Here's to perspective...

Rob Graham

I agree. However, since it is the Republicans who claim the mantle of conservatism (but mean ONLY social conservatism), it is they who will inherit the blame. And Bush/Paulson/Cox are not alone in this. The bailout could not have passed without the support of many Republican congressmen and senators. Now, of course, it's too late for anything other than a squeaky "we didn't mean that" whine from them.

Stan Shannon

Rob Graham wrote:

The failure precedes this election by at least two, if not more. The Republican Party has not selected a small government fiscal conservative candidate since Reagan.

I agree completely. I didn't vote for Bush with any sort of grand expectation that he was going to be a movement conservative. There are no movement conservatives to vote for. But I did believe that he would have to throw we conservatives a bone or two in the form of supreme court justices so I voted for him. I had no expectation of getting anything else conservative out of the man. He is obviously a guy who thinks that we need bipartisanship and compromise in government. I knew that going in.

Rob Graham wrote:

And the answer to your question is likely the candidate I chose: Bob Barr.

Was he on the balot in 2000? In any case, I don't vote libertarian. Libertarians are not conservatives. They are as anti-Jeffersonian as the liberals are.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Oakman

Rob Graham wrote:

The Republican Party has not selected a small government fiscal conservative candidate since Reagan.

Maybe I misunderstand what you mean by fiscally conservative. To my way of thinking, Reagan ran as one, but in office he chalked up what was at the time - though small potatoes by today's standards - a gigantic deficit, while raising taxes (under the guise of tax reform) quite a bit. Eisenhower actually balanced the budget 3 years out of eight - something no other post-war president has done.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

soap brain

Stan Shannon wrote:

You made the alligation alligator

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Oakman

Rob Graham wrote:

Now, of course, it's too late for anything other than a squeaky "we didn't mean that" whine from them.

Of course. Pointing the finger at the other guy seems to be one of the few things that all politicians do well. Picking the pockets of the tax-payers, likewise appears to be something conservatives do equally as well as liberals.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

Rob Graham

Roe V Wade. That was when one single religious principle became so overwhelmingly important to conservatives that they became willing to sacrifice all else to find a way to overturn that decision, and to insure that the high court would never again venture that way. When republicans took religion from the local to the national, they became theocrats and ceased to wear the mantle of Reagan and Lincoln. And as this election demonstrated, not all of American society changed with you. It is not America in general I am comparing to the Taliban (as you would assert), just the Christian religious right that owns the Republican party, and has determined the nomination of every national Republican candidate for the past two decades.

Stan Shannon

Rob Graham wrote:

That was when one single religious principle became so overwhelmingly important to conservatives that they became willing to sacrifice all else to find a way to overturn that decision, and to insure that the high court would never again venture that way. When republicans took religion from the local to the national, they became theocrats and ceased to wear the mantle of Reagan and Lincoln.

Thank you. I actually agree with that. Now, in response, like me ask you another simple question. When the courts decide an issue as fundamentally important to a large segment of the electorate such as the very definition of human life based on very strained legal reasoning, is that electorate simply suppose to lie down and accept it? If the issue of abortion was so important why could it not have been addressed directly by the elected representatives of the people rather than being 'discovered' in a constitution which states explicitely that all powers not given explicitely by the constitution to the federal government belong to the states and to the people? I would observe that to a true conservative the Roe v Wade issue has nothing to do with religion at all. It has to do with who you trust most to hold the power to decide social issues ,the courts or the people. And for you, a guy who just last night was agreeing with Heinlein's trust for his neighbors, I would submit that is an extremly contradictory position for you to assume. My opposition to Roe v Wade has nothing to do with religion, but the fact that there is religious opposition to it is entirely appropriate. There should be. The court needs its arrogant assed kicked over that decision. And the fact that religious people are made the bad guys in that is simply staggering.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Stan Shannon

Hey, thanks for my daily spelling lesson.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

soap brain

Spelling is very important. Nobody ever won an argument by saying: "lol d00d ur so rong teh sky iz blue cos of raili scatering lulz n00b!!!!1111"

Rob Graham

Oakman wrote:

Picking the pockets of the tax-payers, likewise appears to be something conservatives Republicans do equally as well as liberals.

FTFY - There are no conservatives in government today, just kleptocrats and theocrats masquerading as conservatives.

Stan Shannon

Ravel H. Joyce wrote:

Spelling is very important

Not so much. An occasional mispelled word is no big deal. ;P I rarely even proof read my comments. In the age of spell checkers, I actually think my spelling and grammer are pretty damn good.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Rob Graham

That differs in what way from the Taliban's insistence on Sharia Law? Many of us do not buy into the assertion that legal availability of abortion is about

Stan Shannon wrote:

an issue... such as the very definition of human life

. No fetus is viable in the first trimester, and it is a strictly Religious definition that says otherwise.

Stan Shannon wrote:

If the issue of abortion was so important why could it not have been addressed directly by the elected representatives of the people

Yes, why not. Why must republicans sacrifice everything to pack a court, rather than seek the simple remedy of a constitutional amendment? Perhaps because they know an amendment would not pass muster?

Stan Shannon wrote:

Roe v Wade issue has nothing to do with religion at all.

Bullshit. It has to do with little else.

Stan Shannon

There are a few - Mike Pence, Tom Coburn, Paul Ryan... They are out there. The problem is that the Republican party is not, and has never been a conservative party in the same sense that the democrats have become a liberal party. Conservatives have no true home.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Stan Shannon

Rob, all I can say is that your position is incomprehensible to me. Roe v wade was a decision that involved defining human life. That was the entire point of it. Viability is nothing but a rationalization, an arbitrary point. What does the word even mean? The viability of the fetus is precisely why an abortion is needed. If it were not viable, no abortion would be needed - it would be called a miscarriage. And we are all just supposed to get in line and salute the courts and do as they say. No politcal oppostion at all. Incredible. Did Roe V Wade mark a turning point? Absolutely. It was a convneient legal case for obliterating traditional American society. It drew a line in the sand between Jefferson and Marx. Between the state as agent of change and people as agents of change.

Rob Graham wrote:

Why must republicans sacrifice everything to pack a court, rather than seek the simple remedy of a constitutional amendment?

Because the courts need to be restrained. They have become too powerful. You cannot say you trust your neighbor and also believe he must be constantly restrained by an all powerful court. No one in congress, liberal or conservative, has the courage to force a legislative solution. That is a problem with congress, not republicans. Conservatives would accept an amendment defining when a human life actually begins. Would you?

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Rob Graham

One last thing: How wise does the Republican strategy of single minded focus on court appointments as the determining criteria for electing representatives, senators, presidents and vice presidents seem at the present juncture? Roe v. Wade is still the law of the land, and the opposition now owns both the power of appointment and of ratification. Any court appointments in the next 4 to 8 years (and I'll bet it doesn't end at 8) will be far to the left of anything you would like. And the price paid to get here has been the abandonment of any reduction in the scope and size of government, and a complete mockery of free market capitalism accompanied by an abandonment of any semblance of fiscal responsibility. It would appear to have been a losing strategy.

Oakman

Rob Graham wrote:

There are no conservatives in government today, just kleptocrats and theocrats masquerading as conservatives.

You're correct. I meant to put quotes around both conservatives and liberals, but rushed to finish my thought because I had an appointment. Barry Goldwater and Robert Taft would not recognize the Republican party of today nor would Scoop Jackson or Hubert Humphrey find he had anything much in common with the Democrats.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface

Stan Shannon

Rob Graham wrote:

One last thing: How wise does the Republican strategy of single minded focus on court appointments as the determining criteria for electing representatives, senators, presidents and vice presidents seem at the present juncture? Roe v. Wade is still the law of the land, and the opposition now owns both the power of appointment and of ratification. Any court appointments in the next 4 to 8 years (and I'll bet it doesn't end at 8) will be far to the left of anything you would like. And the price paid to get here has been the abandonment of any reduction in the scope and size of government, and a complete mockery of free market capitalism accompanied by an abandonment of any semblance of fiscal responsibility. It would appear to have been a losing strategy.

The courts are at the center of the battle. Control them, and you control the entire agenda. And as long as our guys stay healthy, there is little Obama can do to change things. It would have been nice to have had one more, but Kennedy will probably become more conservative as Obama tries to use his own appointments to enable his true leftist agenda. But, frankly, I don't give a damn. Liberalism will not work. It will ultimately fail for both fiscal and social reasons. It is fatally flawed on both scores. (Libertarians are only wrong on social issues) All we conservatives need do is set and wait. The freer the collectivist left is to promote its principles, the sooner the end will come. If all the rest of you have to learn your lessons the hard way, so be it. Not my fault.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Stan Shannon

Oakman wrote:

Barry Goldwater and Robert Taft would not recognize the Republican party of today nor would Scoop Jackson or Hubert Humphrey find he had anything much in common with the Democrats.

But modern conservatives would embrace Goldware and Taft much more eagerly than modern liberals would do so for Jackson and Humphrey.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Stan Shannon

Oh, and btw, the fact that you essentially want some groups removed from the political arena because you disagree with them, actually makes you far more like the taliban than any fundamentalist christian is. The only real difference is - you are actually doing it.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Rob Graham

Stan Shannon wrote:

the fact that you essentially want some groups removed from the political arena because you disagree with them,

I never suggested anything of the kind. I said you deserve condemnation, not extinction. OTOH, if you prefer suicide, I'm not about to stand in your way as long as you keep it to yourself.

Stan Shannon wrote:

The only real difference is - you are actually doing it.

How is that? At the ballot box? Try winning back my vote.