Friday, November 9, 2012

Constitutional Conservatism or Die

Romney's loss means the Republican Party must become genuinely conservative or remain irrelevant.

The moderate Republican ticket that liberals and GOP establishment types covet has been tried recently: Mitt Romney and John McCain. Conservatives are right that a more moderate Republican Party is not the answer.

What many of them are wrong about is conservatism. To turn on talk radio or watch Fox News is not to experience the philosophy of Bill Buckley, the rhetoric of Ronald Reagan, or even something like the free market proposals of Jack Kemp. Aside from Paul Ryan’s proposals for entitlement reform—one of the few tangibly conservative and positive differences that separated the Romney and Obama tickets—the populist Right remained stuck on stupid: The President “apologizes” for America; the U.S is threatened by Sharia Law; “Where’s the birth certificate?” Obama eats dog. Donald Trump. Dinesh D’Souza.

Demagoguery, partisanship, and conspiracy theories do not represent ideas. They represent a lack of them. Throw in some clumsy language about “legitimate rape” and couple it with Romney’s Dubya impression on foreign policy, and Americans saw a “conservatism” they didn’t want. Who can blame them?

But they don’t necessarily want Barack Obama’s America either. Voters weren’t in love with George Bush when they rejected John Kerry. They just liked Kerry less. On paper, Democrats should have lost, if sour economies and high unemployment still have anything to do with how people vote. That Romney couldn’t beat Obama says far more about the Republican Party than it says about the Democrats.-Back to Constitutional Conservatism

2 comments:

  1. I can only agree with you. EVERYBODY that i asked about voting for Romney was not excited in the least. Nobody was actually voting for him, instead voting against Obama. We need sombody who is a real conservative or else it will not excited and entice anybody to vote.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well, considering Romney received fewer votes than McCain did in 2008, I guess you're right.

      Delete

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