Comments on: Taking the Fight to the Dems

By: handworn

handworn — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 17:17:50 +0000

“to reassure the grass roots that the party will stay true to its values.”

I’ve just been reading a bio of Theodore Roosevelt, in whose time the Republican party was different than it had been in Lincoln’s time and also from when I was growing up in the 1980s. The Republican party has no “values” that are inherent to it; neither does the Democratic party. The ones that really do, the Libertarians and the Greens, are arguably as tiny as they are precisely because of that fact. Knowability conveys impeachability, in the argumentative rather than the legislative sense, and that impeachability implicit in the Republican leadership’s claim to “values” means that the Republicans will never be a big-tent party. It would limit them to gaining only those margins of victories granted by people voting against the Democrats, which is the most left-handed of compliments (so to speak). A purer definition of mediocrity than to be contented with that, I can’t imagine.

“there are two questions that remain. One is strategic: is it better to give people credit for the Republican values they share, or to punish them for the points on which they disagree?”

That’s like asking, “Is it better to raise people’s incomes or reduce their expenses?” What is the value of this distinction?

By: sricher

sricher — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 22:29:26 +0000

My pleasure.

By: garlic

garlic — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 20:01:13 +0000

thanks for the info Stephen.

By: sricher

sricher — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 15:37:52 +0000

Joel lives in Skokie, IL. He works remotely for Hudson.

By: mulligan1

mulligan1 — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 06:46:29 +0000

Garlic must work for the Schakowsky campaign…yes chicago media seems to be locked in with the incumbents……But you people know who broke the story about Jail bird Creamer AKA Mr. Schakowsky..
I quess you are paying attention to Joel a bit more now …..

By: garlic

garlic — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 22:02:21 +0000

Does Joel still live in the 9th district? It looks like he grew up there, but lives in D.C. now — perhaps I’m missing something about how Hudson works.

Also, does Joel have a reasonable chance of winning? He’s not mentioned at all on the websites of local media (suntimes, tribune, WBEZ). Nor does he have any media links on his website.

By: rbottoms

rbottoms — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:16:28 +0000

Turnabout is fair play.

You believe taking positions that are antithetical to the best interests of the soldiers is fine, even if it means political gain. So lets attack Obama for doing exactly what the GOP proposed, in fact with more of a push for hurry it up then the generals themselves wanted, soley yo do better in the 2010 elections and if t hurts the war effort, well screw it. Sounds about right.

By: sinz54

sinz54 — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 01:18:36 +0000

ltwpolitics: the GOP has figured out how to make political hay from the blood of our soldiers.
You liberals wrote the book on that tactic,
with your disgraceful behavior during the Vietnam War.

One of the things that made me a conservative (as a teenager!) was watching the antics of the antiwar Left on TV in 1968.

So don’t be surprised if we take YOUR playbook and use it against YOU.

Turnabout is fair play.

By: sinz54

sinz54 — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 01:16:56 +0000

ltwpolitics: What’s the meaning of this “took so long” objection?
The meaning is that Obama had already announced his policy on Afghanistan way back on March 27, in a speech to military veterans.

http://www.cfr.org/publication/18952/

Don’t you remember???

The only reason Obama took eight more months to come up with the troop surge was that it stuck in his antiwar craw. He finally managed to swallow it, after washing it down with who knows how much booze.

By: gmckee1985

gmckee1985 — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 00:30:51 +0000

If Republicans can’t win back or extensively damage the Democrats advantage with the crop of wackos they have running the show (Reid, Pelosi, Frank, etc), I’ll be highly depressed.