RSS Feed MenuAs the Obama administration defines itself by actions rather than words and George W. Bush fades into history, the number of people calling themselves conservative has increased. As RealClearPolitics notes however, they do not call themselves Republican. Yet we find ourselves in a world where the Republican Party, which is unpopular, often calls for abandoning major facets of conservatism which are popular. This is consistent with the party direction between Goldwater and Reagan. The Republican Party, when seen as the party of big business and privileges for the rich, is unpopular. When seen as the vehicle for conservatism it regains popularity.
Again, and again, the Republican Party is maneuvered into a position to defend corporations against popular outrage, even when, as with subsidies and earmarks, such policies work against the free market, accountability, and the other principles for which the party is nominally said to stand. One way that Republicans obtained a working majority in the 1980s was to convince conservatives who were Democrats that it was safe to vote for them, and indeed dangerous to vote for the Democrats.
Once again Republicans need to take a page from this playbook. The main type of conservatives available, but unmarried to the Republican Party, are the fiscal conservative, balanced budget hawks. At the present time, the congressional party is not doing that much to gather them in. It is Obama and his policies that are causing them to look to the Republicans again. Republicans must build on the successes of fiscally conservative governors like Mitch Daniels and Tim Pawlenty and go national with slowing the growth of government.
The next thing Republicans can do is publically get behind popular initiatives in the states. Again and again, Republicans have shied away from publically backing initiatives in the states with massive public support such as anti-discrimination ballot initiatives and pro-traditional marriage efforts. The Republican Party rarely raises money and presents a popular face for these movements which then go on to win by landslide margins.
This is also the case for anti-tax movements, where the Republicans sometimes join but just as often don’t. Arnold Schwarzenegger is single-handedly destroying the Republican brand in the nation’s largest state. He was against Proposition 8. He was for every tax hiking ballot initiative that failed by 25% margins. He has supported affirmative action. It is as if Conan was asked “What is best in life” and responded “To raise taxes, to spend enormous sums we don’t have, and to hear the lamentations of social conservatives.” I would love to hear a defense of Ahnold from some New Majoritarians if there is one to be made.
The Republican Party needs to poach on the territory that is vacant by Democrats. That is defense of balanced budgets and less spending. This should be coupled with a shot at corporations that live on the public dole. Republicans should attack the takeover of banks and businesses with the rallying cry “Keep the Private Sector Private — Vote Republican.” Ronald Reagan said that Democrats have a three-step process: “If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. If it stops moving, subsidize it.” Obama has added “If it continues not to move, socialize it.” There is vast unease in the land over this. It is unease tailor made for conservatives. If they fail to seize it they deserve their minority state.
midcon // Jun 17, 2009 at 5:01 pm
sinz,That is actually a very good suggestion. I hope Frum sees it and decides that it might make sense to get on the non-Ivy League school circuit. The smaller schools would indeed welcome the increased attention. Good solid concrete idea. Nice to see one of those every once in awhile.
Cforchange // Jun 17, 2009 at 5:55 pm
Sinz – I second the praise. This is the best idea that I’ve heard out of any of my internet viewing. It appears there are simply too few ideas, a sure symptom of the age of party members.Well for thinking you are a downer, your attitude is in the right place. Good night, I’m off for my lobotomy or some other seedy activity that helps me cope with my conservative impurity.
Cforchange // Jun 18, 2009 at 4:19 am
Sinz, I’ve had my treatment – ha and now my input to a potential agenda: The GOP needs to take ownership of “Business Organizing”. It’s a natural for the original platform and it’s necessary. Let’s give the Dem’s their day, they deserve it because for a party that didn’t even realize the dior need for “Community Organizing” we deserve our 8 year holiday. We need to respect their strength’s if they succeed in getting humanity back in order but then we will need to manage the cost of this effort. If you need details about what I mean here – I’ve got them… I’ll show them…. Business Organizing needs to be a movement that encourages and simplifies the process to reinstitute small scale assembly or manufacturing where it makes sense. It needs to be efficient thus naturally green plus close to home is the future.Example: The screw.Recently we engaged in a tiny home project where we jetted out to the home improvement mega store to purchase some wood and screws. Upon leaving, I was so stunned at the end cost I surveyed my friends who are in the know about these things and yes the price was double what they would have expected. Where we live, wood is local so we bought and paid for convenience. The screws on the other hand, while they were nicely marked and perfectly packaged – they were $7.50 per dozen. Further, one of my survey responders reported that during a recent kitchen rehab, the screws became a major source of stress because they were faulty(fact -poor quality foreign metal) .The weakness: Purchasing building supplies in this costly mannner is no longer advantageous but it could be argued that it never was. I didn’t care that the screws came out of a retail store nor did I want them shrink wrapped. Quality expected, but for my rehabing friend, the screw cost much more because the carpenter had to source/ resource – screw and unscrew.The opportunity: New US screw manufacturing plant that uses better quality materials, doesn’t waste time & money on wrapping goods in environ unfriendly materials or burn fossil fuels to deliver around the world then within the states.The benefit: Accountants put to work managing. Hand work jobs created – this is essential to American happiness. Everyone buys/ rents plus maintains housing. Company buys and mantains facility. Lot’s of money circulated right in the community. Everyone gladly pays taxes and that is how it should be. The GOP has pit bulled onto taxes are bad – no, what is bad that not enough people are paying them.How many other activites have we dismissed? We need to get out of our Seinfield mentality of days about absolutely nothing. Busy and prosperity are the keys to family values, busy keeps you married. Empty preaching about family values garners spite.I wouldn’t know what advice to give to a business student today. But it the game changed and we moved to an evolved rhetro state of doing again there is lots to excite and engage people in. Business Organizing would give the GOP a direct connection back to where we come – the business school and yes of non Ivy league contention. Getting back to business on all accounts would leave a lot less time for obsessing over the nebulous like religion and personal behavior. The hero will be the one who can deliver a paycheck and yes taxes.
sinz54 // Jun 18, 2009 at 6:55 am
There already are some so-called “Young Republicans” type organizations. But they don’t seem to be reaching outward to the schools as I had suggested. Rather, they’re spending their time on various hot button issues, like the recent California propositions.Steele and the national GOP should work to reorient those “Young Republicans” into a cadre who can aggressively target all the schools within reach.
barker13 // Jun 18, 2009 at 9:52 am
You know, Sinz… you’re quick to ask others questions and when you ask me questions I’m quick to reply.Why is it a one-way thing with you?Not that I want to think ill of you… but if you were actually being honest and sincere in your 1:52 PM post, why not just answer the simple and direct clarification questions I posed in my 2:12 PM post?As I wrote over on another thread, “fair is fair” and if you’re going to satisfy YOUR curiosity regarding others opinions and where their facts come from then I suggest you show some reciprocity. BILL
balconesfault // Jun 18, 2009 at 12:43 pm
“There already are some so-called “Young Republicans” type organizations.”For what it’s worth, can anyone explain why Young Republicans weren’t spearheading campus enlistment drives during the last decade? That, more than any polemics, would have defused many liberal arguments against the way our troops were deployed.
midcon // Jun 18, 2009 at 2:41 pm
Another good idea I just saw here. Well not so much a whole articulated policy, but I see the potential.Isn’t our industrial (including manufacturing) capability a national security issue?Shouldn’t be interested in re-industrializing the U.S. I’m not talking about smokestack spewing factories, but we use to be good at making things. I bet we still are, but we need things to make.We have people who like to do that work. They like making things. Isn’t there room in this country for a little insourcing? Does most of Boeing’s Dreamliner have to be produced outside of the U.S.?
WillyP // Jun 19, 2009 at 5:51 am
I couldn’t agree more with Mr. Vecchione. Shortly following the election, weak-kneed Republicans reflexively recoiled at what they view as the defeat of conservatism. But Mr. McCain was no movement conservative, never fired up the base, never spoke to principles, and aside from his surge policy, had little to brag about. It’s good to read this type of recommendation on this website, which usually focuses inordinately on absurd and dangerous ideas such as fighting global warming and jettisoning all social values from politics. I think traditional conservatism will inevitably re-conquer the party and save us from the systematic destruction being executed by Obama.
sinz54 // Jun 19, 2009 at 6:05 am
WillyP sez: “But Mr. McCain was no movement conservative, never fired up the base”This urban myth has been exploded by the 2008 exit polls, which showed that some 80% of self-described conservatives voted for McCain. The election was lost by a massive defection of moderate and swing and Independent voters.If the GOP is to make any forward progress at all, it’s going to have to start by facing FACTS, not fantasies. The notion that the 2008 election was lost due to the base being disaffected is FALSE, just FALSE.
sinz54 // Jun 19, 2009 at 6:07 am
barker13 asks: ‘why not just answer the simple and direct clarification questions I posed in my 2:12 PM post?”Because I don’t remember those questions anymore!!!If I remembered them, I would answer them.If you jog my memory and repeat your questions, I will answer them.
Cforchange // Jun 19, 2009 at 6:13 am
Midcon I’m repeating my message because I think it’s the key and obviously those on the crusade are not capable of identifying the weakness. Average (majority) voters aren’t concerned with ideology. They want to succeed and for some reason – it has been too difficult to do so. This has nothing to do with Iraq and Iraq spending – the problem was there before the start of the war. There is somthing fundamentally wrong or unbalanced preventing prosperity unless you participate in the scam of the moment. The party that encourages and simplifies this path will dominate. That’s what the GOP prevailing message represented when I signed on.Balcon – from what I know about the Young Republican efforts -tied very closely if not one and the same to the pro life movement. That goes back to my orignal statement that college years, self exploration and an anti anything message do not mix. The numbers speak for the results and that we will live with for at least a decade.
sinz54 // Jun 19, 2009 at 6:15 am
midcon: The number of units procured by our modern all-volunteer army is so small that our shrunken manufacturing base is perfectly adequate. Our civilian manufacturing base hasn’t had to be converted to military use since World War II.Our MRAPs are produced not by the auto makers, but by a small company, Force Protection Inc.Boeing and Raytheon and Lockheed Martin, which show no signs of major financial difficulty, produce all the planes and missiles that we need. Northrop-Grumman-Newport News builds our ships.Of course we need a defense manufacturing base. But these companies aren’t the ones verging on bankruptcy right now. And the failure of the U.S. auto industry doesn’t impact them.We haven’t needed to convert much *civilian* manufacturing to military procurement in many years. It would require a titanic effort comparable to either World War to require that to happen.
sinz54 // Jun 19, 2009 at 6:19 am
Cforchange: The more libertarian message that conservatives had in the late 1970s was more appealing to young Americans than today’s socially conservative message. Back then, Republicans offered a vision of entrepreneurship, start-up companies, reduced government red tape, abundant energy, and an America with a bright economic future. What’s happened to that kind of vision? Why have conservatives gone back to being America’s moral scolds, like they were in the 1950s and before?
Cforchange // Jun 19, 2009 at 7:03 am
Sinz – my point exactly re the party feel then “It would require a titanic effort comparable to either World War to require that to happen.” Titanic means big, means lots of people – that’s what I’m talking. There’s lots of people that need to get in the game. Digest this number – all most 1/3 of my very middle America high school has failed their 1st year of high school. They are migrating to an easier welcoming “Alternative Lifestyle” you know, under the radar never to pay taxes. These are white males – the infection from urban to surburban has occurred. It is time for intervention or we will be very sorry.
WillyP // Jun 19, 2009 at 8:49 am
Young Republicans are not intimately tied to any pro-life organizations. I don’t know where you get this from, but from all I’ve known it’s untrue. I must be one of the few pro-life YRs in my club, and it’s the largest in the country (nyyrc.com).John McCain was the author of a political censorship bill, a nearly disasterous immigration bill that was stopped only because of vocal talk radio hosts and listeners, and a supporter of cap and trade. These 3 transgressions are egregious violations to free speech, free enterprise, and national sovereignty respectively. Conservatives see them for what they are.
sinz54 // Jun 20, 2009 at 8:03 am
WillyP: Two questions for you:1. What percentage of your New York Young Republican club consists of blacks and Hispanics? 2. When your speakers have spoken to other young people about environmental issues, what was the response?
barker13 // Jun 20, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Re: Sinz54; 6/19/2009 6:07 AM –”I don’t remember those questions anymore!!!”Have you lost the ability to scroll down the page…???I mean, Sinz, how many times do I have to direct you to the exact spot where you’ll find the questions…???One more time… scroll down to barker13; 6/17/2009 2:12 PM.Re: Sinz54; 6/19/2009 6:05 AM –Two points, Sinz: 1) “…self described…” (*SNORT*); 2) “…some 80%…” What’s that leave, Sinz… some 20%… right…???(*CHUCKLE*)BILL
sinz54 // Jun 20, 2009 at 6:01 pm
barker13: I most certainly NOT consider Gingrich and Rove to be part of what somebody else called the “ugly part” of the GOP.But Gingrich and Rove were not averse to using that part of the GOP to help win elections–even if it meant compromising some of the GOP’s earlier liberty-oriented positions.