009 - 10:34 am 69. Fred Beloit:

Well, Light,thanks for the tip:
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/ronaldreagan1980rnc.htm

I just went quickly through the speech you referenced, “Read his acceptance speech at the 1980 Republican Convention. He quotes FDR’s acceptance speech from 1932 in glowing terms.”

One comes away from it not with an idea that he worshiped FDR but rather that he verbally beat the living crap out of that peanut farmer your voters once made President. Guess you guys never learn.

May 14, 2009 - 10:52 am 70. jmmx:

@ shaui-jan

Just add up the cost of the Republican Invasion of Iraq. Why is it that you all wanted so badly to go to war – but never wanted to pay for it? The same is true for Reagan’s military/missile build up. Totally unnecessary waste of money. The cost? added to the deficit.

The simple fact is that all the Republican administration since Reagan have vastly increased the national debt. See:
http://www.lafn.org/politics/gvdc/Natl_Debt_Chart.jpg

This is a simple fact.

As for comments on trickle down…
You went off on a whole tirade about taxes which is something I never raised. My original post really had nothing to do with taxation and such issues – it was about the problems of the Republican party as I see them, in the context of the current arguments within your party.

But let me say this:
My point is really rather simple. Republicans like to criticize Obama for “wanting to redistribute the wealth.” But I think you miss the simple fact that ANY SET OF GOVERNMENT POLICIES distributes the wealth. How they tax, how they distribute taxes, what they give price supports to, all affect the distribution of wealth. So when Reagan & Bush CUT taxes on the wealthy and on corporations, HE was redistributing the wealth just as much as Obama may want to.

This is not to say that it was WRONG to cut the taxes. That is a personal political question. I only want to say that it is disingenuous to accuse Obama of “redistributing wealth” when he is only undoing what the Bush administration did. If Obama is redistributing in one direction then Reagan & Bush MUST HAVE BEEN redistributing in another direction. To deny this just is not honest.

Now let us look at some figures.
On the site:
http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html

Now – I feel that Reaganomics (sometimes called VooDoo economics – sorry guys I had to get that in J ) — Reaganomics has been in sway ever since 1982, after he completed his first year. It held throughout the Clinton administration because Clinton had to deal with a very strong Republican congress. He never reversed any significant portions of the Reagan policies. (Remember, there is an active conservative wing of the Dem party who regularly vote with Republicans on many issues.) So if you look at the wealth of the 2 groups you see:

>> Table 3: Share of wealth held by the Bottom 99% and Top 1% in the United States, 1922-2004.
——- Bottom — Top
——- 99 % —– 1 %
———————–
1972 70.9% — 29.1%
1976 80.1% — 19.9%
1979 79.5% — 20.5%
1981 75.2% — 24.8%
1983 69.1% — 30.9%
1986 68.1% — 31.9%
1989 64.3% — 35.7%
1992 62.8% — 37.2%
1995 61.5% — 38.5%
1998 61.9% — 38.1%
2001 66.6% — 33.4%
2004 65.7% — 34.3%
Sources: 1922-1989 data from Wolff (1996). 1992-2004 data from Wolff (2007).

As you can see throughout this period, an enormous percentage of wealth SHIFTED from the 99% of the people to the top 1%. (If you include the next 19%, the lower 80% has even less.)

So the question is simply put, IS THIS WHAT AMERICA WANTS? Is it really fair that corporate heads receive 10s of millions of dollars each year, while working families get less and less? Perhaps you believe that this is fair. Perhaps you feel this is the correct direction for the country. Perhaps you see reverting tax rates to those of the Reagan administration as unfair or wrong. That is fine. We can agree to disagree on these issues. But PLEASE, let us realize the real effects of these policies and not pretend that it is something else.

(Disclaimer: I have not read this website – sociaology.ucsc.edu… – closely and do not endorse anything said by the author therein. I only assume that the table data comes from a reliable source.)

May 14, 2009 - 2:20 pm 71. jmmx:

PS

The downturn in the figures in 2001 is most likely do to the 9/11 attacks when the stock market plunged.That affected those who own a great deal of stock much more than those who do not.

May 14, 2009 - 2:25 pm 72. Ed Wallis:

jmmx #70: “So the question is simply put, IS THIS WHAT AMERICA WANTS?”

Thanks for showing everyone here how openly addicted you are to envy and greed
…just as is the whole of the Democrat Party of today.

Most of the folks here – and most Americans, I would wager – prefer to know:

what percentage of what they earn, do they finally get to keep and spend as they wish, after paying taxes?

REMEMBER: We’re not talking about the “sucking off the teat of the government via benefits/welfare programs” folks…just people who actually earn the money from which they live. Hope that doesn’t disqualify you….

May 14, 2009 - 3:01 pm 73. Jayson H:

jmmx! My facts are right. The Democrats were in charge of congress during the Reagan years. Remember Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill. Is your memory really that short?

You know what ” We’re all out of crazy here, go do crazy some place else”

May 14, 2009 - 4:15 pm 74. jmmx:

No Jayson – I did not say that Democrats did ot have a majority. Only that
1- they pared down the budgets proposed by Reagan, and
2- the budgets were passed by Republicans with help from more conservative Democrats. If there are 52 Dems and 48 Reps in the Senate, and a vote passes with 48 R + 6 D in favor and the rest of the Dems opposed – it is not fair to say “It was passed by the Democrats!”

May 14, 2009 - 5:16 pm 75. jmmx:

Remember – congress votes on a budget presented by the president. If they had passed all of Reagan’s budgets as HE sent them to congress, then the deficit would have been even HIGHER. Check it out.

May 14, 2009 - 5:18 pm 76. jmmx:

@Ed #72

I see that you are in favor of big deficits. Remember this invasion of Iraq is costin

May 14, 2009 - 5:21 pm 77. jmmx:

@Ed #72

I see that you are in favor of big deficits. Remember this Iraq WAR is costing us ONE TRILLION DOLLARS. How do you propose to pay for it.

Furthermore, you are assuming that all taxes go to paying welfare. How silly. how about military? Border guards? Farm price supports? Roads? Do you want anyone to test if the toys from China have poisons – or just wait until a few kids die? What about all the different “incentives” government wants to big business?

I have an idea – why not do away with all taxes all together?

My question to you is: do you think those who make over 10 million a year should pay their fair share of taxes or not?

As for “addicted to greed” this is hilarious! Repu0blicans LOVE to accuse Dems of what they are most guilty. The Republican corporate and financial fusion is a total worship of greed.

All I ask is that everybody pay their fair share and not have the wealthiest benefit. I just want to go back to the Eisenhower system.

But I guess he was a socialist too.

May 14, 2009 - 5:31 pm 78. shaui-jan:

jmmx;thank you for taking the time to post that information.none of it however,adresses my point.
you are correct,you never mentioned taxes.you did however,refer to trickle down economics.which means growing the economy fom the top down.right?
my ‘tirade’ was in support of that proven theory.
as far as the income gap is concerned,i could care less about what other people make.it is a meaningess canard to be trotted out as part of the class warfare cudgle.
people getting taxed less and growing the economy is not redistibuting wealth.it is creating it.the capital gains cuts weren’t just for the rich and big corporations.i pay capital gains and i am far from wealthy.
my original statement about how taxes(no matter who gets taxed)affect the most vulnerable was entirly factual and you are more than intelligent enough to have understood it.we both know it has nothing to do with reagan,the iraq war or any other strawmen you drug out.
i live this reality every day,trying to convince me that black is white and up is down is a waste of both of our time.like said before,try studying some basic economics.

May 14, 2009 - 6:34 pm 79. shaui-jan:

jmmx;what is someone’s”fair share”?and how is it tabulated?

May 14, 2009 - 6:39 pm 80. G Alston:

#72 — what percentage of what they earn, do they finally get to keep and spend as they wish, after paying taxes?

You’re not quite getting jmmx’s drift. Tax rate reduction for what *most* people earn isn’t even relevant; it’s relevant only to those who are earning the big bucks. Wealth charts show ownership of wealth and assets, not what people pay income tax on.

And why isn’t it relevant? Because already there are millions upon millions who either pay no income tax or get money paid to them via tax reductions.

meanwhile…

jmmx

Crapping on Reagan budgets is silly. Big $$ to the military results in wealth creation. Budgets heavy in anything requiring the creation of new technology and/or advancement of science results in this technology filtering into the mainstream. Computers, GPS, the internet: all of these things are the direct result of **military** investments, and only a fool would attempt to deny the massive amount of wealth just those 3 things have added to the economy.

To you perhaps missile defense was silly, but then again you don’t seem able to peer beyond the immediate ROI and grasp the impact within a generation or two due to technological offshoots and scientific advancement in general.

On the other hand I agree with your smacking conservatives; many (most?) regurgitate the “small government” nonsense as if it were a commandment and yet there is and has never been any such thing. If republicans were “fiscally responsible” as advocated by the dimwitted parrots here, we’d all be conversing via typewriters and listening to our shiny new AM radios.

May 14, 2009 - 7:31 pm 81. jmmx:

@ shaui-jan

“jmmx;what is someone’s”fair share”?and how is it tabulated?”

That of course IS the BIG QUESTION.

I do appreciate the fact that you are trying to have a conversation here.

But I think we can agree on one thing: The government spends money and citizens and corporations pay taxes to pay for these items. All of these “things” that the govt spends money on are approved by congress (in the case of federal govt).

If you personally want to drive a big SUV, then you go out and get one. You then are expected to pay for it, either cash on the barrel, or over time via a loan.

If the govt spends money, then it too has to pay for it. Either with revenues or by borrowing (deficit.)

Now – I imagine that there are some things that YOU DO believe the govt should do, and there are things that I think that the govt should do. I imagine that there is some overlap in these areas and also some areas of disagreement. All that aside, however, we both agree that the govt needs to spend $$ for some worthwhile things, and also needs to pay for such things.

The issues then are two:
1- how much do we pay now and how much do we add to the deficit? and
2- How do we pay for these things, and how do we distribute the cost among the various parties.
One more thing I think we can agree on: NOBODY LIKES PAYING TAXES!

BUT – if you want to have the government spend money, THEN THERE HAS TO BE SOME TAXES TO PAY FOR IT.

—- It seems to me, that we have now agreed on quite a bit here. It also seems to me, that if YOU want to talk about taxes, then to talk about the Reagan & Bush deficits and the war are not straw men.

So now it comes down to this money has been spent – how are we going to apportion the costs? If you want to invade Iraq, then someone is going to have to pay for it. If not us now, then it will be our children. But sooner or later, it will be paid.

So how DO we apportion it? I assume that everybody wants some way that is fair. But maybe not. In fact most people want a way that is NOT fair. They want someone else to pay for things, always some other group of people, usually the children of our children, who have no say.

You see (and this gets back to my original point) this is where the Republican party is loosing the traditional conservatives (TCs). For TCs, the balanced budget (or at least small deficits) was THE main point in their platform. But the NEW Republicans want it both ways. They want to spend spend spend – mostly on the military and police but also subsidizing nuclear energy and other big business – AND they do not want to pay taxes. Well, you cannot have it both ways. Well you can – big deficits!
—

One last thing – whether you agree with me on this or not, I think you can see my *frustration* when Republicans force through the Iraq invasion, and then go off railing against taxes. Can you see my point?

Thank you.

May 14, 2009 - 8:33 pm 82. myth buster:

BTW, the majority of Americans don’t consider themselves pro-choice anymore. That number is now down to 49% and falling. Very few Americans support unrestricted abortion. The overwhelming majority believe abortion should only be legal in a handful of hard cases, if at all.

May 14, 2009 - 9:49 pm 83. Jayson H:

This is what I think.
Taxes for the Iraq war and bringing down a wicked dictator who murdered hundreds of thousands and use WMD’s on his own people. Best money we ever spent. The best good this country as ever done.

Money for Defense. Best money we ever spent. That’s what keeps America safe.

Also almost every Democrat in Congress and the Senate supported the war Iraq from day one.
Bill Clinton supported and suggested regime change in Iraq way before G.W.Bush was even in the white house. In fact I think he was the first leader that had ever suggested it.

Now the Democrat leadership in congress are and have been playing dirty and trying to change history to cover up their support of it. No one was tricked into going into war. War is never neat or pretty and predictable.

May 15, 2009 - 1:18 am 84. Jayson H:

And another thing,
A free people that is not hampered by intrusive Government regulation and is free to invent is what caused this country to be the greatest country on earth. Bill Gates started in a garage. Henry Ford and Thomas Edison they didn’t work for the government. All the GPS, Internet, and advancement were the result of free enterprise. Yes the defense department did help spur on new advancement in areas, but all the building blocks came out of a people free to invent.
No ones for doing away with taxes. That’s ridiculous. But low taxes always fuels a economy and increases advancement in the technology. That’s what Reagan ran on, low taxes, less government, and deregulation. That’s way we had so much growth in the 80’s. Low taxes actally brings in more revenue in the long run.

May 15, 2009 - 2:10 am 85. shaui-jan:

jayson h#83;people seem to forget the ten years we blockaded and starved the iraq population.conservative estimates run at a half millon deaths per year.mostly children and the elderly.
they also have short memories when it comes to our history of supporting saddam and allowing him to commit war crimes and other atrocities with no repercussions.
the iraq war was a massive gamble and the county is far from being stablized.given the circumstances,i agree that it was worth it.
jmmx;i was going to reply to your statement but #84 spelled out my position better than i could have.
if i came across as crass earlier i apologize,but’expectation of outcome’when discussing economics kinda rubs me the wrong way.it does make people more equal though….equally poor.

May 15, 2009 - 8:14 am 86. jmmx:

@JaysonH #83 – Iraq war

Jayson & Shaui-Jen – thank you for making the effort here to have a respectful exchange of views. I hope you can see from my post that while I may be a “misguided fool” at least I do have WHAT I BELIEVE to be the best interests of our country at heart, as I believe you also do. We are together in this.

You said: “Taxes for the Iraq war and bringing down a wicked dictator who murdered hundreds of thousands and use WMD’s on his own people. Best money we ever spent. The best good this country as ever done.”

First, I DO agree with you that Hussein was a wicked dictator who deserved to be removed. Unfortunately I disagree with you on the rest for several reasons.

1- It is always easy for us, who live far away to talk about the “good” that was done in overthrowing S.H. because we have not born the main cost. People in the USA have no idea of the suffering that we have inflicted on the Iraqi people. There have been estimates of well over 100,000 killed in the first 2 years of our invasion/occupation. While Bush pooh-poohed this as not real, just because someone does not want something to be true does not make it so. If you want to be honest, then you MUST at very least recognize the possibility that such figures are real. Republicans are supposed to believe in “the sanctity of life,” yet from my perspective the history of the last 40 years is that this belief ends as soon as a child is born – especially in other countries. On top of the deaths, there are hundreds of thousands of injuries, the destruction of whole cities, and the literally millions of refugees from Iraq. All these people have had their lives turned upside down. THEY are the ones paying the real price of the war. It is of course very easy to dismiss these number of casualties/refugees as some kind of “leftist propaganda,” but if you REALLY believe in Christian values, then you have a responsibility to consider them seriously before you back a policy such as invasion/continuation.

I sincerely believe that if the American people could only see the suffering that we have caused, that we would be horrified.

2- We did not invade Iraq in order to overthrow SH, we did so because he was supposed to have had WMDs. As we look back on it, I think we can all see that the Bush administration purposely fabricated all the information in spite of the fact that most was known to be false by the intelligence community prior to the press conferences in which they were espoused. More recently there have come to light documents and testimony that the Bush admin was bent on invading and was doing all it could to come up with justifications. Do you think the American people would have supported the invasion solely to overthrow SH? Do you think that a government is right to trick the American people into invading another country using scare tactics such as these?

3- Regarding Dems supported the invasion. Let’s face it, if you were there at the time you know that the Dems were dragged kicking and screaming into their support – those that did. They were hoodwinked with the false WMD data, and in the aftermath of 9/11, pretty much strong-armed into supporting the resolution as a show of solidarity. Finally – the were also sucker-punched by the administration as the resolution does NOT support the invasion of Iraq, but rather authorized the President to invade, IF all other means fail. Unfortunately, Bush did not wait for all other efforts to fail, and never had any intention of doing so. STILL, for the Republicans to scream and say “You are putting the country at risk if you do not support this resolution!” and to now turn and say “Oh the Dems supported it all along.” is really disingenuous.

4- There are lots of dictators around the world who are, even as we speak, doing as bad or worse than SH. Should we invade them all? Which ones do we overthrow? I think we could have done a lot more good for a lot less money if we intervened in Darfur. Why did we not do this? Also, if the real reason for the invasion was to overthrow a vicious dictator, why did Bush not present it as such and have the U.N. agree on it? Don’t you think that the deceitfulness of the Bush admin has seriously hurt our credibility around the world? Is it a good thing for America that we alienated so many of our allies?

5- Finally – “Best money ever spent.” I have a problem with your statement here. The money has not been spent – at least not in the sense that it has been paid for. All it has done is add to the National Debt. If this war really was important to national security, why was it not important enough to pay for it? You say “Best money ever spent” then turn around and say “cut taxes, cut taxes, cut taxes!” In other words, “Let out grand-kids pay for it.” (Please see the chart linked below.)

http://www.lafn.org/politics/gvdc/Natl_Debt_Chart.jpg

I understand that my criticisms seem harsh. Perhaps they are. Please, however, do not take them personally. I do not mean them so. Whether you agree with them or not, I do hope you can at very least see my point of view. They are, after all, very reasonable considerations. Perhaps in error, or perhaps not really the best point of view, but they are sincere and thoughtful. (I hope)

Thank you.

May 15, 2009 - 10:38 am 87. jmmx:

@ JaysonH #84
You say: “…That’s what Reagan ran on, low taxes, less government, and deregulation. That’s way we had so much growth in the 80’s. Low taxes actally brings in more revenue in the long run.”
1- Reagan also ran on the important conservative principle of a balanced budget. Once again, please see the chart linked below. This is pretty much incontrovertible fact. The deficit increased under Reagan, almost a 3X increase – tripled! The deficits for his original budgets were so huge that he had to lie about them and revise them multiple times.

2- The Reagan era double deficits (national and trade) were an enormous drag on the economy. In my view, the only reason that the economy did not tank big time (as it did 4 years later under Bush the senior) is because the price of oil fell tremendously during this time. This was do largely to the fact that Iran and Iraq were flooding the market with oil in order to finance the war between them. Iraq was supported in this invasion by the Reagan admin. though not necessarily overtly. I do hope that you are not supporting the idea that it is right to support a bloody war in order to keep down our price for oil. (Oh yes, if SH was such an evil guy, why did Reagan support him in his invasion of Iran?)

3- Deregulation: Reagan’s deregulation of the banking industry led directly to the collapse of the Savings & Loan industry. Besides the direct cost of 10s of billions of taxpayer dollars (I think we are still paying for that today), the collapse of the Savings & Loan industry also took out one of the main set of players in the financial system. More importantly, these players tended to be small and local banks that provided a lot of services to local communities. If you are a true capitalist, then you should, of all people, bemoan the loss of competition in the banking industry. Competition is the foundation of capitalist theory. The gross centralization of financial power into just a handful of international banks has led to arbitrary raising of costs to the consumer. When the banking system is so dominated by only a few players, the few remaining banks have power similar to a government (since they are unrestricted in their power) and their arbitrary fees are no different than a tax.
Deregulation of the financial industries is the direct cause of the current financial crisis. (IMHO)

Thank you once again for your considerate review of my opinions.

May 15, 2009 - 11:05 am 88. G Alston:

#87 — (Oh yes, if SH was such an evil guy, why did Reagan support him in his invasion of Iran?)

Ummm… I’ll take “realpolitik” for $1000, Alex.

May 15, 2009 - 12:08 pm 89. shaui-jan:

jmmx;the only thing you can ever trust a politican to say honestly about war is “we’re going to war”.after that,it is a series of lies concocted by lawyers.
one of main things bin laden hoped to accomplish with 9/11 was getting us bogged down in afganistan,which is why we went in with a handful of spec ops and bags of money.
iraq from a purely strategic stand point,was the best move available.the actions that led up to the invasion can be traced back to the invention of internal combustion engine.
we are in a situation now that i see as irreversabe.even if we can find an energy alternative to fossil fuels,we simply could not let those resources be controlled by our advisaries.oil is the life blood of warfare,without it an army is useless.by controlling resources we prevent global conflict.
we are the worlds only super power,a position i think is sickening our culture.unless we can lesson the pressure on our society,i feel it will be our undoing.
as far as your comments on the democrats being dragged to the fight or being misled,i think you are being,with all due respect,a little naive.take as one example what obama said he would do and what he is really doing now.(as far as militarily)we now have around 70,000 soldiers in afanistan.that’s about 12% of what COIN doctern recommends to stabilize that region. that means little chance of success.(i do not even know what”success”would be).or take what nancy pelosi is telling her constituants about her knowledge of waterboarding.
i have no dog in this hunt,neither party represents my beliefs.i just want my country safe and the troops home.
going into darfur would have turned into a nightmare(think mogadishu times a thousand)that is why no country will touch it.
sorry for the grammer always in a hurry,be back later.interested in hearing more of your thoughts on these matters.

May 15, 2009 - 12:13 pm 90. Jayson H:

87. jmmx you wrote :Reagan’s deregulation of the banking industry led directly to the collapse of the Savings & Loan industry.
I’ll have to look into that one.

As far as the deficit increased under Reagan, the Democrats who controlled Congress controlled spending. I remember Reagan asking them repeatedly to bring spending under control but they refused. It wasn’t until under Newt management and the Republican controlled Congress did we have a balanced budget and a surplus.

One can say under Reagan the deficit increased and blame him, because it was under his watch. But the truth of the matter is and the facts are the Democrats are mostly the blame. They controlled Congress during the years when he was President.

Just like Bill Clinton took and is given credit for having balanced the budget. But the facts are Newt Ginrich and a Republican controlled Congress were the reason we had a balanced budget and surplus during the Clinton years. So he came out looking good because it was on his watch. However we all know if Bill Clinton had is way he would have run up the deficit if he had a Democrat Congress. Why because a democrat loves spending and taking other people’s money.

The Democrats are very clever in how the cherry pick history and present the facts. But the facts are whatever party controls Congress controls spending, just like now. And the facts are democrats are on a wasteful spending spree unmatched in the history of the United States and they are going to bankrupt us if we don’t stop them soon. We never pay off this debt that Obama, the three RINOs, and the Democrat controlled congress just passed. I’m proud of the rest of the Republicans in Congress that voted against it and am mad as heck at the three RINOs who wimp out on us.

May 15, 2009 - 4:40 pm 91. jmmx:

Shaui-Jan

I am sorry, but all your explanations for Reagan back Hussein’s invasion seem to me to be pure rationalizations. They are excuses for what is an inexcusable policy. I was an adult at the time, and remember thinking it crazy that we did not fully criticize and do all we could to oppose that invasion of Iran. Full opposition was the only moral policy.

Regarding Dems opposing the referendum on the invasion of Iraq. I stand by my view of it, that most were at best mislead, at worst coerced into supporting what was supposed to be an action of last resort. (”Show Hussein we stand united” was the appeal.)

Obama cannot send any more troops to Afghanistan (which is what he always said he would do) because we do not HAVE any more to send. Another of my pet peeves are all the young men with yellow ribbons on their pickup, sitting on the tailgates waving flags and drinking beers. HELLOOO! You want ME to support the troops – what are YOU doing here? Those poor soldiers are in their 3rd and 4th tours of duty because, while 50 million voted to continue the war in 2004, no one is signing up to replace the real heroes – the poor suckers who are there!

(Ooops – sorry about that rant – I got carried away.)

(AS for grammar – don’t worry – not a prob with me. Just please, a space and Capitalize after a period. Much easier to read for us poor old holf-blind folk.) Have a good weekend!

May 15, 2009 - 4:55 pm 92. Jayson H:

No one fooled the Democrats into voting to invade Iraq. They knew the risks and Bush told everyone it wouldn’t be an easy war. And the truth of the matter is they probably voted for it because at the time it was the popular thing to do and they were afraid of getting voted out of office if they didn’t support it. Which if that is the case and that was their motive, they are the most shallowest and pathetic bunch losers ever to grace Washington D.C. or the planet for that matter. As far as WMDs everyone thought Saddam Hussein had them the way he acted by not letting the weapons inspectors do their jobs. The U.N., CIA, British, and Israeli intelligence all thought he had them. Saddam is the one that fooled everyone. After all he did use them on his own people. My personal opinion he had them and sent them over to Iran or Syria before the invasion like he did with his fighter jets. Even Bill and Hillary Clinton thought Saddam had WMDs, as well as AL Gore and Harry Reid. They are on all record supporting the war and saying they supported George Bush. Go on youtube.com and see for yourselves. Oh yes the Democrat leadership supported the war in Iraq whole hardily, until the radical left wing peace protestors, acorn nut jobs, and moveon.org crowd started flexing their muscle in the Democrat party. Thus the Democrat leadership fearing the grass root base of their party started playing real low down dirty by back peddling, rewriting history, and tried to undermined G.W. Bush and act like they were all fooled into going into war. Even some dirt bag RINOs back peddled as well. They would rather lose the war in order to please their party base and also to make Bush look bad in order to save face.
What a dirty wimpy cowardly group. You Democrats make me sick.

May 15, 2009 - 9:42 pm 93. Jayson H:

And by the way. I would take Ronald Reagan at his worst, any day, over Obama and this nightmare you call change.

May 15, 2009 - 9:56 pm 94. shaui-jan:

jmmx;If you want to hold these partisan views on matters of the war,that is you choice.We have a system of checks and balances in this country,the dems had four reps in ‘the gang of eight’.
People chosen equaly from both parties to oversee ALL of the most secretive information.They had direct access to our intel services.This is indisputable fact.
Jane harmen(d)was one of them….she sent a letter in protest after the IET’S were described to her.Pelosi declined TO speak up and has now been clearly shown to be culpable,as well as a bold faced liar.
Like i said,obama’s campain promises about withdrawing our troops in iraq and bolstering our presense in afganistan,as well a attacking pakistan,defie common sense.It was campain rehtoric designed to appeal to a swath of voters who know little or nothing about the risks and concequences of these actions.These are subjects of the highest importance.So don’t take my word for it,look in to it yourself.

May 16, 2009 - 12:35 am 95. shaui-jan:

jmmx;I did not state anywhere that i backed reagan on hussain.In fact,a few posts back i critisized it quite clearly.#85…….?

May 16, 2009 - 12:48 am 96. jmmx:

Hi again guys.

I agree with you that many Dems voted for the war. HOWEVER Many were indeed fooled by the WMD issue. If the Pres insists “There is no doubt that SH has WMDs” then you need to take that seriously. How is a senator to know that Rumsfeld & Cheney had doctored the evidence?

I also hold that many were coerced by this talk of “Let us just show SH that we are united.”

If you really believe yourself to be a patriot, then you should view the movie “Uncovered” http://www.truthuncovered.com/ These are members of the intel community who are debunking every one of the WMD justifications. All of this was known in advance BUT only by the Bush Administration. The simple truth is – the Bush administration lied us into a war. Be honest now – if Clinton had done this you guys would be roasting him alive!

As for H Clinton continuing to support the war, even after the WMDs justifications were proven false – that is why she lost the nomination. I believe that she went wit the theory “We will win quickly and cleanly and the winers re-write history, so I will be on the side of the winners.” When it comes to war – I think that is immoral and vowed never to vote for her after that.

Once again – I still believe that if Americans ever saw the horrible suffering that we have caused there, there would be hardly anyone left supporting the war. I really fail to see why there are not more people from the religious right who are appalled by this. It seems that on this issue it is the Democrats who are the Pro-Life party.

(shaui-jan – glad to see that at least one person from the right will look at the Reagan policy on the Iraq/Iran War realistically.)

May 16, 2009 - 8:04 am 97. jmmx:

Also on WMDs –
Let us not forget the our allies the Germans, the French and even the Russians kept trying to tell us that we should not invade. As for the UN – the head investigator Hans Blix kept saying” No NO we still have no evidence for any WMD program. Wait and let us keep looking.”

Several months before the invasion, Tony Blair went to visit Putin with “all the evidence for the WMDs” After reviewing it, Putin declared “I see no evidence – ONLY PROPAGANDA!” History has proven Mr Putin was correct. Personally, I think it is a sad day when American people hear the TRUTH from a former director (or whatever he was) of the KGB, and lies from their own president.

There is now lots of evidence out that Bush and company had always intended to invade Iraq – even before they were elected. Why is it that the right insists on ignoring this evidence? Do the right think that it is appropriate for a president to LIE the American people into a war? But you all BLINDLY ignore what is a very simple truth. — Bush was intent on going to war no matter what. –

If a stupid old liberal like me could figure out in advance that there were no WMDs in Iraq, then why did not the newspapers and the Congress?

I ask you – if you are REALLY interested in the truth – not in continuing to believe your current beliefs no matter what, then take a look at that movie “UNCOVERED: The War on Iraq”. I believe a real patriot has an obligation to look at all sides critically.

May 16, 2009 - 8:22 am 98. jmmx:

@Jayson H

Look at your words dude:
“Even some dirt bag RINOs back peddled as well. They would rather lose the war in order to please their party base and also to make Bush look bad in order to save face.
What a dirty wimpy cowardly group. You Democrats make me sick.”

Look at all that hatred! Why are you so filled with hate? You even turn on your own people if they do not live up to your ideal. I think you need to look at yourself and ask why you have such feelings.

Come on now – even if you are opposed to everything Bill Clinton stands for, we survived his administration. (We actually did pretty well there.) We will also survive Obama. He is not going out there destroying anything. Get up – look around – this is a great country. No need to be so radical here!

This hatred is tearing this country apart! What – are you going to join Jim D. Adkisson and go shoot up a liberal church?

May 16, 2009 - 8:32 am 99. shaui-jan:

jmmx;My above statements in #94 are not my’beliefs’,they are hard facts.i am not the one here with the idiological blinders on.
As far as plans to invade iraq,they have been contingicies in place for that region and every other stratigicly important area since 1945.Noam chomsky is far from a warmonger and even he understands this.
BTW…that’s not hate your witnessing,that’s frustration…im sure your familiar with it considering the last eight years.

May 16, 2009 - 10:58 am 100. Tennwriter:

A stellar piece of analysis. I’m not sure I can find anything to disagree with.

And no, Reagan twasn’t a RINO. Being a RINO is in part about your heart as you so capably point out in your article.

I wonder if you don’t have so many people directly engaging with your article because it was so good. Its a bit boring to have a long list of “Bravo!!” which is what this piece really deserves.

May 16, 2009 - 1:23 pm 101. Jayson H:

Hey JMMX! You’re a historical revisionist of the highest degree. Your even are cherry picking what I said to cover up the Democratic cowardly betrayal of Bush and the war.

This is what I wrote;
****”Oh yes the Democrat leadership supported the war in Iraq whole hardily, until the radical left wing peace protestors, acorn nut jobs, and moveon.org crowd started flexing their muscle in the Democrat party. Thus the Democrat leadership fearing the grass root base of their party started playing real low down dirty by back peddling, rewriting history, and tried to undermined G.W. Bush and act like they were all fooled into going into war. Even some dirt bag RINOs back peddled as well. They would rather lose the war in order to please their party base and also to make Bush look bad in order to save face.
What a dirty wimpy cowardly group. You Democrats make me sick..”*******

I meant “they (meaning the democrats) rather lose the war in order to please their party base and also to make Bush look bad in order to save face.”

I didn’t mean the Republican base who still supports Bush when it comes to Iraq. I should of put Democrat in place of they. Sorry I wasn’t clear.

And the democrats do make me sick. I personally don’t no how they can sleep with themselves at night.

May 16, 2009 - 3:59 pm 102. Jayson H:

And another thing JMMX

You wrote saying in regards to me this rude statement,

“This hatred is tearing this country apart! What – are you going to join Jim D. Adkisson and go shoot up a liberal church”

I don’t hate democrats and shouldn’t have used the word dirt bags, but I am still mad at them. Let’s face it when it comes to the war in Iraq they were and are playing dirty. I am also mad at the RINO’s for not standing with President Bush, because it gave credibility to the Democrats and the left wing media.

May 16, 2009 - 4:17 pm 103. Jayson H:

And another point I want to make, is this notion that Bush lied and trick the Democrats into war with Iraq in nonsense and a re-writing of history. Bush believed Saddam had WMDs, as did the Democrat leadership. Bill Clinton also believed that Saddam was in the process of also creating nuke WMDs before Bush was ever in the white house when he was president. Was he also lying? Just because you believe something doesn’t mean your lying.

You guys can’t have it both ways on this one.

May 16, 2009 - 5:56 pm 104. Kevin Jackson:

Here is how you rebuild the GOP. http://theblacksphere.blogspot.com/2009/05/republican-solution-to-winning.html FUNNY read!

May 17, 2009 - 11:04 am

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