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Does the Colorado GOP want to be like the Florida GOP?
Colorado has a few Tea Party candidates who are dreaming of replicating the Florida GOP’s efforts to elect Democrats. Hopefully, the bitter, negative and libelous fights that the Florida Tea Party candidates are waging against their state party won’t happen here, but Florida is showing how things can get out of hand.
Look for the Democrats to win big in Florida because the Florida GOP is being torn apart by Tea Party people who don’t care about the GOP. The same thing could happen in Colorado. In fact, I’m beginning to think that Governor Bill Ritter and Senator Michael Bennet are more likely to win in Colorado because the Tea Party people who don’t care who wins are poised to try to tear the Colorado GOP apart. Independents who hold the balance of power in Colorado are very unlikely to support scary Tea Party candidates in the general elections.
Response: 1
“In fact, I’m beginning to think that Governor Bill Ritter and Senator Michael Bennet are more likely to win in Colorado because the Tea Party people who don’t care who wins are poised to try to tear the Colorado GOP apart.”
And whose fault is that, pray tell? Was it the Tea Party movement that caused the major GOP defeats in 2006 and 2008? Or has the GOP brought this upon itself, haivng become SO useless to the cause of conservatism that it simply doesn’t matter any more whether it wins or loses? Perhaps the Tea Party folks correctly sense that it’s time for the Republicans to go the way of their ideological forebears the Federalists and Whigs, and for a new Middle American populist/conservative party to take their place. A case can be made that the BEST THING to happen to the conservative cause in a long, long time was the defeat of John McCain (aka Juan Mequeno).
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/22/2009 at 02:19 PMResponse: 2
Conservatives are revitalized like never before; why would they be interested in supporting a party whose constant shifts to the left render it an unworthy vehicle for their cause?
“Independents who hold the balance of power in Colorado are very unlikely to support scary Tea Party candidates in the general elections.”
Oooooh, those “scary” Tea Party candidates. And so the demonization begins. The GOP will attempt to marginalize true conservatives just as it did Ron Paul, drawing this blistering response from The American Conservative:
“The Stupid Party”
http://www.amconmag.com/article/2007/jun/18/00010/
If so, this is evidence that the GOP hasn’t learned thing one from 2006, 2008 and what happened on the streets of America this year.
“Stupid Party” indeed.
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/22/2009 at 02:20 PMThe two things I keep thinking about are Barry Goldwater’s silent majority and Ross Perot’s third-party run in 1992. Both failed to deliver, and those guys had big money as well as very intense supporters, stronger activists than the Tea Party folks are today.
So while I definitely sympathize with the complaints of the Tea Party people, I have a lot of doubts about their staying power. What’s more, both McInnis and Norton are quickly moving to adopt their issues and empathize with them. Whether the most ardent Tea Party activists trust McInnis and Norton or not may not be so important to less active Republicans and independents.
If the Tea Party candidates catch on and show strength, it will be a good story. And it may be good for the GOP because it will force whoever wins the primaries to focus on being conservatives as well as on winning the votes of independents.
Posted by Donald Johnson on 12/22/2009 at 10:12 PMBut here’s where you go wrong, Mr. Johnson: you’re fixated on who can “deliver” in the next election. Let me submit to you that we’ve moved way past that question. The Tea Party folks are way ahead of you. And while they still may want to work within the system to the extent they can, many if not most of them know that we are in the midst of a huge paradigm shift.
Electing the likes of Jane Norton is not going to fix anything, I assure you.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 12/22/2009 at 11:14 PMIf you’ll continue to indulge me, I need to post this quote from the blog entry I’ve linked above, so powerful is it. You and your readers really need to absorb every word of it:
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 12/22/2009 at 11:31 PMPart I:
“The original Boston Tea Party was a calculated act of law-breaking designed to send the British Empire a message it could not fail to comprehend. Making long-winded speeches, thumping impassioned chests and denouncing a government made up of people who have already written you off as unimportant, impotent and no threat to their plans is a waste of time, energy and oxygen. As comfortable and deeply ingrained as they are in all Americans, the conventional political tactics of speech-making, letter-writing and electioneering have brought us to this precipice of defeat.
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/22/2009 at 11:33 PMPart II:
“The guttering flame of the Founders’ Republic is within one stiff breeze of going out forever. Both political parties have conspired through malice or incompetence to bring us to this state, yet still people look in vain to the system of party politics for salvation. The Founders were not so stupid as to place all their hopes on a corrupt system. When the accepted channels of politics and remonstrance failed, they burned the King’s tax stamps, dumped his tea, broke the windows of his tax collectors with rocks and bricks, smuggled forbidden goods, defied ‘his royal majesty’ in hundreds of other ways and dared him to do anything about it. Liberty is not free, nor is it without risk.”
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/22/2009 at 11:34 PMI want the GOP to be the Conservative party, period. If that makes me a scary tea party person, fine.
As a man of Conservative principles, I would prefer to have a democrat that I can fight in office, rather than a RINO like Jane Norton or Lindsey Graham, or George W. Bush that I’d have to justify and apologize for.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 12/23/2009 at 12:46 AMKevin, how are the Republicans in Congress doing fighting the incumbents?
They’re getting their brains beat in. They may be winning the pr battle in some quarters, but bills they hate are passing. And even if they regain power some day, they won’t be able to roll back bills they hate. Dems will have enough power to stop them.
To me it’s much more important to elect Republicans next year than to elect pure Republicans. There are no moderate Dems or Republicans, but every Democrat in Congress is hard left. And they’re in power. That won’t work for me.
Posted by Donald Johnson on 12/23/2009 at 02:09 PMSnaggle,
I’m trying to be realistic about what’s politically doable. I think Republicans can win next year if they can win independents. But if they appeal only to Tea Partiers and right wing extremists, the left wing extremists will continue to rule. And that’s unacceptable to me. How about you?Posted by Donald Johnson on 12/23/2009 at 02:11 PMWell, Mr. Johnson, since I happen to be one of those “scary right wing extremists” you deride, I’m going to be less concerned than you are about “what’s politically doable.” As I mentioned previously, it’s been this pursuit of “what’s politically doable” that has led slowly but surely to the corruption of conservatism. And that’s why I’m with Mr. Allen here.
The Confederate pastor and theologian long ago predicted what would become of this “bandaid conservatism”, as I call it:
http://coloradoconfederatarian.squarespace.com/journal/2009/1/26/they-call-it-th-center-right.html
I hope you will read the whole quote but chew on these words from it:
“It is worthless because it is the conservatism of expediency only, and not of sturdy principle. It intends to risk nothing serious for the sake of the truth, and has no idea of being guilty of the folly of martyrdom.”
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/23/2009 at 08:46 PM“The Confederate pastor and theologian R.L. Dabney. . . .”
Sorry.
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/23/2009 at 08:48 PMI should point out that the Tea Party folks don’t scare me or many conservative Republicans because of their positions on the issues. They scare me only because I think they’ll cost Republicans some important elections next year.
Also, I don’t think Tea Partiers scare the left, because they know Tea Party candidates will be mostly unelectable.
Instead, the left loves the Tea Party candidates because they see that TP candidates and the idea of the TP itself are so easy to demonize. And negative sells in politics. So as far as Democrats are concerned, the Tea Party folks are their best friends.
Posted by Donald Johnson on 12/24/2009 at 07:52 AM“Also, I don’t think Tea Partiers scare the left, because they know Tea Party candidates will be mostly unelectable.”
Quite true. The left (and the pseudo-right, for that matter) *should* be scared of the Tea Party, but not because their candidates will be mostly unelectable.
As I’ve tried to tell you, Mr. Johnson, you’re still in the “politics-as-usual” mode. The question is, however, whether or not politics as usual will be sufficient to save the republic. Others of us are starting to think outside of that box.
Related discussion here:
http://rossputin.com/blog/index.php/we-have-met-the-enemy#comments
Posted by Snaggle-Tooth Jones on 12/24/2009 at 12:53 PMYes, I probably look like an establishment guy to you. Ask the establishment folks.
Posted by Donald Johnson on 12/24/2009 at 07:08 PM