Many will not vote for a liberal for President, including me. I don’t really matter, that much, but my many friends who won’t be voting for a liberal — they’ll matter.
The Republican party has probably taken a bigger hit with this than they will realize . . . until November, that is.
McCain is the only Republican who can defeat Clinton. Romney was terrible for MA. and would be terrible for the US. For those who haven’t experienced him, you’re not losing out.
I voted for Romney. I would have voted for Fred. That said, the only way that McCain looks close to either Obama or Clinton in policy is from a very great political distance. I have a friend in upstate NY who feels that way. He’s an anarcho-syndicalist, and Dennis Kucinich is well to his right. From where he’s standing, the remaining major candidates are all pretty close. Just like from Neptune, the Earth and the Moon are pretty close.
Romney would have been eviscerated in the general election campaign, most notably for his royal flip-flops on major positions he took as Governor of Massachusetts. You think John Kerry was a bad flip-flopper? He has nothing on Mitt. All during this campaign it has amazed me how otherwise seriously minded Republicans could have supported Romney knowing how effectively the flip-flop charge was used on Kerry in 2004.
Sorry, Elf Lady – not intending to bait. But the premise of her position is important to this thread. If conservatives won’t vote for McCain because he’s too liberal, then they are essentially supporting Obama/Clinton. That doesn’t make much sense to me.
McCain has given a strong statement on Supreme Court Justices, and if he means it, which I hope he does, then I will support him. It’s clear that either Obama or Clinton would appoint totally unsuitable people. Also, it is possible that McCain would actually veto some spending bills, and that’s a plus.
So, with regret, it’s McCain ’08 for me, and Jindal ’12 or ’16.
Charles #18, he has outraged conservatives, including me, by trying to push through a stealth immigration “reform” bill bypassing the normal Senate procedures. He championed, and Bush regrettably signed, a campaign finance bill which restricts free speech. And even now he is working with Sen. Lieberman on an energy bill which would require a big tax increase on gasoline and, I think, a cap-and-trade scheme which many conservatives view as worse than useless. These things are why the opposition to him has been so strong, and he’ll have to do some major fence-mending.
OK – I thought that abortion, marriage, and supreme court justices were more important to conservatives than immigration, campaign finance, tax increases and trade issues. Am I wrong?
I was home at lunch and was watching MSNBC. The latest poll shows (if election were held today) McCain 44%; Clinton 43% (rest undecided); but McCain 37%, Obama 63% (apparently nobody undecided). Note to bloggers: Don’t jump on me I’m just reporting what I heard on TV.
#22, I think that is what all the Republicans, who crossed over on Tuesday, to vote against Hillary, forgot about. It may very well be that no Republican can beat Obama, and then what have we got … someone who is may be more likeable than Hillary, but who is infinitely less experienced than anyone else in the race (Democrat or Republican – remember Jimmy Carter) and whose policies are just as liberal and maybe more liberal than Hillary’s (or Bill’s) would ever be. Republicans better start using some long term thinking or this thing could get way out of hand, if it hasn’t already. And an extreme conservative is not the answer for the Republicans, either. Remember the massacre of 1964. I’m no fan of McCain, but he would seem to be the only moderate candidate running.
I’m 43 and have never missed an election since turning 18 – not even for dog catcher. In that time, I have NEVER – EVER knowingly pulled a lever for a democrat. Even so…. I will NOT reward McCain or the GOP by voting for him. Discipline is needed, and if it takes a loss for the GOP to straighten out, so mote it be.
Absolutely. The GOP is being operated like Chicago politics and I think that it stinks. I would rather that a Democrat president screw up the country than a Liberal Republican.
And what rumor is it that McCain is Pro-life? Check his record. He is entirely in favor of producing as many easy targets for dirty old men as he can.
I have always voted Republican, and think that the current conservative Republicans have committed a titanic blunder in their anti-immigration stance. All that it is going to do is to ensure that the hispanic vote will forever be in the Democrats’ pocket.
24 and 25, there have always been moderates in the Rep Party. There used to be in the Demo Party; only Birch Bayh, far as I can tell right now. Conservatives have run the party for quite a while now. Time for some moderation. But you can cut off you nose to spite your face if you want to. It’s just that the rest of us may have to suffer, if there are enough of you sulking conservative Republicans to throw the election to Hillary.
#25: Party Politics?? The party insiders picked Romney! And McCain’s record (whatever you think of it) was called a 100% pro life record by National Right to Life.
RE: “If conservatives won’t vote for McCain because he’s too liberal, then they are essentially supporting Obama/Clinton.”
Nonsense. That’s a bit like saying “if you don’t vote for [insert x policiy] then you support [y policy].
I’m not a Republican. I’m not a Democrat. I’m a conservative. Just to give you an idea of what I *can* stomach — I voted for Bob Dole, and was proud to do so.
But . . . sadly . . . the Republican Party is not nominating a conservative candidate in this presidential cycle. It is certainly their right to do what they wish.
And it is my right to make certain that no such candidate receives my vote.
If the Republican party wishes to nominate a non-conservative to run for President and count on the moderates and liberals who cross-over to win the election, this is fine. I think it a foolish error — but hey, I’m not a political strategist, and I could certainly be wrong.
But it’s not my responsiblity to enable further poor choices on the part of the Republican party. It’s not my responsibility to reward their decisions. It’s my responsibility to vote in integrity and according to what I believe to be compatible with my political philosophy. And that is what I will do.
That is what many of my friends will do as well.
It remains to be seen whether I and others like me — conservatives — will have any sort of impact on the election. I certainly cannot say.
But the Republican party has nominate a non-conservative. Again — their right to do so. But certainly not my duty to “make up for” their choices by ignoring that fact and voting against my beliefs.
McCain has always done well with independents and conservative Democrats; the thing he’s never been able to do in the past is convince many Republicans to vote for him. Since he’s now the undisputed front-runner in the delegate count, he’s obviously found a way to do that… but I’m wondering if he’ll find that he’s done so at the expense of losing his independent base.
If it ends up being an Obama/McCain contest, it’s going to be spun as the independent idealist outsider versus the independent maverick outsider; which says something about the way the voting public seems to be feeling about politics-as-usual.
Personally, I still like Hillary for president, but the way she and Obama are beating each other bloody in the primaries isn’t good for our side no matter who comes out on top.
i don’t get why each party is so extreme. i am not a right or left winger, more moderate leaning right-except for being an extremist tree hugger. i haven’t voted for a republican since reagan and yet might do so for mccain.
if you are talking about electing someone on likeability and no experience well that shouldn’t be so surprising should it? how the heck else could bush have been elected? the office of governor in texas is largely a figurehead post and from what i have read he was never successful in business, but people thought ‘he would drink a beer with them’ and he claimed to be a Christian. it certainly wasn’t because he was learned and experienced.
This is good news to Ron Paul supporters. Ron Paul is the only candidate that can beat Hillary Clinton. A vote for anyone else is a vote for Hillary Clinton. McCain or “Songbird†as he is called by POWs and the Clintons are good friends, even Mrs McCain has been caught wearing Clinton campaign buttons in the past. Also, McCain considered being the VP for John Kerry in 04. Everything he stands for is the opposite of what the American people want, especially conservatives.
If Ron Paul dropped out of the race and didn’t run on a third party ticket (he probably will run third party), I was planning on voting for Romney. Oh, well…..
I predict its going to be Hillary Clinton as president and Obama as vice president. They will be running against a McCain/Huckabee ticket, which will be a losing ticket. The US will come to love Hillary…..don’t worry …I’m sure the Clintons are working on it.
How can you possibly say everything he stands for is the opposite of what the American people want? Obiviously, you are wrong, unless of course Romney & Huckleberry are even more opposite.
#21, you’re right. And no matter what, I will never knowingly vote for anyone who supports unrestricted abortion. I may not like other stands the candidate may take, but that’s my measuring rod. McCain made clear his stance on abortion at the CPAC this afternoon. He’s agin it. So, if nominated, he gets my vote.
T
Oh, that’s a great idea, “teach the Republican Party a lesson”, and throw this country into the hands of the current “american idol” who is out to change not only this country, but the “world”, or
perhaps into the hands of a woman who now and always has “hated” the military, not that we’re in a war for our very existence or anything.
Yep, I know its ones’ “right”, but its also ones’ responsibility to look out for the people of one’s country.
Conservatives who will not vote for McCain are de facto supporting either Obama or Clinton. JM spoke to CPAC today and spoke of his brand of conservatism. While I disagree with his position on immigration, he certainly is conservative on taxes, abortion, limited govt., and a host of other issues.
McCain is for amnesty for the 30 million+ illegals, stricter gun laws and continuing the Iraq war (for 100+ years!!!). Those are just three big issues were the majority of the country is against McCain. In addition to this, he is so corrupt. He was a part of the Keating 5 scandal. He lies about his time in Vietnam. Just like the speedboat soldiers came out about Kerry in the last election, the POWs are going to come out with the truth about McCain.
Hillary is going to be president. McCain is going to take the fall, because the establishment knows about McCain’s past. It’s going to be brought out and Hillary will win the election. But, Hillary is going to win anyway. That’s why I keep stressing that Ron Paul is the only candidate that can beat Hillary Clinton. If you look at RP’s voting record and beliefs, the majority of Americans share his views.
I’m sorry you missed the argument. Allow me to spell it out more clearly for you: those who don’t vote hurt the candidate they are most in agreement with and bolster the candidate from the opposing party.
What you mean, surely, is “those who don’t vote [for my selected candidate] hurt the candidate [which I have selected] and bolster the candidate from the opposing party.”
To which I reply:
[blockquote]Conservatives who will not vote for [the latest spending package] are de facto supporting either [poverty or unfettered abortion].
Vincent,
if so many Americans are so opposed to those supposed stances, then why is he so far ahead? Look, it’s not like I’m a McCain supporter. In fact I’m not sure there is anyone left that I can vote for (AGAIN!!!). But I guess somewhat like Sarah, I just have to challenge patently ridiculous statements.
Without meaning to be rude, it seems to me that the bloggers who say ‘they will not vote the party candidate chosen by the people’, are the same ones who have said that all who received an invite to Lambeth should go,(even if they don’t agree) because if they don’t then ECUSA and the others will have it all their own way. Does anyone else see similarities ?
The big winner here is Ron Paul — he’s the only true conservative in the race at this point, and he’s the only nominee who could get enough anti-Iraq crossover votes from the Democrats to win the general election. Watch for a Ron Paul upswing in the polls as conservatives revolt against McCain in the coming weeks.
Quo Vadis,Conservatives?
As a Romney supporter, I am dispirited. If I may…here’s a little peptalk from Michelle Malkin… http://michellemalkin.com/2008/02/07/quo-vadis-conservatives/
And if that doesn’t help, Hugh Hewitt gives 7 reasons to take a good look at McCain [nose held or not]1 war + 6 possible supreme court vacancies.
[blockquote] And even now he is working with Sen. Lieberman on an energy bill which would require a big tax increase on gasoline and, I think, a cap-and-trade scheme which many conservatives view as worse than useless.[/blockquote]
Man, do I love my new hybrid. 46.7 mpg on the second tank of gas so far! I’ll think of this quote when I fill the tank next.
Ron Paul isn’t really a conservative, is he? I was always taught that he was a Libertarian.
I do agree that McCain will be the best bet against Clinton. I also agree that Obama would clean McCain’s clock. Nice to see the polls agree!
Whoops, I meant to ask whether Ron Paul was really a Republican (not a conservative).
I agree with Sarah’s style. I’ll vote for the person who best matches my beliefs, not the party. I like Obama and have and would vote for him. I do not like Clinton and would vote for McCain if he was the alternative.
I am a conservative, but I have enough fear for this country under the Euro-Socialism of Obama or Clinton that I will vote for McCain if he is the candidate–on one conditon: that he can come up with a satisfactory explanation for the anti-free speech provisions of McCain-Feingold. The idea that McCain thought it was acceptable to bar American citizens from banding together to post political advertisements within thirty days of an election is frightening to me. The bill’s blatant disregard of threshold Constitutional rights took my breath away at the time the bill was proposed. It still does. I understand that the role of money in political campaigns is a big problem, but to solve it by tearing up the Constitution just blows me away. I’m waiting for McCain’s “innocent explanation” for the idea.
PREDICTIONS!!!(a la John McLaughlin): McCain probably beats Clinton, unless Clinton picks Richardson or Bayh for V-P, which evens the odds. Obama beats McCain.
#49…As I understand it, Ron Paul is a Libertarian. On economic matters he’s looks as conservative as any Republican, but on personal moral choices, he’d be as (or more) liberal as any Democrat. Basically, the Libertarian motto is government leave us alone!
I sometimes hear things like, “some conservatives would sit out a McCain/Hillary election, or even vote for Hillary.”
That is a logically impossible statement. Anyone who would sit out the forthcoming election, or vote for a third party, because Sen. McCain is the nominee, is not a conservative. Knowing the age of the SCOTUS justices…. Any so-called conservative who takes such a position is no more a conservative than Billary; and is deserving only of the deepest, deepest, contempt.
So did I, Sarah, in the general. In the primary I voted for Alan Keyes, and I think that establishes my conservatism quite well.
It’s elegant to bring up the excluded middle, but that misses the point. To not vote for either candidate is to act, perhaps not to think, or talk, or pray, but to [b]act[/b], as if it does not matter who gets into office. And all jokes about “no matter who you vote for, the Government always gets in” aside, the premise of that action is ridiculous.
If you are indifferent to whether Admiral Mullen and Admiral Fallon brief Iranian options to President Obama or to President McCain, well, your conservatism is uninformed by memory of the 60s and 70s.
I respect Sarah’s right to do what she thinks is best, but I agree with Ed the Roman. I have to vote for the best electable candidate among the available choices. The arguments among Republican candidates were about choosing the best one. I don’t think McCain is the best, but on security and court appointments, he’s far better than either Democrat.
I’m not so sure Obama would beat McCain in the general election. At some point he’s going to have to leave behind the vague “hope” statements and say something specific, and he is a very left-wing candidate. It could be framed by the McCain campaign as the American consensus vs. the left-wing fringe, which might work. And I hope very sincerely that this does not happen, but if there were a major terrorist incident between now and the election, it would hurt Obama as well as the nation.
And don’t y’all think there’s something statesmanlike about Romney’s declining to rip the party’s fabric any further now that he can see the handwriting on the wall? Makes Huckabee look shallow in comparison, at this point, since the differences between him and McCain are not huge, and McCain is way ahead.
Vincent Lerins I have looked at Mc Cain’s war record and to disparage that is one of the worst ad hominine attacks I have seen. It is will documented that McCain could have left North Vietnam prison camps after two years because his dad was an admiral. McCain stayed in a hell worst than you can imagine for four more years, to avoid preferential treatment, and was the one of last to leave and had to be carried out on a stretcher. When the bad boys of the military get together McCain is pretty well thought of. If you can’t document your attack please don’t express it. I don’t agree with McCain’s politics but I will never doubt his courage or disparage his honor while he was a service member!
Thanks, Dave B. I have been ignoring the Ron Paul enthusiasts, because their candidate is getting very few votes among Republicans and shows little sign of being attractive to Democrats either. The attacks on McCain’s military record are unsubstantiated and out of line. If there are men who served with him and wish to criticize him, let them do so publicly. Otherwise, this kind of thing is unacceptable.
Katherine, the election is nine months away, a life time in poitics. Obama and Clinton are raising tons of money but spending it fighting each other. I find all the negativity about McCain disingenous. Obama really hasn’t been pressed too much and has gotten a pass. Who knows who would beat whom? (Gulliani was the front runner and McCain a foot note about a month ago). Ron Paul doesn’t play well. I watched one debate where Ron Paul wondered into the stratosphere and the moderator finally had to ask him what he was talking about. Clinton or Obama would destroy Ron Paul.
RE: “Anyone who would sit out the forthcoming election, or vote for a third party, because Sen. McCain is the nominee, is not a conservative. . . . Any so-called conservative who takes such a position is no more a conservative than Billary; and is deserving only of the deepest, deepest, contempt.”
Toral1 will be unsurprised to learn that I don’t give a flying fig for his contempt, in fact I smile at it. Nor do I care to be the definition of a “conservative” that Toral1 clearly has of one.
Moving on to a more substantive comment [rather than blustering threats of “contempt” from a man I don’t know] . . .
Ed the Roman brings up an excellent point that deserves comment [and hey, we have something in common since I also am an admirer and voted for Alan Keyes].
RE: “To not vote for either candidate is to act, perhaps not to think, or talk, or pray, but to act, as if it does not matter who gets into office.”
That actually seems to be the real issue here.
You see, I’m not looking at the short term of the “next four years” . . . I’m looking at, long term, what the nomination of a liberal does to the Republican party and to conservatives and to America. That party once was the party that could come up with a conservative for people to vote for.
What does this mean? Let’s wargame it.
Option 1): Things work out great for the Republican Party, McCain is elected in 2008, and all is hunky dory for non-conservatives who for some reason wish to vote for a Republican in future. The Republican party says “see, things aren’t so bad . . . we’ll try this again in four more years.”
Things are not so great at all for actual conservatives who can look forward to dozens more presidential candidates like this one.
Option 2: Things don’t work out so great for the Republican party. Having nominated a liberal for President — and incidentally behaved atrociously in the 6 years in which they held the House, the Senate and the Presidency by voting in grossly inflated budgets, adding more wild entitlement programs, completely muffing immigration reform, and having no clear principles that I can see concerning overhaul of our terrible tax system as well as the dead-in-the-water social security program — the Republicans experience a rout in 2008. Nothing goes their way.
Is this a trend, all of us conservatives wonder? Is the Republican Party no longer wishing to be the party of conservatives? Have they surrendered that whole notion? Even as the party ponders its vast failure, and turns their ire towards those Wicked Radical Hyper-Fundamentalist-Conservatives who didn’t vote for their Great Candidate [but who voted for Bob Dole, GB Senior, etc], they continue to augur into the ground. A vast shift — one which some saw earlier — continues to take place in the party, so that they are essentially The Party That Is Not Quite As Progressive As The Party of the Democrats.
Actual conservatives are morose that the Republican party appears to be permanently no longer that of conservatives, but hey, these things happen. They naturally gravitate towards another third-party, and the long long decades that are required to build something anew begins [in the true tradition of the Republican party, which was once itself a third party.]
Option 3): Things don’t work out so great for the Republican party. Having nominated a liberal for President — and incidentally behaved atrociously in the 6 years in which they held the House, the Senate and the Presidency by voting in grossly inflated budgets, adding more wild entitlement programs, completely muffing immigration reform, and having no clear principles that I can see concerning overhaul of our terrible tax system as well as the dead-in-the-water social security program — the Republicans experience a rout in 2008. Nothing goes their way.
Even as they ponder their vast failure, they acknowledge just how far away from conservative values — [i]like their actual platform[/i] — they have drifted. A fresh wind blows — that thing that comes after repentance, and sackcloth and ashes. Slowly they begin to reform.
Actual conservatives work hard to participate in this refreshing change.
Look.
The Republican party has chosen to take a risk — nominate a liberal for President. They are going to go for the independents, the moderates, and the liberals-who-can’t-stand-Hillary and ditch the conservatives.
I actually think this is a valid experiment. I’m okay with it. I honestly don’t know if it will work.
What I hear from some on this thread is outrage that people would let them run a valid experiment. The question that the Republican party is asking is . . . “what happens if we run a liberal for our party — would he be elected? Do we actually need the conservative base to win?” I think that’s a valid question!
The answer to it will provide loads of information to the folks running the Republican party. They either can do without the conservative base — which is a distinct possibility — or they can’t.
It appears that some folks on this thread don’t want them to run that experiment. They’re uneasy with it — and as a result they want conservatives like me to “enable” the Republican party and give them false information by pretending as if I’m going to vote for liberal nominees. But once I do that once, what’s to prevent me from continuing that trend? And how does that actually give the Republican party real, practical information? The Republican party needs to know if people like me are going to vote for liberals or not. Why lie to them “just this once” when they would merely use that information to come to a false conclusion — “conservatives will vote for liberal candidates which we nominate.”
It’s too late — the Republican party has decided to proceed with their experiment. We have no control over their actions, other than to provide them with valid information. I honestly don’t know the results of the experiment. McCain could possibly win, with the result that the Republican party [i]will still lose many many conservatives for the future, but with happy results to their experiment.[/i]
Someone on another thread about this issue—I believe that it was Cap’n Jack Sparrow—asked how I could do that, even though I’m assured that the third-party candidate would lose in this presidential term.
That’s a bit like asking a corporation in research and development “how they could support a product that will initially lose moneyâ€.
Naturally a third-party candidate at this point in American history would lose in a presidential election. But elections are a bit like R&D;. One learns as one goes, and building a viable third-party will be the work of a generation of committed voters and workers.
Election cycles build one on another, and it’s all R&D;, in a sense. The loss of one election or two elections is not the end of the world.
[Hopefully those running for vestries and convention delegates and Standing Committees will also have this attitude and think about the future rather than an immediate short-term loss.] ; > )
To circle back around, I appreciate Ed the Roman’s asking that question. It does indeed matter whether a liberal gets elected president — but that’s sort of already decided. A liberal will be the next President of the United States — perhaps a liberal Republican, perhaps a liberal Democrat. I’ll be sorry all around — but certainly not devastated. If a liberal Republican is elected, I give good odds to being lost to the Republican party forever, since I figure that the party will continue its “winning strategy” long into the future.
If a liberal Democrat is elected, it will be interesting to see what the Republican party will learn from its experiment.
What matters more, though, to me long-term is not “who is going to be our next President”. What matters more to me is “will there be a party that will nominate conservatives — or will there have to be a new party created over the coming decades and scores of years.”
Sarah, thanks for your analysis. In the long term, you’re probably right. My problem is that, as it has for the past thirty-five years, Roe v. Wade has distorted the American political system so it doesn’t work the way it should, as your analysis looks at it. The liberals have discovered that they can use the courts to subvert the representative legislative system. The four to six Supreme Court nominees the next President will nominate mean either a return to the constitutional system or another generation, and perhaps forever, without it. I can’t take the risk that my vote would enable this. I respect your different choice.
Certainly, conservatives need to be building a new set of leaders. We don’t have one right now, and haven’t for a long time, since G.W. Bush really never was a program conservative. I knew that when I voted for him twice; as this time around, I thought he was the best choice available.
If a liberal Democrat is elected, it will be interesting to see what the Republican party will learn from its experiment.
It will also be interesting seeing whether there will be a United States in four years; perhaps the war, and the Iranian [b]nuclear weapons[/b] program that even the European diplomats think is ongoing (regardless of that NIE which was disowned by the DNI as a tendentious piece of trash intended to handcuff policy makers), slipped your mind.
You are grossly unjust to McCain. His only weak spot on pro-life is ESCR, and that, while grievous, is probably solely out of personal loyalty to Nancy Reagan. I hate him on immigration and CFR, too, but we won’t be in charge of the borders at all, and we won’t have campaigns to finance either, if we lose the war.
Perhaps the Rockefeller Republicrats should have thought of that before contemptuously discarding the conservative base. Guess who suffers the most in the coming socialist utopia? It sure won’t be the working class! Conservatives have consistently voted against their own economic interests and supported the Republicans because the Republicans were socially conservative. That is changing…right now.
Frankly, what I would like to see (and perhaps SATON #65 would, too) is a campaign with the economic policies of Obama and the social policies of Huckabee. So what’s a theologically/morally conservative, economically liberal voter to do? The same thing we’ve done for lo, the past many elections, I guess.
The Dems are bad because of their strong support for distinct evils like abortion on demand and moral libertinism. Most of the more conservative Repubs are bad because of their strong support for distinct evils like torture, a police state, and economic libertinism. (Libertarians like Ron Paul just support libertines across the board; his uncompromising pro-life stance appears anomalous to me.)
Huckabee is as close to one of my heroes, the Populist William Jennings Bryan, as we are likely to get in the present day. Unfortunately he can’t be elected… but McCain is reasonably close, and can be elected.
Songbird’s real record is all over the alternative media. Google ‘Songbird McCain.’ The establishment media will not report on this until an opportune time. So, don’t worry, when it looks like McCain will win, the media will reveal McCain’s true war record. Hillary is the anointed candidate that will become president. Hillary has the support of the “puppet masters,†the ones who control and manipulate society.
The mainstream media has been actively suppressing Ron Paul. Also, vote fraud has been used to continually steal elections from Ron Paul and also Obama. That’s why it appears that Ron Paul isn’t doing well. Yet, for someone who isn’t doing well, he has raised the most money in the past 2 or 3 quarters than any other candidate. He has over 20 million dollars. What is amazing about this is that the 20 million dollars are coming from individual voters who contribute on average about $90!! That shows he has huge grassroot support!
Ron Paul is our last chance to turn things around in America. He is having an effect. He’s waking up a lot of people to America’s economic, civil liberties and foreign policy situation. Lots of people have started to store food, firearms and precious metals for the ensuring collapse of America’s economy and society. On alternative radio Ron Paul has stress to his listeners the importance of storing the above supplies. If Hillary is elected, it’s time to find another country, just as many of the rich are buying homes on islands and preparing for a total collaspe of society. My hope is that people will go to Ron Paul’s campaign website and read his position papers to learn where he stands on the issues.
RE: “It will also be interesting seeing whether there will be a United States in four years; perhaps the war, and the Iranian nuclear weapons program that even the European diplomats think is ongoing (regardless of that NIE which was disowned by the DNI as a tendentious piece of trash intended to handcuff policy makers), slipped your mind.”
I actually have more faith in America than to think that one Democrat will in four years completely overturn a Constitutional Republic. I mean — they’re bad and all — really really really bad, and their values are entirely the opposite of mine in almost every way — but not that bad.
And again, the Republican party has chosen this experiment. If you really really think that the country is at risk if a Democrat is elected, then shame on the Republican party for its clever little experiment.
But again . . . I am very proud to be an American, and I don’t believe that a duly elected president will overturn this country, however horrible he or she is. Further, I won’t be “held hostage” to the Republican party’s poor choices by wild threats of “our country will go to rack and ruin if you don’t vote for our liberal candidate.”
Vincent, can you say “Lyndon LaRouche”? I knew you could.
What a maroon.
From the [url=http://www.vfw.org/index.cfm?fa=news.newsDtl&did=2195&tok=1]VFW website[/url]: “Sen. John McCain’s 5 1/2 years of captivity in North Vietnam were divided into two phases. Initially this son and grandson of high-ranking naval officers was accorded relatively privileged status. Then he refused early release — which he saw as a public relations stunt by his captors — insisting that POWs held longer than he should be granted their freedom first. Thereafter McCain was treated much more severely by his captors, but he also had more of an opportunity to bond with his fellow prisoners.”
#67, I googled and Politifact says you are dead wrong about McCain’s war and POW record. Looks like all the trumped up info is coming from one guy in upstate NY, who has some sort of vendetta against Vietnam and is mad at McCain for his support of normalizing relations with Vietnam. Your innuendo and implications don’t serve your credibility well, when they are not supported.
Katherine, regarding the supreme court appointments — GB Senior and Ford appointed terrible justices. And they were more conservative than McCain.
Bush Senior appointed Souter . . . Ford, John Paul Stevens . . .
I can’t imagine McCain doing better than Bush Senior, as McCain is not nearly so conservative as Bush Senior [who himself was a strikingly weak man, although a man that I respect].
Vincent Lerins My knowledge of what happened to McCain in vietnam doesn’t even come close to the song bird drivel. You need better sources. If McCain were as bad as you state, folks would know. The truth about Kerry’s christmas in Cambodia didn’t take long to come out nor did the truth about a bunch of other stuff with Kerry. McCain could have left Viet Nam POW confinement 4 years earlier than he did. He refused to avoid preferential treatment and left on a stretcher. If he was as cooperative with the North Vietnamese etc as you say why wouldn’t he have left the North Vietnam prison camps? NOBODY would have critized his leaving. Makes no sense. McCain is held up as a model of defiance in the US military Culture (and McCain’s story is spported by people who KNOW with in the US military).
Sarah, I put this on another thread as well. I’m off-schedule because of the time differences. Neither GB Senior nor Ford were pro-life. I’m not sure I would view either as particularly conservative; both were more country-club in religion and in politics. It is the pro-life issue, and McCain’s votes have been pretty reliable on abortion, which makes me think he is much more likely that GB Senior or Ford to nominate appropriate justices.
And maybe I’m being too pessimistic about what could happen with four to eight years of Obama or Clinton, but at least I haven’t yet put on my tin-foil hat like the Ron Paul gang.
One term could mean some pretty nasty Supreme Court judges. One term could have seriously deleterious effect on an already unstable economy. One term of what Hillary and Barack are preaching could strengthen our nation’s enemies, particularly terrorists.
Since Sarah wants to find an excluded middle argument where there isn’t one, let me try a little Billy Martin. Martin was the manager of the Yankees and his philosophy was that if my team scores one run your team has to score two runs to beat us. For the logically challenged, this means that if someone calls themself a conservative yet doesn’t vote for the most conservative candidate in the race (i.e scored no runs) one has effectively strengthened the more liberal candidate (if there are two candidates). If one votes for a third party candidate, same difference.
Tony thank you for expressing what I just couldn’t quite get out. I would also encourage people to work with in the Repub party to get street credit so maybe a really conservative can get elected next go around. If any one with a military background has a differant take on McCain’s POW years I would be glad to hear. I am always open to correction!
Katherine, if Ron Paul supporters are all donning tin-foil hats, then it’s time to buy stock in Reynolds Metals Company since he’s doing very well among conservative voters. He’s captured 2nd place in several states, had tremendous fundraising success, and with Romney out of the race he’s the only option left for principled conservatives.
What’s really crazy is voting for McCain and expecting him to do anything other than what he’s done in the past: support amnesty for illegals, sell out conservatives, and make insane comments (“100 years” in Iraq!) that virtually guarantee a loss in the general election. Voting for Ron Paul will send the message that McCain is unacceptable!
I am unconvinced that McCain will be the judicial appointment disaster you are predicting, Sarah. I’m certain that Senators Clinton and Obama would be.
#78, I wanted Romney to get the nomination. He, and I, could see that it wasn’t going to happen. If Romney, with a lot more money at his disposal and a lot more convention delegates and votes than Huckabee, much less Paul, could read the handwriting on the wall, why can’t you? The problem you don’t want to acknowledge is that Paul’s principles and the principles of most conservatives don’t match, and wishful thinking on your part won’t make it so.
Further, while McCain is not my guy, and I can see his flaws, these unsubstantiated charges about his military record look to me like flat-out slander. If there are men who served with him who are willing to criticize him in public, let them do so. Otherwise, if Paul and his supporters won’t repudiate this stuff, they lose my respect.
It’s okay if you don’t believe what McCain’s fellow POWs and other military men in the know have said about Songbird McCain’s real military record. Former POWs have already formed groups like ‘Vietnam Veterans Against John McCain. Don’t believe me, research it for yourself and come to your own conclusions. I know vindication will come sometime between now and the November election. You can say you heard it first on titusonenine!
NWOhioAnglican:
Lyndon LaRouche and his EIR report have done a lot of good research over the years. However, it’s some of his solutions that are the problem.
Katherine:
You are right that Ron Paul’s principles don’t match most conservatives’ principles. Most conservatives are not real conservatives. That’s why they can support a charlatan like McCain or a liberal Democrat. You have major so-called conservatives like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter throwing their support behind Hillary Clinton!!!!
If Ron Paul supporters seem a little crazy, it’s due to the fact that most of us realize that Ron Paul is probably the last chance we have to turn things around in America before we lose all our civil liberties, national sovereignty, jobs and most important, our freedom. There are plans to merge the US with Mexico and Canada. It’s called the North American union. We will have one currency, the Amero. There will probably be another terror attack doing the next administration. It will be used as an excuse to attack Iran or whoever else we want to attack. Here at home, we will have martial law. However, what concerns me the most, especially as a conservative Christian is that religious freedom will be eliminated through hate speech legislation. That doesn’t bode well for Common Cause churches or any other conservative church. They could be labeled as a hate group. I believe that this is the “ace in the hole†that KJS and others are counting on. Remember that events, especially in politics, are not a random series of events. Everything is interconnected.
here’s the link: http://thepage.time.com/2008/02/07/sources-romney-to-quit-race/
whoops this one is better
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/02/07/romney.campaign/index.html
Uncle!
Sad.
Many will not vote for a liberal for President, including me. I don’t really matter, that much, but my many friends who won’t be voting for a liberal — they’ll matter.
The Republican party has probably taken a bigger hit with this than they will realize . . . until November, that is.
#4…Then I suppose you’ll be supporting McCain.
The Republican Party is toast.
Loaded the front end with Liberals.
Didn’t matter who won.
Frankly, if the wayyyy..to the right conservatives abandon McCain, then Clinton or O’Bama are shoe ins.
McCain is the only Republican who can defeat Clinton. Romney was terrible for MA. and would be terrible for the US. For those who haven’t experienced him, you’re not losing out.
I voted for Romney. I would have voted for Fred. That said, the only way that McCain looks close to either Obama or Clinton in policy is from a very great political distance. I have a friend in upstate NY who feels that way. He’s an anarcho-syndicalist, and Dennis Kucinich is well to his right. From where he’s standing, the remaining major candidates are all pretty close. Just like from Neptune, the Earth and the Moon are pretty close.
Romney would have been eviscerated in the general election campaign, most notably for his royal flip-flops on major positions he took as Governor of Massachusetts. You think John Kerry was a bad flip-flopper? He has nothing on Mitt. All during this campaign it has amazed me how otherwise seriously minded Republicans could have supported Romney knowing how effectively the flip-flop charge was used on Kerry in 2004.
“if the wayyyy..to the right conservatives abandon McCain, then Clinton or O’Bama are shoe ins.”
Expect a Democrat President.
RE: “#4…Then I suppose you’ll be supporting McCain.”
LOL. ; > )
I agree that it will be Clinton or Obama — and if that is what America wants, than that they shall have. I am at peace with that.
Sarah #12 –
So you’d rather see Clinton or Obama as the next president than McCain?
[i] Oh, c’mon. Quit baiting Sarah. [/i]
Elf Lady
Sorry, Elf Lady – not intending to bait. But the premise of her position is important to this thread. If conservatives won’t vote for McCain because he’s too liberal, then they are essentially supporting Obama/Clinton. That doesn’t make much sense to me.
McCain has given a strong statement on Supreme Court Justices, and if he means it, which I hope he does, then I will support him. It’s clear that either Obama or Clinton would appoint totally unsuitable people. Also, it is possible that McCain would actually veto some spending bills, and that’s a plus.
So, with regret, it’s McCain ’08 for me, and Jindal ’12 or ’16.
I’m writing in Hugh Hefner….bringing all new meaning to the term “party politics”.
Additionally, how is McCain a liberal? He’s convervative on abortion, marriage, the war…
Is he a liberal economically? No. He’s moderate.
Either of the two remaining Republicans would be infinitely preferable to either Sen. Obama or Sen. Clinton.
Charles #18, he has outraged conservatives, including me, by trying to push through a stealth immigration “reform” bill bypassing the normal Senate procedures. He championed, and Bush regrettably signed, a campaign finance bill which restricts free speech. And even now he is working with Sen. Lieberman on an energy bill which would require a big tax increase on gasoline and, I think, a cap-and-trade scheme which many conservatives view as worse than useless. These things are why the opposition to him has been so strong, and he’ll have to do some major fence-mending.
OK – I thought that abortion, marriage, and supreme court justices were more important to conservatives than immigration, campaign finance, tax increases and trade issues. Am I wrong?
I was home at lunch and was watching MSNBC. The latest poll shows (if election were held today) McCain 44%; Clinton 43% (rest undecided); but McCain 37%, Obama 63% (apparently nobody undecided). Note to bloggers: Don’t jump on me I’m just reporting what I heard on TV.
#22, I think that is what all the Republicans, who crossed over on Tuesday, to vote against Hillary, forgot about. It may very well be that no Republican can beat Obama, and then what have we got … someone who is may be more likeable than Hillary, but who is infinitely less experienced than anyone else in the race (Democrat or Republican – remember Jimmy Carter) and whose policies are just as liberal and maybe more liberal than Hillary’s (or Bill’s) would ever be. Republicans better start using some long term thinking or this thing could get way out of hand, if it hasn’t already. And an extreme conservative is not the answer for the Republicans, either. Remember the massacre of 1964. I’m no fan of McCain, but he would seem to be the only moderate candidate running.
I’m 43 and have never missed an election since turning 18 – not even for dog catcher. In that time, I have NEVER – EVER knowingly pulled a lever for a democrat. Even so…. I will NOT reward McCain or the GOP by voting for him. Discipline is needed, and if it takes a loss for the GOP to straighten out, so mote it be.
24. midwestnorwegian:
Absolutely. The GOP is being operated like Chicago politics and I think that it stinks. I would rather that a Democrat president screw up the country than a Liberal Republican.
And what rumor is it that McCain is Pro-life? Check his record. He is entirely in favor of producing as many easy targets for dirty old men as he can.
I have always voted Republican, and think that the current conservative Republicans have committed a titanic blunder in their anti-immigration stance. All that it is going to do is to ensure that the hispanic vote will forever be in the Democrats’ pocket.
24 and 25
So you’d throw the country to the Democratic dogs to teach the Republican Party a lesson? How smart is that?
24 and 25, there have always been moderates in the Rep Party. There used to be in the Demo Party; only Birch Bayh, far as I can tell right now. Conservatives have run the party for quite a while now. Time for some moderation. But you can cut off you nose to spite your face if you want to. It’s just that the rest of us may have to suffer, if there are enough of you sulking conservative Republicans to throw the election to Hillary.
#25: Party Politics?? The party insiders picked Romney! And McCain’s record (whatever you think of it) was called a 100% pro life record by National Right to Life.
RE: “If conservatives won’t vote for McCain because he’s too liberal, then they are essentially supporting Obama/Clinton.”
Nonsense. That’s a bit like saying “if you don’t vote for [insert x policiy] then you support [y policy].
I’m not a Republican. I’m not a Democrat. I’m a conservative. Just to give you an idea of what I *can* stomach — I voted for Bob Dole, and was proud to do so.
But . . . sadly . . . the Republican Party is not nominating a conservative candidate in this presidential cycle. It is certainly their right to do what they wish.
And it is my right to make certain that no such candidate receives my vote.
If the Republican party wishes to nominate a non-conservative to run for President and count on the moderates and liberals who cross-over to win the election, this is fine. I think it a foolish error — but hey, I’m not a political strategist, and I could certainly be wrong.
But it’s not my responsiblity to enable further poor choices on the part of the Republican party. It’s not my responsibility to reward their decisions. It’s my responsibility to vote in integrity and according to what I believe to be compatible with my political philosophy. And that is what I will do.
That is what many of my friends will do as well.
It remains to be seen whether I and others like me — conservatives — will have any sort of impact on the election. I certainly cannot say.
But the Republican party has nominate a non-conservative. Again — their right to do so. But certainly not my duty to “make up for” their choices by ignoring that fact and voting against my beliefs.
McCain has always done well with independents and conservative Democrats; the thing he’s never been able to do in the past is convince many Republicans to vote for him. Since he’s now the undisputed front-runner in the delegate count, he’s obviously found a way to do that… but I’m wondering if he’ll find that he’s done so at the expense of losing his independent base.
If it ends up being an Obama/McCain contest, it’s going to be spun as the independent idealist outsider versus the independent maverick outsider; which says something about the way the voting public seems to be feeling about politics-as-usual.
Personally, I still like Hillary for president, but the way she and Obama are beating each other bloody in the primaries isn’t good for our side no matter who comes out on top.
i don’t get why each party is so extreme. i am not a right or left winger, more moderate leaning right-except for being an extremist tree hugger. i haven’t voted for a republican since reagan and yet might do so for mccain.
if you are talking about electing someone on likeability and no experience well that shouldn’t be so surprising should it? how the heck else could bush have been elected? the office of governor in texas is largely a figurehead post and from what i have read he was never successful in business, but people thought ‘he would drink a beer with them’ and he claimed to be a Christian. it certainly wasn’t because he was learned and experienced.
This is good news to Ron Paul supporters. Ron Paul is the only candidate that can beat Hillary Clinton. A vote for anyone else is a vote for Hillary Clinton. McCain or “Songbird†as he is called by POWs and the Clintons are good friends, even Mrs McCain has been caught wearing Clinton campaign buttons in the past. Also, McCain considered being the VP for John Kerry in 04. Everything he stands for is the opposite of what the American people want, especially conservatives.
If Ron Paul dropped out of the race and didn’t run on a third party ticket (he probably will run third party), I was planning on voting for Romney. Oh, well…..
I predict its going to be Hillary Clinton as president and Obama as vice president. They will be running against a McCain/Huckabee ticket, which will be a losing ticket. The US will come to love Hillary…..don’t worry …I’m sure the Clintons are working on it.
-Vincent
How can you possibly say everything he stands for is the opposite of what the American people want? Obiviously, you are wrong, unless of course Romney & Huckleberry are even more opposite.
#21, you’re right. And no matter what, I will never knowingly vote for anyone who supports unrestricted abortion. I may not like other stands the candidate may take, but that’s my measuring rod. McCain made clear his stance on abortion at the CPAC this afternoon. He’s agin it. So, if nominated, he gets my vote.
T
Oh, that’s a great idea, “teach the Republican Party a lesson”, and throw this country into the hands of the current “american idol” who is out to change not only this country, but the “world”, or
perhaps into the hands of a woman who now and always has “hated” the military, not that we’re in a war for our very existence or anything.
Yep, I know its ones’ “right”, but its also ones’ responsibility to look out for the people of one’s country.
Gloria
Conservatives who will not vote for McCain are de facto supporting either Obama or Clinton. JM spoke to CPAC today and spoke of his brand of conservatism. While I disagree with his position on immigration, he certainly is conservative on taxes, abortion, limited govt., and a host of other issues.
Mike:
McCain is for amnesty for the 30 million+ illegals, stricter gun laws and continuing the Iraq war (for 100+ years!!!). Those are just three big issues were the majority of the country is against McCain. In addition to this, he is so corrupt. He was a part of the Keating 5 scandal. He lies about his time in Vietnam. Just like the speedboat soldiers came out about Kerry in the last election, the POWs are going to come out with the truth about McCain.
Hillary is going to be president. McCain is going to take the fall, because the establishment knows about McCain’s past. It’s going to be brought out and Hillary will win the election. But, Hillary is going to win anyway. That’s why I keep stressing that Ron Paul is the only candidate that can beat Hillary Clinton. If you look at RP’s voting record and beliefs, the majority of Americans share his views.
“Conservatives who will not vote for McCain are de facto supporting either Obama or Clinton.”
Conservatives who will not vote for [the latest spending package] are de facto supporting either [poverty or unfettered abortion].
[roll eyes]
Thank you for your intelligent rolling of eyes, Sarah.
Why you are most welcome, Tony!
Any time, whenever there is that sort of “argument” to respond to.
I’m sorry you missed the argument. Allow me to spell it out more clearly for you: those who don’t vote hurt the candidate they are most in agreement with and bolster the candidate from the opposing party.
I’ll certainly be voting, Tony.
What you mean, surely, is “those who don’t vote [for my selected candidate] hurt the candidate [which I have selected] and bolster the candidate from the opposing party.”
To which I reply:
[blockquote]Conservatives who will not vote for [the latest spending package] are de facto supporting either [poverty or unfettered abortion].
[roll eyes][/blockquote]
PS: Other than using a parallel to combat the fallacy, rolling eyes is actually an excellent response to the fallacy of the Excluded Middle.
Vincent,
if so many Americans are so opposed to those supposed stances, then why is he so far ahead? Look, it’s not like I’m a McCain supporter. In fact I’m not sure there is anyone left that I can vote for (AGAIN!!!). But I guess somewhat like Sarah, I just have to challenge patently ridiculous statements.
Without meaning to be rude, it seems to me that the bloggers who say ‘they will not vote the party candidate chosen by the people’, are the same ones who have said that all who received an invite to Lambeth should go,(even if they don’t agree) because if they don’t then ECUSA and the others will have it all their own way. Does anyone else see similarities ?
The big winner here is Ron Paul — he’s the only true conservative in the race at this point, and he’s the only nominee who could get enough anti-Iraq crossover votes from the Democrats to win the general election. Watch for a Ron Paul upswing in the polls as conservatives revolt against McCain in the coming weeks.
Quo Vadis,Conservatives?
As a Romney supporter, I am dispirited. If I may…here’s a little peptalk from Michelle Malkin…
http://michellemalkin.com/2008/02/07/quo-vadis-conservatives/
And if that doesn’t help, Hugh Hewitt gives 7 reasons to take a good look at McCain [nose held or not]1 war + 6 possible supreme court vacancies.
[blockquote] And even now he is working with Sen. Lieberman on an energy bill which would require a big tax increase on gasoline and, I think, a cap-and-trade scheme which many conservatives view as worse than useless.[/blockquote]
Man, do I love my new hybrid. 46.7 mpg on the second tank of gas so far! I’ll think of this quote when I fill the tank next.
Ron Paul isn’t really a conservative, is he? I was always taught that he was a Libertarian.
I do agree that McCain will be the best bet against Clinton. I also agree that Obama would clean McCain’s clock. Nice to see the polls agree!
Whoops, I meant to ask whether Ron Paul was really a Republican (not a conservative).
I agree with Sarah’s style. I’ll vote for the person who best matches my beliefs, not the party. I like Obama and have and would vote for him. I do not like Clinton and would vote for McCain if he was the alternative.
I love listening to conservatives and Republicans groan and moan. After so many years of Democratic suicide, it gives me such a warm feeling . . .
I am a conservative, but I have enough fear for this country under the Euro-Socialism of Obama or Clinton that I will vote for McCain if he is the candidate–on one conditon: that he can come up with a satisfactory explanation for the anti-free speech provisions of McCain-Feingold. The idea that McCain thought it was acceptable to bar American citizens from banding together to post political advertisements within thirty days of an election is frightening to me. The bill’s blatant disregard of threshold Constitutional rights took my breath away at the time the bill was proposed. It still does. I understand that the role of money in political campaigns is a big problem, but to solve it by tearing up the Constitution just blows me away. I’m waiting for McCain’s “innocent explanation” for the idea.
PREDICTIONS!!!(a la John McLaughlin): McCain probably beats Clinton, unless Clinton picks Richardson or Bayh for V-P, which evens the odds. Obama beats McCain.
#49…As I understand it, Ron Paul is a Libertarian. On economic matters he’s looks as conservative as any Republican, but on personal moral choices, he’d be as (or more) liberal as any Democrat. Basically, the Libertarian motto is government leave us alone!
I sometimes hear things like, “some conservatives would sit out a McCain/Hillary election, or even vote for Hillary.”
That is a logically impossible statement. Anyone who would sit out the forthcoming election, or vote for a third party, because Sen. McCain is the nominee, is not a conservative. Knowing the age of the SCOTUS justices…. Any so-called conservative who takes such a position is no more a conservative than Billary; and is deserving only of the deepest, deepest, contempt.
So did I, Sarah, in the general. In the primary I voted for Alan Keyes, and I think that establishes my conservatism quite well.
It’s elegant to bring up the excluded middle, but that misses the point. To not vote for either candidate is to act, perhaps not to think, or talk, or pray, but to [b]act[/b], as if it does not matter who gets into office. And all jokes about “no matter who you vote for, the Government always gets in” aside, the premise of that action is ridiculous.
If you are indifferent to whether Admiral Mullen and Admiral Fallon brief Iranian options to President Obama or to President McCain, well, your conservatism is uninformed by memory of the 60s and 70s.
I respect Sarah’s right to do what she thinks is best, but I agree with Ed the Roman. I have to vote for the best electable candidate among the available choices. The arguments among Republican candidates were about choosing the best one. I don’t think McCain is the best, but on security and court appointments, he’s far better than either Democrat.
I’m not so sure Obama would beat McCain in the general election. At some point he’s going to have to leave behind the vague “hope” statements and say something specific, and he is a very left-wing candidate. It could be framed by the McCain campaign as the American consensus vs. the left-wing fringe, which might work. And I hope very sincerely that this does not happen, but if there were a major terrorist incident between now and the election, it would hurt Obama as well as the nation.
And don’t y’all think there’s something statesmanlike about Romney’s declining to rip the party’s fabric any further now that he can see the handwriting on the wall? Makes Huckabee look shallow in comparison, at this point, since the differences between him and McCain are not huge, and McCain is way ahead.
Vincent Lerins I have looked at Mc Cain’s war record and to disparage that is one of the worst ad hominine attacks I have seen. It is will documented that McCain could have left North Vietnam prison camps after two years because his dad was an admiral. McCain stayed in a hell worst than you can imagine for four more years, to avoid preferential treatment, and was the one of last to leave and had to be carried out on a stretcher. When the bad boys of the military get together McCain is pretty well thought of. If you can’t document your attack please don’t express it. I don’t agree with McCain’s politics but I will never doubt his courage or disparage his honor while he was a service member!
Thanks, Dave B. I have been ignoring the Ron Paul enthusiasts, because their candidate is getting very few votes among Republicans and shows little sign of being attractive to Democrats either. The attacks on McCain’s military record are unsubstantiated and out of line. If there are men who served with him and wish to criticize him, let them do so publicly. Otherwise, this kind of thing is unacceptable.
Katherine, the election is nine months away, a life time in poitics. Obama and Clinton are raising tons of money but spending it fighting each other. I find all the negativity about McCain disingenous. Obama really hasn’t been pressed too much and has gotten a pass. Who knows who would beat whom? (Gulliani was the front runner and McCain a foot note about a month ago). Ron Paul doesn’t play well. I watched one debate where Ron Paul wondered into the stratosphere and the moderator finally had to ask him what he was talking about. Clinton or Obama would destroy Ron Paul.
RE: “Anyone who would sit out the forthcoming election, or vote for a third party, because Sen. McCain is the nominee, is not a conservative. . . . Any so-called conservative who takes such a position is no more a conservative than Billary; and is deserving only of the deepest, deepest, contempt.”
Toral1 will be unsurprised to learn that I don’t give a flying fig for his contempt, in fact I smile at it. Nor do I care to be the definition of a “conservative” that Toral1 clearly has of one.
Moving on to a more substantive comment [rather than blustering threats of “contempt” from a man I don’t know] . . .
Ed the Roman brings up an excellent point that deserves comment [and hey, we have something in common since I also am an admirer and voted for Alan Keyes].
RE: “To not vote for either candidate is to act, perhaps not to think, or talk, or pray, but to act, as if it does not matter who gets into office.”
That actually seems to be the real issue here.
You see, I’m not looking at the short term of the “next four years” . . . I’m looking at, long term, what the nomination of a liberal does to the Republican party and to conservatives and to America. That party once was the party that could come up with a conservative for people to vote for.
What does this mean? Let’s wargame it.
Option 1): Things work out great for the Republican Party, McCain is elected in 2008, and all is hunky dory for non-conservatives who for some reason wish to vote for a Republican in future. The Republican party says “see, things aren’t so bad . . . we’ll try this again in four more years.”
Things are not so great at all for actual conservatives who can look forward to dozens more presidential candidates like this one.
Option 2: Things don’t work out so great for the Republican party. Having nominated a liberal for President — and incidentally behaved atrociously in the 6 years in which they held the House, the Senate and the Presidency by voting in grossly inflated budgets, adding more wild entitlement programs, completely muffing immigration reform, and having no clear principles that I can see concerning overhaul of our terrible tax system as well as the dead-in-the-water social security program — the Republicans experience a rout in 2008. Nothing goes their way.
Is this a trend, all of us conservatives wonder? Is the Republican Party no longer wishing to be the party of conservatives? Have they surrendered that whole notion? Even as the party ponders its vast failure, and turns their ire towards those Wicked Radical Hyper-Fundamentalist-Conservatives who didn’t vote for their Great Candidate [but who voted for Bob Dole, GB Senior, etc], they continue to augur into the ground. A vast shift — one which some saw earlier — continues to take place in the party, so that they are essentially The Party That Is Not Quite As Progressive As The Party of the Democrats.
Actual conservatives are morose that the Republican party appears to be permanently no longer that of conservatives, but hey, these things happen. They naturally gravitate towards another third-party, and the long long decades that are required to build something anew begins [in the true tradition of the Republican party, which was once itself a third party.]
Option 3): Things don’t work out so great for the Republican party. Having nominated a liberal for President — and incidentally behaved atrociously in the 6 years in which they held the House, the Senate and the Presidency by voting in grossly inflated budgets, adding more wild entitlement programs, completely muffing immigration reform, and having no clear principles that I can see concerning overhaul of our terrible tax system as well as the dead-in-the-water social security program — the Republicans experience a rout in 2008. Nothing goes their way.
Even as they ponder their vast failure, they acknowledge just how far away from conservative values — [i]like their actual platform[/i] — they have drifted. A fresh wind blows — that thing that comes after repentance, and sackcloth and ashes. Slowly they begin to reform.
Actual conservatives work hard to participate in this refreshing change.
Look.
The Republican party has chosen to take a risk — nominate a liberal for President. They are going to go for the independents, the moderates, and the liberals-who-can’t-stand-Hillary and ditch the conservatives.
I actually think this is a valid experiment. I’m okay with it. I honestly don’t know if it will work.
What I hear from some on this thread is outrage that people would let them run a valid experiment. The question that the Republican party is asking is . . . “what happens if we run a liberal for our party — would he be elected? Do we actually need the conservative base to win?” I think that’s a valid question!
The answer to it will provide loads of information to the folks running the Republican party. They either can do without the conservative base — which is a distinct possibility — or they can’t.
It appears that some folks on this thread don’t want them to run that experiment. They’re uneasy with it — and as a result they want conservatives like me to “enable” the Republican party and give them false information by pretending as if I’m going to vote for liberal nominees. But once I do that once, what’s to prevent me from continuing that trend? And how does that actually give the Republican party real, practical information? The Republican party needs to know if people like me are going to vote for liberals or not. Why lie to them “just this once” when they would merely use that information to come to a false conclusion — “conservatives will vote for liberal candidates which we nominate.”
It’s too late — the Republican party has decided to proceed with their experiment. We have no control over their actions, other than to provide them with valid information. I honestly don’t know the results of the experiment. McCain could possibly win, with the result that the Republican party [i]will still lose many many conservatives for the future, but with happy results to their experiment.[/i]
Someone on another thread about this issue—I believe that it was Cap’n Jack Sparrow—asked how I could do that, even though I’m assured that the third-party candidate would lose in this presidential term.
That’s a bit like asking a corporation in research and development “how they could support a product that will initially lose moneyâ€.
Naturally a third-party candidate at this point in American history would lose in a presidential election. But elections are a bit like R&D;. One learns as one goes, and building a viable third-party will be the work of a generation of committed voters and workers.
Election cycles build one on another, and it’s all R&D;, in a sense. The loss of one election or two elections is not the end of the world.
[Hopefully those running for vestries and convention delegates and Standing Committees will also have this attitude and think about the future rather than an immediate short-term loss.] ; > )
To circle back around, I appreciate Ed the Roman’s asking that question. It does indeed matter whether a liberal gets elected president — but that’s sort of already decided. A liberal will be the next President of the United States — perhaps a liberal Republican, perhaps a liberal Democrat. I’ll be sorry all around — but certainly not devastated. If a liberal Republican is elected, I give good odds to being lost to the Republican party forever, since I figure that the party will continue its “winning strategy” long into the future.
If a liberal Democrat is elected, it will be interesting to see what the Republican party will learn from its experiment.
What matters more, though, to me long-term is not “who is going to be our next President”. What matters more to me is “will there be a party that will nominate conservatives — or will there have to be a new party created over the coming decades and scores of years.”
I will be voting for Ron Paul or no one.
Sarah, thanks for your analysis. In the long term, you’re probably right. My problem is that, as it has for the past thirty-five years, Roe v. Wade has distorted the American political system so it doesn’t work the way it should, as your analysis looks at it. The liberals have discovered that they can use the courts to subvert the representative legislative system. The four to six Supreme Court nominees the next President will nominate mean either a return to the constitutional system or another generation, and perhaps forever, without it. I can’t take the risk that my vote would enable this. I respect your different choice.
Certainly, conservatives need to be building a new set of leaders. We don’t have one right now, and haven’t for a long time, since G.W. Bush really never was a program conservative. I knew that when I voted for him twice; as this time around, I thought he was the best choice available.
It will also be interesting seeing whether there will be a United States in four years; perhaps the war, and the Iranian [b]nuclear weapons[/b] program that even the European diplomats think is ongoing (regardless of that NIE which was disowned by the DNI as a tendentious piece of trash intended to handcuff policy makers), slipped your mind.
You are grossly unjust to McCain. His only weak spot on pro-life is ESCR, and that, while grievous, is probably solely out of personal loyalty to Nancy Reagan. I hate him on immigration and CFR, too, but we won’t be in charge of the borders at all, and we won’t have campaigns to finance either, if we lose the war.
Ed the Roman,
Perhaps the Rockefeller Republicrats should have thought of that before contemptuously discarding the conservative base. Guess who suffers the most in the coming socialist utopia? It sure won’t be the working class! Conservatives have consistently voted against their own economic interests and supported the Republicans because the Republicans were socially conservative. That is changing…right now.
Frankly, what I would like to see (and perhaps SATON #65 would, too) is a campaign with the economic policies of Obama and the social policies of Huckabee. So what’s a theologically/morally conservative, economically liberal voter to do? The same thing we’ve done for lo, the past many elections, I guess.
The Dems are bad because of their strong support for distinct evils like abortion on demand and moral libertinism. Most of the more conservative Repubs are bad because of their strong support for distinct evils like torture, a police state, and economic libertinism. (Libertarians like Ron Paul just support libertines across the board; his uncompromising pro-life stance appears anomalous to me.)
Huckabee is as close to one of my heroes, the Populist William Jennings Bryan, as we are likely to get in the present day. Unfortunately he can’t be elected… but McCain is reasonably close, and can be elected.
Dave and Katherine:
Songbird’s real record is all over the alternative media. Google ‘Songbird McCain.’ The establishment media will not report on this until an opportune time. So, don’t worry, when it looks like McCain will win, the media will reveal McCain’s true war record. Hillary is the anointed candidate that will become president. Hillary has the support of the “puppet masters,†the ones who control and manipulate society.
The mainstream media has been actively suppressing Ron Paul. Also, vote fraud has been used to continually steal elections from Ron Paul and also Obama. That’s why it appears that Ron Paul isn’t doing well. Yet, for someone who isn’t doing well, he has raised the most money in the past 2 or 3 quarters than any other candidate. He has over 20 million dollars. What is amazing about this is that the 20 million dollars are coming from individual voters who contribute on average about $90!! That shows he has huge grassroot support!
Ron Paul is our last chance to turn things around in America. He is having an effect. He’s waking up a lot of people to America’s economic, civil liberties and foreign policy situation. Lots of people have started to store food, firearms and precious metals for the ensuring collapse of America’s economy and society. On alternative radio Ron Paul has stress to his listeners the importance of storing the above supplies. If Hillary is elected, it’s time to find another country, just as many of the rich are buying homes on islands and preparing for a total collaspe of society. My hope is that people will go to Ron Paul’s campaign website and read his position papers to learn where he stands on the issues.
-Vincent
RE: “It will also be interesting seeing whether there will be a United States in four years; perhaps the war, and the Iranian nuclear weapons program that even the European diplomats think is ongoing (regardless of that NIE which was disowned by the DNI as a tendentious piece of trash intended to handcuff policy makers), slipped your mind.”
I actually have more faith in America than to think that one Democrat will in four years completely overturn a Constitutional Republic. I mean — they’re bad and all — really really really bad, and their values are entirely the opposite of mine in almost every way — but not that bad.
And again, the Republican party has chosen this experiment. If you really really think that the country is at risk if a Democrat is elected, then shame on the Republican party for its clever little experiment.
But again . . . I am very proud to be an American, and I don’t believe that a duly elected president will overturn this country, however horrible he or she is. Further, I won’t be “held hostage” to the Republican party’s poor choices by wild threats of “our country will go to rack and ruin if you don’t vote for our liberal candidate.”
Vincent, can you say “Lyndon LaRouche”? I knew you could.
What a maroon.
From the [url=http://www.vfw.org/index.cfm?fa=news.newsDtl&did=2195&tok=1]VFW website[/url]: “Sen. John McCain’s 5 1/2 years of captivity in North Vietnam were divided into two phases. Initially this son and grandson of high-ranking naval officers was accorded relatively privileged status. Then he refused early release — which he saw as a public relations stunt by his captors — insisting that POWs held longer than he should be granted their freedom first. Thereafter McCain was treated much more severely by his captors, but he also had more of an opportunity to bond with his fellow prisoners.”
#67, I googled and Politifact says you are dead wrong about McCain’s war and POW record. Looks like all the trumped up info is coming from one guy in upstate NY, who has some sort of vendetta against Vietnam and is mad at McCain for his support of normalizing relations with Vietnam. Your innuendo and implications don’t serve your credibility well, when they are not supported.
Katherine, regarding the supreme court appointments — GB Senior and Ford appointed terrible justices. And they were more conservative than McCain.
Bush Senior appointed Souter . . . Ford, John Paul Stevens . . .
I can’t imagine McCain doing better than Bush Senior, as McCain is not nearly so conservative as Bush Senior [who himself was a strikingly weak man, although a man that I respect].
Sarah, your faith is touching.
I don’t actually think one term is enough for us to be defeated.
But one term is MORE than enough to put the issue very much in doubt.
Vincent Lerins My knowledge of what happened to McCain in vietnam doesn’t even come close to the song bird drivel. You need better sources. If McCain were as bad as you state, folks would know. The truth about Kerry’s christmas in Cambodia didn’t take long to come out nor did the truth about a bunch of other stuff with Kerry. McCain could have left Viet Nam POW confinement 4 years earlier than he did. He refused to avoid preferential treatment and left on a stretcher. If he was as cooperative with the North Vietnamese etc as you say why wouldn’t he have left the North Vietnam prison camps? NOBODY would have critized his leaving. Makes no sense. McCain is held up as a model of defiance in the US military Culture (and McCain’s story is spported by people who KNOW with in the US military).
Sarah, I put this on another thread as well. I’m off-schedule because of the time differences. Neither GB Senior nor Ford were pro-life. I’m not sure I would view either as particularly conservative; both were more country-club in religion and in politics. It is the pro-life issue, and McCain’s votes have been pretty reliable on abortion, which makes me think he is much more likely that GB Senior or Ford to nominate appropriate justices.
And maybe I’m being too pessimistic about what could happen with four to eight years of Obama or Clinton, but at least I haven’t yet put on my tin-foil hat like the Ron Paul gang.
One term could mean some pretty nasty Supreme Court judges. One term could have seriously deleterious effect on an already unstable economy. One term of what Hillary and Barack are preaching could strengthen our nation’s enemies, particularly terrorists.
Since Sarah wants to find an excluded middle argument where there isn’t one, let me try a little Billy Martin. Martin was the manager of the Yankees and his philosophy was that if my team scores one run your team has to score two runs to beat us. For the logically challenged, this means that if someone calls themself a conservative yet doesn’t vote for the most conservative candidate in the race (i.e scored no runs) one has effectively strengthened the more liberal candidate (if there are two candidates). If one votes for a third party candidate, same difference.
Tony thank you for expressing what I just couldn’t quite get out. I would also encourage people to work with in the Repub party to get street credit so maybe a really conservative can get elected next go around. If any one with a military background has a differant take on McCain’s POW years I would be glad to hear. I am always open to correction!
Katherine, if Ron Paul supporters are all donning tin-foil hats, then it’s time to buy stock in Reynolds Metals Company since he’s doing very well among conservative voters. He’s captured 2nd place in several states, had tremendous fundraising success, and with Romney out of the race he’s the only option left for principled conservatives.
What’s really crazy is voting for McCain and expecting him to do anything other than what he’s done in the past: support amnesty for illegals, sell out conservatives, and make insane comments (“100 years” in Iraq!) that virtually guarantee a loss in the general election. Voting for Ron Paul will send the message that McCain is unacceptable!
RE: “One term could mean some pretty nasty Supreme Court judges. One term could have seriously deleterious effect on an already unstable economy.”
Right — it’s sickening that McCain might bring that about, but that choice by the Republican party is now over and finished.
I am a conservative who remembers the Carter years. I will be voting for McCain.
I am unconvinced that McCain will be the judicial appointment disaster you are predicting, Sarah. I’m certain that Senators Clinton and Obama would be.
#78, I wanted Romney to get the nomination. He, and I, could see that it wasn’t going to happen. If Romney, with a lot more money at his disposal and a lot more convention delegates and votes than Huckabee, much less Paul, could read the handwriting on the wall, why can’t you? The problem you don’t want to acknowledge is that Paul’s principles and the principles of most conservatives don’t match, and wishful thinking on your part won’t make it so.
Further, while McCain is not my guy, and I can see his flaws, these unsubstantiated charges about his military record look to me like flat-out slander. If there are men who served with him who are willing to criticize him in public, let them do so. Otherwise, if Paul and his supporters won’t repudiate this stuff, they lose my respect.
RE: “I am unconvinced that McCain will be the judicial appointment disaster you are predicting, Sarah.”
I understand that.
I am convinced of it, however, and I must be responsible for my vote.
I don’t begrudge hope springing eternal in a conservative’s choice though. No ill will towards those who do vote for him.
I guess if he’s elected people will learn soon enough . . .
It’s okay if you don’t believe what McCain’s fellow POWs and other military men in the know have said about Songbird McCain’s real military record. Former POWs have already formed groups like ‘Vietnam Veterans Against John McCain. Don’t believe me, research it for yourself and come to your own conclusions. I know vindication will come sometime between now and the November election. You can say you heard it first on titusonenine!
NWOhioAnglican:
Lyndon LaRouche and his EIR report have done a lot of good research over the years. However, it’s some of his solutions that are the problem.
Katherine:
You are right that Ron Paul’s principles don’t match most conservatives’ principles. Most conservatives are not real conservatives. That’s why they can support a charlatan like McCain or a liberal Democrat. You have major so-called conservatives like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter throwing their support behind Hillary Clinton!!!!
If Ron Paul supporters seem a little crazy, it’s due to the fact that most of us realize that Ron Paul is probably the last chance we have to turn things around in America before we lose all our civil liberties, national sovereignty, jobs and most important, our freedom. There are plans to merge the US with Mexico and Canada. It’s called the North American union. We will have one currency, the Amero. There will probably be another terror attack doing the next administration. It will be used as an excuse to attack Iran or whoever else we want to attack. Here at home, we will have martial law. However, what concerns me the most, especially as a conservative Christian is that religious freedom will be eliminated through hate speech legislation. That doesn’t bode well for Common Cause churches or any other conservative church. They could be labeled as a hate group. I believe that this is the “ace in the hole†that KJS and others are counting on. Remember that events, especially in politics, are not a random series of events. Everything is interconnected.
-Vincent
Vincent,
I dunno about Ann, but Limbaugh was making a joke about the hostility of the conservative base towards Hillary. He does not actually want her to win.
Doesn’t anybody remember the “tax the poor” show he did 1 April ’91?