Tag Archives: republican establishment

Two Republican Establishment Examples Before You Vote In The Florida Primary

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Gingrich is getting pounded again as the Republican establishment tries to stop him.   The attacks are coming in hard now, and while Gingrich is none to conservative himself, but he has far more of it in his background than Romney and a better track record from his time in the House.  So in case you’ve possibly opened your mind to listening, here are two reminders of exactly who the Republican establishment is and why you should think carefully before taking their word on anything.

  1. The Senate just killed the motion of disapproval for Obama’s $1.2 trillion dollar debt ceiling increase.  Some Republican staffer commented about how red-state Democrats would suffer for it, which is completely beyond all comprehension.  All any Democrat has to do to deflect blame is remind everyone that this debt ceiling agreement was bipartisan, and possibly create an ad with McCain calling all the Tea Party types who didn’t agree with the approach that just handed the Democrats a win yet again Hobbits.  None of this would have been possible without the aggressive assistance of Boehner and McConnell, which won’t be lost on much of anyone.
  2. The House is passing legislation in a shady way.  This is either because the Establishment wants to short-circuit their own conservative caucus to maintain the status quo or they’re too terrified of Obama and Reid to resist the status quo.  They broke a few more promises too, and you can read the details at RedState.

This is the Republican establishment at work.  They’re the same establishment that wants Romney.  The same people that made the House the Other Democrat in spending after Gingrich left.  The same lot that led us to 2006 and 2008.  Why would the candidate they back be any different from them?

News link credits:  RedState, The Hill

The Newt Win In South Carolina

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By now you’ve heard that Newt ran away with South Carolina in the primary.  The down side of this is that South Carolina is a proportional delegate state under the new rules.  This means that while Newt may get the largest share of delegates, he’s not taking them all.  Mitt still gets some of them, so for now the race isn’t going to be decided before it gets to other states like it was for McCain in 2008.  He had pretty much wrapped up the primaries and lost the general election around February of that year.

The biggest hit Mitt took wasn’t in delegates, but the meme of his inevitability.  Now he’s more like Mr. Inevi<CRASH>.  Since that’s pretty much all he has going for him besides the bogus electability argument (it’s what they say to promote all the non-conservative candidates nowadays), expect more shrill from his supporters.

Last, Mitt’s not the only one with something to lose.  If he doesn’t make it through the primary, it will be the first time since Reagan that the Republican establishment doesn’t get its way in a Presidential nominee.  Their reaction will likely be similar to 2010 as with Charlie Crist, Senator Murkowski, Karl Rove’s treatment of Cristine O’Donnell, and all the trouble we had with the NRSC trying to put milquetoast moderates into the race.

Still, it would be one more small victory.

News link credit:  Legal Insurrection

Here’s How The Capitulation Is Working For The GOP

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Today seems like a good day to talk about GOP capitulation, because they’re being attacked on the austerity they’ve supposedly inflicted on us all.  Yes, all of that hellish austerity is slowing down the economy.  It’s all the GOP’s fault.  Except that they haven’t actually done all that much by the way of budget cuts.

Here’s the bottom line.  They managed a few hundred million in cuts in a continuing resolution, and received a complete thrashing in their wholesale capitulation on the debt ceiling.  I’ll grant this presumes it ends with a deadlocked Super Committee, which is a good bet.  Their base isn’t happy with them now because not only are the Republicans not doing anything budget-related correctly, but they attacked their base as ‘childish’ for actually wanting something real done.  Didn’t buy any goodwill from the left in the end, did it?  Now both sides are going to be mad at the GOP.

Typical Republican fail.

Now the establishment wants Romney to be the nominee, arguing for his electability.  If you stop to think about it, he’s too far to the left to be electable.  He’s not distinguishable from Obama in any meaningful way.  His argument and that of every other RINO can be boiled down to something along the lines of ‘I concede that the Democrat way of doing things is the right way, but I’m better because I’m going to do less of it more slowly.  Oh, and the conservatives have nowhere to go so they have to vote for me and they can suck it’ (this is not a direct quote from anyone).  If he’s nominated, I’m sure he’ll give a beautifully delivered and polished concession speech in November against an incumbent that could not have won without him.  As a mislabeled Democrat, he’ll have capitulated on all of the arguments before the election even begins in a futile attempt to attract independents and annoyed the base he thinks he can take for granted.

The moral of this story?  If you’re going to be attacked for being conservative no matter what, be conservative.  It works and will give anyone who uses it actual successes to tout come election time.  The media and Democrats will never love Republicans, but trying to appease them can cost those Republicans the support of their base.  At the very least, they may get votes but can forget the manpower they they need to win elections.

Being the Other Democrats never works.  The sooner they learn that, the more they’ll win in the future.  Heck, the RINOs might even buy themselves a little leeway once they rack up enough real wins to get the wiggle room.  The Gathering Of Pansies approach, however, won’t continue to do.

News link credit:  Hot Air

Wanting a Candidate With Fight Is Not Superficial

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Cantor wrote a great op-ed in the Washington Post about how Obama is destroying jobs.  It really hit the nail on the head.  In light of the debt ceiling capitulation however, it was totally meaningless.  Without the will and ability to fight for the principles the Republicans claim to uphold, it’s just words.  More pretty platitudes that will disappear the second any opposition from the Democrats materializes, and it always does.

Perry entered the race and now everyone is gunning for him.  Trial lawyers are going ballistic.  Karl Rove doesn’t like him.  Obama’s already mentioned him by name.   Mitt Romney may even stop being a silent windsock and pretend to be a leader now. Certainly, it’s because Perry’s electable and has a track record of winning and holding the offices he wishes to win or hold, but also that he won’t back down.  Should he become President with enough of a Congress to do something conservative, something conservative will actually get done because he has some fight to him.

No one ever has to worry about that with Republican moderates.  Moderates don’t get anything done unless they’re being Other Democrats and decimating their own ranks.  Anything resembling resistance from the left will cause them to fold.  Moderates are entirely willing to swallow hook, line, and sinker the ’need’ for comity, bipartisanship, and civility that is the spin designed to prevent action.  Throw in the puff press, and not only will moderates refuse to fix what is broken, but they can pretend to be wise and nuanced afterwards.  It’s why Democrats want them to be Republican candidates.  If they can’t push forward on their agenda, they can just tread water knowing nothing of worth will happen with a moderate in charge.

Therefore, fight in a candidate is a question of practicality.

Yes, candidates who will fight for conservative beliefs are inspiring, but our desire for them isn’t simply a superficial need for rhetorical red meat.  If a candidate will not fight for their stated principles then they may as well be Democrats.  If they just sit on their hands for fear of opposition it’s capitulation because Democrats and their policies are the status quo.  Nothing will get fixed without defeating the Democrats, and that won’t happen with standard issue Republican establishment milquetoast.

The establishment sorts have taken to defending their actions as ‘adult’ while those of us who want conservatism are ‘childish’.  They can’t exactly sell themselves on the merits so  what else were they going to do?  Their failures, cowardice, and ineptitude are as much to blame for our current mess as Democrat belief in action.  The snark is them running out of ways to sell yet another election cycle of marginal LOTE votes to an increasingly restive voting bloc growing more reluctant to support loser-as-usual.

In the end, loser-as-usual has no practical worth anyway.  It won’t fix the mess.  It won’t roll back Democrat damage inflicted since FDR.  It won’t repeal Obamacare and it won’t cut spending.  Only a fighter will do that, which is why come 2012 only a fighter will do.

News link credits:  Hot Air.