The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Republican vs. Conservative

6.5.06 @ 12:01AM

(Page 2 of 5)

Long ago, I advocated that conservatives take bold action to consolidate their power within the Republican Party and to purge from it enough of what many call Republicans in Name Only (who, in truth, are "country-club" Rockefeller Republicans) that the rest would understand not only who brought the party its majority, but who ran the party.

Obviously the conservatives did not do that. Either they bought into the rhetoric that doing so would endanger the Republican majority, they failed to see the need, or they simply lacked the courage. They, and the American people, are now paying the price for their inaction.

Now the country-club Republicans are launching a series of attacks against the conservative wing of the GOP. In Missouri, they have heavily backed a divisive stem cell referendum that is bound to harm conservative Senator Jim Talent's re-election effort. In Washington, they pushed through the Senate an even more divisive guest-worker and illegal alien amnesty bill.

Do we hear the same criticism of the country-clubbers' actual attempt to take control of the GOP that we heard of a potential consolidation of power by the conservatives? I have not.

They say politics makes strange bedfellows. It is becoming more apparent that the so-called "moderate" country-club Republicans detest conservatives nearly as much as does the liberal/progressive/left, and they are willing, if not eager, to act in concert with the lefties to destroy what they see as a common enemy.

The Republican Party is approaching the same crossroads that the Whigs did in the 1840's. Which of its principal factions is going to control the party? And is the other faction willing to remain subservient to the one in control? Clearly the country-clubbers are not willing to remain subservient. They have for years, and especially in the Senate, done everything they could to provide advantage to the Democrats and to frustrate Republican leadership.

The current Republican Party includes those of three philosophies: (1) "moderates" who are in truth big government tax and spend liberals, just to a slightly lesser degree than Democrats, (2) conservatives, and (3) libertarians. Conservatives and libertarians probably agree on more issues than does either with the "moderates." Perhaps they should "agree to disagree" on their major sticking point, which is the libertarians' refusal to have government address moral issues such as recreational drug use, and unite on the others to overcome the liberal Dems and the almost-as-liberal so-called Republican "moderates."

It's time for the conservatives to regain firm control of the Republican Party. Does it really matter if Maine is represented in the Senate by Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, who speak and vote like Democrats while claiming to be Republican, or by two actual Democrats? Will the Presidential candidate who benefits most from John McCain's constant undercutting of Bush be a Republican, or Hillary Rodham Clinton? Conservatives have little to lose by driving the RINO (Republicans in Name Only) faction out of office and, if necessary, out of the party. A Republican Party that would sell America to the highest bidder is no more worth preserving than was a Whig Party that allowed millions to remain enslaved. If self-labeled GOP "moderates" want to engage in mortal combat, let's have that fight now rather than later when it is China to whom they would sell us.
-- Steve Fernandez

Trust the Union Leader editor. Since our state is increasingly "Blue" due to transplants from away (Yes that means Mass.), I find the Cline's article particularly note worthy, and simply wish to say; "AMEN."
-- Ken Shreve

Thanks, Andrew. As a long-time Republican voter I agree wholeheartedly! Actually, I am ready for a good truly conservative third party
-- Mel Evans

I got another fax yesterday from Tom DeLay's office asking for more money in their time of crisis to defeat the liberal Democrats... I laughed out loud. I realize now that I was always libertarian, now I'm a card carrying one. Since I was old enough to vote, I always voted Republican (sometimes holding my nose at the ballot box). It was a means to a conservative end. I always told myself to consider the alternative...if only the Republicans could hold both Houses of Congress and the White House...think of what could be done. Well now we know what can be done, and from now on I'm going to vote my conscience. I suspect that very little in Washington will change either way, but I'll sleep well at night.
-- Tom Bledsoe

As regards Andrew Cline's highly readable article "The Task at Hand," his thoughts are too little, too late. Within the Constitution-busting two-party system Conservativism is DOA!
-- Paull Palmer
Republican-in-remission

THE LAW OF POLITICS
Re: Lawrence Henry's Why We Call It "Amnesty":

Yes!!! Great wit, nice sarcasm. Your point was dead on target in every way.
-- M.L. Gilbert
Bristow, Virginia

When the likes of a Senator Schumer or Kennedy rant about how there is one set of rules for the rich and powerful and another set for the ordinary working citizen, poor person, or senior citizen, they are absolutely correct. That is the inconvenient fact brought out in the debate surrounding the immigration fiasco and also the flap over the FBI conducting a search of a Congressman's office under the authority of a judicial warrant. The rub is that politicians like Schumer and other liberals and "moderates" see the situation and then reach the wrong conclusion from it.

Letter to the Editor

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