1) So long as it's in the opposition, where should the Republican Party focus its energy?
The GOP must have a three-pronged approach to the state of the union:
a) It must stand upon the watch towers and expose the real agenda of the Obama administration in terms that common people understand and then effectively contrast them with the basic principles of conservatism.
b) It must use any and all means, parliamentary and well as political, to place speed bumps and roadblocks at every turn to slow down the statist legislative agenda.
c) It must recruit electable candidates who will stand for the basic principles of conservatism when in office.
2) What is the most worrisome part of Barack Obama's presidency?
The unbridled horse race to Fabian socialism on the one hand, and the fact that there are avowed and unapologetic Cummunists in the White House being paid by US Taxpayers who are advising the president on domestic policy issues.
3) There's been a lot of debate about the role that talk radio and cable news hosts should play on the right. Particularly controversial are Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly and Mark Levin. What do you think about these folks? Do they help the right or hurt it (or is it more complicated than that?) How should Republicans interact with them?
Thank God for letting Al Gore create the Internet. The rise of cable news and Internet sources of news are our salvation right now. Were it not for real men like Limbaugh, Beck, Levin and Hannity, we would wake up in America in the not-to-distant future wondering what happened to our Constitution and our God-given human rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
4) One particularly fraught controversy pertains to race in America -- with the first black president in the White House, some conservatives have been criticized as racists for opposing him, and some on the right have accused the Obama Administration or its allies of racism or anti-white sentiments (for example, Sonja Sottomayor's "wise Latina" comment drew fire, as did the Skip Gates incident). As the right thinks about political strategy and policy, how should it approach matters of race?
I only see the Demcrats doing the race baiting. Texas got over that issue a long time ago. Take a look at all of the elected state-wide officeholders and you will find plenty of people to make Martin Luther King, Jr. proud - that is, unless your ideology is leftist. If so, then the remarkable achievements Texans have made at building a color-blind society are reduced to sneers of token representation and the worn-out and cliched slogans about Uncle Tom's fronting for the REAL power brokers.
5) Is there anything you observe locally, or that Republicans in your area of the country care about, that doesn't get sufficient attention in the national media conversation? If so tell me a bit about the issue, and the approach you think the right ought to take.
Open borders and the resultant threat to our national security are an ignored issue. The financial drain and cost to taxpayers which illegal immigration, drug smuggling, and anchor babies put on border states like Texas is enormous. This issue will not likely be solved as long as both Parties compete for the Hispanic vote and keep the issue political rather one of national security.
6) Traditionally the Republican Party has been a coalition of religious conservatives, libertarians, fiscal conservatives, and national security conservatives. Is that alliance viable going forward? If so, what must be done to hold it together? If not, what alliance should the GOP try to build?
The alliance is alive and well. The Texas GOP Platform is a wonderful document in all aspects. It should be adopted nationally and it must be articulated by candidates who can reach into the souls of Americans on an emotional level to compete against the emotional dogma from of the Fabian socialists who promise a free lunch for everyone.
7) Is there anything I didn't ask about that you'd like the media or the country as a whole to know?
I believe that the wreckless spending in Washington is part of a plan to wreck our economy and facilitate a socialist takeover of the basic industries as the Fabian socialists did in Great Britain following World War One.
The checks and balances of the collective 50 state constitutions and the overlapping US Constitution are not adaptable to socialism in their current form. So an economic collapse must precede an event which opens the door to a revolutionary rescue. The devasted economy in the aftermath of WWI allowed such an opening in Great Britain.
But the planners of such a collapse must know there will be God-fearing, multi-generational Americans standing arm-to-arm with first-generation freedom-loving immigrants who together will fight to preserve our Constitution and our American way of life. We will not willingly fall into the hands of tyrants.
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ReplyDelete"I believe that the wreckless spending in Washington is part of a plan to wreck our economy and facilitate a socialist takeover of the basic industries as the Fabian socialists did in Great Britain following World War One."
ReplyDeleteWere GWB and congressional republicans part of this conspiracy? Or was their reckless spending part of a different secret agenda?
OMG Chris, but you've got a lot ignorance in your position. George Bush presided over the largest increase in deficit spending in our history. The tax decreases for the rich were certainly a huge write off of government income, along with the increases of spending, particularly for the misbegotten wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have left us in a really bad situation.
ReplyDeleteAdd all of this to the economic meltdown that follows such financial foolishness, and yes, Houston, we have a problem.
Add all of this to the economic meltdown that follows such financial foolishness...
ReplyDeleteEconomic meltdowns follow deficit spending? When did that become standard economics?
The "meltdown" happened because Big Business thought it had created a new form of Free Money, based entirely on a flawed theory of borrowing (ie, lend money to people who can't pay it back at high interest rates), which everyone knew was wrong until they saw how profitable it was; as they could repackage these bad loans and pretend they were good loans, and use the bad loans as collateral for their own loans. And not only was the Bush-era economic prosperity a bubble based upon this flawed theory, but it eventually locked-up the lending markets once they realized that the original theory of lending was correct (ie, don't lend to people who can't pay it back).
But this has little to do with deficit spending. If fact, the tax cuts and high spending HELPED the economy during the Bush years, and things only turned sour once the borrowing started to dry up and the bad debts went unpaid. Essentially, America did as well as it did because the government credit cards were still good, even after the private sector cards went over-limit. And had we taxed more or spent less, the economy would have tanked sooner.
Fabian socialists didn't take over in Britain following WW1. *Conservatives* did. He really needs to google.
ReplyDeleteConor - I've read through all 21 comments thus far, and what it says to me, and I mean this with the greatest respect, is that the current GOP base is VASTLY out of touch with what is the current mainstream. Most of your responders are advocating a GOP that is even MORE conservative.
ReplyDeleteThat is not a winning political strategy. That so many of the respondents refuse to even consider that Limbaugh, Levin, Beck and Hannity are a problem speaks directly to this point.
Best of luck with this project. I fear that, ultimately, you'll be shocked and disillusioned by how out of touch the GOP base really is.
Mr. Friedersdorf:
ReplyDeleteEnjoying this project, but could we get better attribution? The respondent's name, the GOP office they hold, county & state?
If any of them have asked anonymity (Though why should they?) at least give us their state & perhaps the population of the county they serve as GOP chair.
Other than that, excellent. Hoist by their own petards. Heh heh.
According the writer of this post I'm one of the card carrying members of the Socialist party running our country into the ground. Funny I voted for Bush I and for other R's a number of times for state-wide offices until 2004. Haven't voted for an R since ..... although I don't consider myself a Republican I am a moderate fiscal conservative and would like to see two viable political parties. It's bad when one or the other dominates. So I'll take a stab at the questions, 'cuz you know I'm the type of voter, both sides need to win elections.
ReplyDelete#1 The GOP needs to look Howard Dean's strategy after the 2004 elections. He refused to accept the Rovian red-blue state divide and went after voters in all 50 states. The D's didn't win hard core Republican strong-holds in the presidential election, but it put the focus on local and state elections, which breed future candidates for higher offices such governor and congress. This grows the base and builds a national party.
RIght now, the GOP is identified and dominated by white, rural, christian, southerners. The demographics are changing. Denying this and creating a party that avoids this will lead to the GOP becoming the modern day Whig party. Even if Obama is defeated in 2012 these trends will not change and if the GOP does not adapt to them they will remain the minority party on a national and local level.
I live in New Mexico. I have a prefect example of how the current GOP party both at the national level and state level are determined to keep themselves in the minority with candidate choices. We had two Republican candidates vie for the Republican Senate seat nomination. Steve Pearce from the southern part of the state was an unsuitable choice for a state wide office. He had a record of voting against the national labs (Sandia and Los Alamos are the two largest employers in the state), making derogatory remarks about veterans benefits (He called the VA a socialist program, in a state where a high percentage of residents are either in the military or vets) and railed against the Mexican hordes coming across the border (In a state where the majority of the Hispanic population in Albuquerque and Santa Fe has been been here since the 1700's). Now in the Southern part of the state where the local politics are controlled by the oil guys and ranchers in Roswell, these kind of stands plays well. But as soon as the Albuquerque metro area heard Steve, he never came with 20 percentage points of Tom Udall, who for the record is an ULTRA-liberal from Santa Fe and about as smart as a bag of hammers.
Heather Wilson, the other candidate, was the moderate Congresswoman who represented the Albuquerque metro area was a moderate (luke-warm pro-life, wasn't anti-immigration) Republican that was shot down in the primaries by outside money. Thanks A LOT Club for Growth. She was behind Udall, but could have made it up if she had hammered Udall on his Anti-National Lab record and connections to the wine-n-cheese set in Santa Fe, not a popular group outside of Taos.
Not only did Pearce go down in flames but the southern congressional seat also went to a Democrat. So in the name purity the Republicans lost both a shot at a Senate seat and one House district that used be a reliable red area. Think that's a big deal? Wouldn't the R's be in some kind of bargaining position with 41 seats in the Senate versus 40? Hmmmmm?
WIlson is now making noise about running for governor, but the same small minded group that pushed the Pearce nomination is against it. Why? She's too 'liberal'? Whatever. In a state where corruption is wide spread and a Dem governor who seems to have had one foot out the door since 2006 ( Bill Bubba Richardson), this should be an easy mark for the R's. But you watch they'll screw it up!
(con't)
ReplyDelete#2 This is easy. Obama's spending and his strategy in Afghanistan. Will he resist the urge this time next year once the economic crisis has faded to reign in spending? Doubtful. I'm willing to cut him some slack. For now.
He inherited the largest financial crisis since the Great Depression. I wasn't happy about the bailouts, but I also wasn't prepared to watch the entire economy burn to the ground in the name free-markets, which let's face it we don't have and haven't had since the 1930's. And BTW that's a good thing. I remember my grandparents telling me stories about people nearly starving to death and losing everything they had in bank. Eighty years ago this country decided that the government had to play a role in regulating the financial systems to prevent the whole thing collapsing into chaos. We have dominated the world economy since then and the nutters like Ron Paul who want to drag our regulatory system back to the 1800's are insane. Economic theories based in the 1800s won't work in today's globalized economy, however neither will the Democratic pipe dream of unionizing everyone like we had in the 50's and 60's. The Republican's need to adapt to the current global economy and quit running with the same tired crap they been using since Reagan.
His Afghanistan strategy looks like it's morphing into a please-everyone-which will-be-a-disaster. I'm not convinced that the Dems fully understand the threat we face against these small state-less terrorist organizations. We can't ignore Afghanistan. Lawless countries like this are havens for groups like Al-Quida. If we leave, we'll be back and spend more blood and money stabilizing the area.
#3 Other than Limbaugh and Hannity none of the media personalities mentioned are Republicans. They are cynical shills whose main purpose is to generate ad revenue. They are not responsible to voters. They don't have to make the tough choices that will be needed to get the fiscal mess we're in fixed. There isn't a single hard-core fan of these shows that will vote for a Democrat and yet the natinal leadership fall all over themselves placating them. Why? They alienate a large portion of the voters ( I think LImbaugh's approval numbers are around the Congress approval numbers) and those folks are already converts. The GOP needs to convince the folks like me, PhD educated upper middle class that they are serious about fixing problems not generating sound bites for Limbaugh for this current news cycle.
#4 As Obama said on Letterman, "I was a black man before the election" I do not think that the majority of the opposition to Obama is about race. They hate him because his a Democrat. End of discussion. However the national leadership and local leadership need to step up and condemn the wink-wink-nudge-nudge racial innuendo crap that's coming from some local southern parties. "Barak the Magic Negro", come on? This is not 1950's America. It crossed a line and should have been roundly denounced. So is calling him Barak Hussien Obama and implying that he was born in Kenya. He isn't a Muslim ( so what if he was BTW) and he's an American citizen and he won the election. Get over it.
GOP has to abandon the Nixon Southern strategy. It no longer applies as the country becomes more urban and integrated.
(con't again)
ReplyDelete#6 The GOP has to move beyond these groups and attract voters like me: I hate taxes but I'm also realistic that we need to pay for our obligations. I don't like spending a fortune to maintain an empire built to defeat a cold war foe, but I don't want to ignore real threats that state-less terrorists present. I don't want the government telling me which doctor to use, but I'm paying $600/month for insurance and it continues to rise at rate faster than my salary increases. Something HAS to be done ignoring the problem and telling to go buy private insurance won't work. I don't support torturing prisoners simply because they've killed Americans. We're better than that. And I don't give a damn if Adam and Steve want to get married. In short start addressing these concerns if you want me to vote Republican an forget about a coalition that is rooted in the 1970's.
#7 Rush Limbaugh (Michelle Bachman, et al. insert favorite screamer pushing a book here) is not the head of the GOP, but until the party starts presenting other view points he will remain the face of the party.
Blaming the media for the GOP current state is lazy. The media did not create the demographic trends and blaming the liberal media for them is just stupid. I think the GOP overestimates the media's influence on the average voter. Voters vote on issues not who is delivering the nightly news.
The conceit that the GOP in Texas long ago "got over" an issue as complex as race is symptomatic of the arrogance and lack of intellectual curiosity that has come to define the Republican Party in recent years.
ReplyDeleteRacism isn't a problem that you solve, it's an ever-changing issue that, from an institutional standpoint, you can only hope to grapple and cope with. By choosing to disengage from the discussion on race, instead smugly insisting that their grasp on the problem renders it insignificant, the GOP has alienated huge -and rapidly growing- swaths of the country. It seems likely that future generations will view this topic specifically as the turning point at which the GOP shrank to a regional party.
As a lifelong resident of Texas, I can attest that a good look at our state's criminal justice system suggests that the opinions on race expressed above are by orders of magnitude too optimistic.