In the news:
(CNN) -- Bruised by charges from Democrats that they've become the "party of no," Republicans on Thursday are launching an outreach effort to reshape their party's image.
The initiative, called the National Council for a New America, will send party leaders across the country for a series of town halls on health care, the economy, energy and national security.
The goal is for the council's panel of experts to listen to the American people and report back to House and Senate Republican leaders with new strategies for rehabilitating the party and winning elections in 2010.
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You know, I suppose, that this is what our community organizing group does on a regular basis? Hold widespread community meetings to take the pulse of the People and that gives us ideas for directions in which to go/concerns that need to be addressed?
Does this mean that someone at the GOP got desperate enough to look into community organizing as a possible solution to their crumbling empire? Reading a little King, Gandhi or even Alinsky, perhaps??
Maybe, maybe not. Nonetheless, listening to the People is always a good thing and I commend the Republicans for doing so. Now, is it too little, too late? I suppose we'll have to wait and see...
35 comments:
What's wrong with the GOP inspired my blog (in part).
I feel that it's their bad rep of intolerance, brought on by social conservatives. For example: abortion nuts, affirmative action bigots, border control / immigration haters, gay marriage bashers, etc...
However, I think they are spot-on(ish) regarding defense, limited spending, and small government.
The GOP needs to distance themselves from social conservatives. Then show themselves as true small government advocates where gov. is out of the bedroom; and tolerance = justice.
But I could be wrong I ofetn am.
Welcome to Payne Hollow, Rich. And I rather agree with you on this point. Or rather, I'd suggest that the GOP needs to distance themselves who would define themselves down (and it is often the social conservatives who do that).
The ones who say, "If you agree with me on these four points but disagree here, here or over there, well get out of my party! You're a traitor, socialist and/or heathen!" will reduce themselves right down to nothing.
We agree!
...see...there is hope for the world :)
Hey, funny guys. Ever hear of the Log Cabin Republicans?
The idea of conservative intolerance is mythical and always has been. It's propaganda nonsense of the opposition in order to scare people away from conservatives to the left. But just look at the intolerance shown toward those who oppose libs. Does anyone get a fair hearing? No. They get shouted down, pies thrown at them, obstructive demonstrations and protests, Perez Hilton types with personal attacks, Janet Napolitano with personal attacks, Howard Dean's "I hate Republicans and everything they stand for". You guys have no business accusing anyone of intolerance.
And what of the social side of conservatism? Only that we oppose the enabling of bad behavior, behavior supported not by the science you say we reject, but by moral relativism without regard to consequences, either to the practioners or to the country in which they live.
Opposition to affirmative action has been to thwart reverse dicrimination. Abortion nuts? Science again rejected by the left in favor of their ideology. We know it tortures and kills people, while you pretend either it isn't a person or that there's some other lame justification for it. We oppose illegal immigration and amnesty that, as has been shown to be the case in the past, will only invite more illegals to enter. There's nothing immoral about a nation controlling the flow of people into and out of the country.
So our social conservativism might align with our firmly held and constitutionally protected religious beliefs, but they also align with science and common sense. They are far more thought out positions than that to which we have been subjected by the left.
Indeed, it's not that the GOP needs to distance ourselves from conservatism, but to better articulate the benefits to the nation and the individuals who live here. Tolerating bad behavior isn't justice, it's stupid and destructive. But we'll allow that some insist on engagin in bad behavior, we just don't hold with those who think we must accept it as normal and sanction it with licensing and legislation like the pathetic and inane "hate crimes" laws.
We don't expell people from the party for disagreeing on a few points. This is nonsense. But we have no trouble ridding ourselves or saying buh-bye to the Arlen Spector types who go too far left too often. I know the Dems don't because power is all that matter to them. On the right, we actually care about the nation far more than personal power.
Down with the GOP! Down with the Democrats! May they both be thrust aside by a vibrant anti-statist movement!
Oh, one more:
Down with the state!
Thanks for the facts and cogent thinking, Michael. Facts always help.
John, while I may be a little sympathetic, what are you proposing in the State's place? Or in the place of the GOP and Dems?
(CNN) — Former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr said Saturday it’s hard to “overestimate the damage” that’s been inflicted on the Republican Party — not only with this week's defection of Sen. Arlen Specter, but also the “lack of any coherent philosophy, vision or leadership.”
“The Republican Party is in very deep trouble right now,” Barr said in an interview with CNN.
Barr, who was once a loyal soldier in the GOP, joined the Libertarian Party in 2006 and was the party’s presidential candidate in 2008.
Dan, in place of our current state, I would like to see one of vastly reduced power. Much of this could be accomplished simply by enforcing the 10th Amendment to the Constitution.
I would like to see both parties be diminished at the expense of a rising Tea Party movement that calls for these changes.
Steps to follow (just off the top of my head):
1. legalize all drugs and other activities by and between consenting adults
2. get governments, and especially the federal government, out of the land owning business
3. eliminate the income tax and replace it with...nothing
Dear John,
Don't like states? Try Somalia. Not much of a state there. Plenty of guns, no taxes, lots of free enterprise (piracy).
FAILED states are the ultimate outcome of true libertarianism.
Can states have too much power? You betcha! Also. (Oops. Saw the Gov. of AK on TV, again.) :-) That's why it is important to have checks and balances and separation of powers.
You know what else can have too much power? Corporations. Especially as in this country when given the legal fiction of "persons" since the late 1890s. (What was the year for Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad?) And one of the few checks on corporate power is government.
It's a tricky balancing act, I'll grant you that. I want to see more worker ownership of corporations. That checks power without giving it to the state.
But we democratic socialists are a strange breed. :-)
Michael-
In the early American republic is a fine example of a society with a minimal state. It has worked, and can work again.
As for Somalia, you confuse civil war and libertarianism. Somalia did not cast off government on an ideological basis and in no way, shape, or form, represents the fulfillment of a libertarian movement.
Marshall is so cute. He's like a stuffed porcupine, only with real quills.
John, hate to say it but Michael Westmorland White is quite right. You want the kind of state you desire, what you end up with is Somalia. Period. It isn't civil war, it's anarchy. It's a nice idea, all these enlightened folks sitting around acting in their own interests and somehow these various oppositions coalesce in to some great big wonderful humanitarian whole, except of course, what really happens is the powerful become even more powerful and with no legal check on that power, it is the people (the supposed beneficiaries of all this anrachic largess) who end up taking it in the end.
Spend a month in Somalia, then get back to me; it is an anarchist's dream and a human being's hell.
GKS wrote:
John, hate to say it but Michael Westmorland White is quite right. You want the kind of state you desire, what you end up with is Somalia. Period.Please present documentation to the effect that Somali leaders were attempting to create a libertarian or minarchist state. If you can, that would contribute to the case that libertarianism produces anarchy.
Oh, please, John. Anarchy is the result of the collapse of authority. Now, a state can certainly vote itself out of existence, or pursue policies that destroy itself. Libertarianism, in practice, would end up with the US looking like Somalia. I know you don't like that idea, but it doesn't make it any less true.
John,
Sorry, but you can't have the early American government of the 18th C. in a modern/post-modern world. You might as well try to have an Athenian direct democracy in today's world.
"Marshall is so cute."Geoffie's been talkin' to my friends. But I see his picture often so I'm afraid I can't say the same for him.
For Michael also of the three names,
If 76% is the best, then obviously Spector is left of the core of the party. Yet, as we are the big tent, he was not kicked out of the party. And his complaint that the party has moved too far right is nonsense if one looks at the spending of the GOP over the past ten years or so. Had those spenders acted more conservatively, we might still retain majorities in at least one of the Houses.
But I certainly wasn't saying the party is not in trouble. Of course it is as evidenced by the election of an incredibly unqualified pretender. Recently I saw a poll that suggests that over 50% of the nation thinks the gov't should be doing more. That, too, shows a real problem with the GOP that such an attitude would spread. That attitude was nowhere near prevalent in the growth of the United States. And of course now, with the likes of you people in charge, there is the constant berating and intolerance of anything right-wing or Christian, showing how you all are bad winners as you are sore losers. THAT is a problem for the GOP as it is now harder to overcome leftist rhetoric while in the minority. But this too shall pass because you'll hang yourselves in no time.
"constant berating of anything rightwing or Christian." Well, I berate the rightwing because it is fascist. As a Christian, of course, I never berate anything truly Christian--just the fascist imitations of fundamentalism.
GKS wrote:
Oh, please, John. Anarchy is the result of the collapse of authority. Now, a state can certainly vote itself out of existence, or pursue policies that destroy itself. Libertarianism, in practice, would end up with the US looking like Somalia. I know you don't like that idea, but it doesn't make it any less true.
Let's use your logic, but with a different agency:
Somalia was ruled by (variously) two to three White European powers. Then, it became independent. Now, it is a lawless collection of ganglands. This is the inevitable result when you let Black people rule themselves. I know you don't like that idea, but it doesn't make it any less true.
And that makes as much sense as your argument.
Michael wrote:
Sorry, but you can't have the early American government of the 18th C. in a modern/post-modern world.
Why not?
I find the new mantra that the GOP is the party of no hugely ironic since that was the mantra used by the GOP against the Democrats just a few short years ago. It's simply a marketing stunt used to marginalize opposition so you can do whatever you want.
And the irony doesn't end there. Arlen Spector switching parties because of a primary contest is being touted as evidence of the GOP's inflexibility and ultimate doom. Again, just a few short years ago a senator with far more standing in the democratic party than Spector has in the GOP, a vice presidential candidate even, lost a primary over a single issue, and was kicked out of his party. Senator Leiberman's centrist, sometimes votes with Dems, sometimes with Repubs, style didn't spell the end of the Democratic party, and neither does Spector's "defection".
Marshall, save your personal insults. You couldn't hurt my feelings if you tried.
John, I don't even pretend to understand how what you wrote has anything to do with what I said. There are supremely efficient states in Africa that are former colonies. That Somalia is a failed state has far more to do with the continued tampering of Western powers than anything else; just consider the Ethiopian invasion, encouraged by the US in particular because it appeared likely for a time that a hard-line Islamic government might emerge. Truly stupid, making a bad situation worse.
None of this has to do with the main issue - whether you call it libertarianism or anarchy, the end result is the same. Reality trumps theory every single time.
Geoffrey, you still have yet to show a causal link between libertarianism and anarchy.
Actually John, I have to side with old Geoffrey on this one. But that's OK because I can whack Mikey's comment at the same time.
I concur with Glen Beck's description, that anarchy is the extreme of the right-wing. One could say Republican to Conservative to Libertarian to anarchy because of the progressive move away from any gov't involvement. Conversely, the left moves from liberal to socialist to communist to fascist because of the progressive move toward MORE gov't involvement.
Now this smacks big Mike by the fact that there's little fascism involved for merely proclaiming truth to those for whom truth is an ambiguity. People like Mike berate the right for their defense of absolutes because they do not want to expend the effort to abide those truths, so they fall to the pretense of being "more open" to other ideas. Well, the right has always been open to other ideas. We just don't waste time with those that are crap.
The real fascism comes from the left, like Mike, who show the real intolerance for the right-wing/conservative/fundamentalist who aren't willing to bend truth to the whims of man, but seek to conform themselves to the truth, be it God's or nature's.
Geoffrey said,
"Marshall, save your personal insults. You couldn't hurt my feelings if you tried."What makes you think I'm trying to hurt your feelings? I suspect you're once again taking yourself too seriously.
Also, why should I save my personal insults? Can I redeem them for valuable gifts later?
No, you should save them because they're boring and inane and contribute nothing to any helpful conversation.
MWW: "(What was the year for Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad?)"
1886. The year American became the government of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations.
Read all about it in Thom Hartmann's book "We the People".
Yeah the republicans are presently in the toilet. Perhaps it would do them good to take a closer look at one of their past presidents - President Eisenhower. He understood all too well, I think because of his military training, the Military Industrial Complex and this letter to his brother, Edgar Newton, setting him straight about a lot of things is just too sweet.
"Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his background), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid."
Boy, I just love that part!
Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history.
I would vote Republican if they tried this, when I otherwise wouldn't. But I'm probably in a small minority.
Here's for a revival of Republicans of the stripe of Abe Lincoln ("Capital is prior to labor and depends on labor."), Teddy Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Sen. Jacob Javits of NY, Sen. Mark Hatfield of OR, Harold E. Stassen (former Gov. of MN and later primary author of the UN Charter), Sen. Chuck Hagel of NE, etc.
I don't see it happening for at least two more election cycles.
John, the GOP DID try to abolish Social Security through privatization in '05. The opposition was even stronger in the Red States that Bush II had just won in '04 than in the Blue States he lost. And, if he had succeeded, we'd now be seeing huge numbers of old people in soup lines after the banks gambled and lost the SS just as they gambled and lost their pension funds. (My anger at Wall Street will die down in about 50 years.) The elderly used to be the majority of the nation's poor. SS changed that. Now the majority of the poor are children because they do not vote and their only "lobby" is not a powerful force like the AARP but the under-funded Children's Defense Fund.
People who want to do things like abolish SS should be shunned from polite society. They should be ranked with those who turn a blind eye to elder abuse and other moral lepers and degenerates.
Yeah, Mikey, you're right. Let's continue to support the very thing that got Bernie Madoff pinched, a ponzi scheme. SS is dying on it's own and doesn't really need to be abolished. And the left is the reason and their self-destructive support for abortion helped. Oh sure, change the rules a bit and it'll last a bit longer, but as the present rate of retired going up, with number of contributors going down, support for this joke isn't a mark of either intelligence or charity.
"No, you should save them because they're boring and inane and contribute nothing to any helpful conversation."You seem to forget this when insults come from your friends, Dan.
Michael wrote:
People who want to do things like abolish SS should be shunned from polite society. They should be ranked with those who turn a blind eye to elder abuse and other moral lepers and degenerates.
Really? You consider me this morally degenerate?
Dan said:
"No, you should save them because they're boring and inane and contribute nothing to any helpful conversation."
To which Marshall responded:
You seem to forget this when insults come from your friends, Dan.
No, I don't forget it. It's just that they have tended to be cleverer than you in their insults.
If you want to make caustic remarks, at least make them funny. Calling Obama, "Barry," or "Hussein" or "Obamable" is not an especially clever way of demeaning a person.
You tend to just not be funny.
One man's opinion.
"It's just that they have tended to be cleverer than you in their insults."
Well THAT'S certainly not true. Not even close. I mean even if EVERYone thought my stuff wasn't funny, there's no way anyone can truthfully say I've been bested. That's a fact.
BTW, that's "Obumble", and it's apt.
In addition, I don't see as how you on the left have any room to talk regarding demeaning speech about a sitting president. Whether "clever" nicknames or outright unsubstantiated accusations, the left has been award winning in their disrespect. At least we speak from a position of truthfulness regarding the glaring unworthiness of one Barack Hussein Obama. And he proves it continually.
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