Originally Posted by
Omaha
Regardless of what Joe does or doesn't do or what he says or doesn't say...conservatives need to get back to their core principles…i.e., those established just before and right after the great 1964 Presidential campaign. It was after Goldwater’s great thrashing, that great brains like William F. Buckley and great money like Richard Mellon Scaife, the Coors family, and eventually extending to that great Christian, Rev. Sun Yung Moon united to explain what conservative Republicanism is all about. Thank goodness, the product of conservative think tanks and media has changed the complexion of our political scene. :)
Sometimes conservatives are referred to as the right-wing. I think it is something of which to be proud. Right wing deserves to be merely descriptive and not a pejorative expression. It comes from French history. During the monarchy, nobility bowed to the King’s right and the peasants to the King’s left. After the French Revolution and the creation of the National Assembly, those who came from wealth, power and nobility [[read church, military, and aristocracy) sat on the right side and the newly enfranchised small merchants and peasants sat on the left. Over time the term left came to mean labor and the right to mean capital.
But I digress. Before Goldwater, the GOP decided that it could no longer be “FDR lite.” You know, the eastern moneyed aristocracy who felt service to the nation was a noble way to invest their time and energy…folks like the Rockefellers, and the Lodges. They wanted to distance themselves from statements like this one of President Eisenhower.
“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 that you can do these things. Among them are a few Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or businessman from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid." :mad:
So Republicans needed to establish their own set of principles. Goldwater was the first test. “I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.” Candidate Goldwater in his nomination acceptance speech at the 1964 Republican National convention
Post Goldwater conservative wing-nuts like the John Birchers were cast off. And the core set of principles was more firmly refined and widely promulgated. Things like…
The playing field is even. Anyone who can’t make it in this society has only him or herself to blame. Hard work and discipline are the only traits needed to succeed in this opportunity-filled society.
Competition in the market is always fair. Winning in a “market competition” is never accomplished due to unfair competition. And because winning a contest in the market never impinges on another’s freedom to compete, the market is both natural and moral. Ergo, private enterprise should rule. It is what grew our economy and has made this nation great.
Because the best [[read hardest working, most disciplined, most responsible, and brightest) people will succeed in a free enterprise economy, those same people should “rightfully” [[pun intended) control what government at all levels should and should NOT do. Small government is good. Compassion and empathy may be good personal traits but they are never appropriate at any level of government. Sometimes this is negatively viewed as advocating profits before people. I think it’s best summarized in this quote:
“Few trends could so thoroughly undermine the very foundations of our free society as the acceptance by corporate officials of a social responsibility other than to make as much money for their stockholders as possible.” Future Nobel Prize winning Economist Milton Friedman in his 1962 book Capitalism and Freedom
Property was accumulated in the market should never be taken by government and redistributed to the “undeserving” poor. Taxes to pay for police, fire, the military, the court system and the like [[stuff that makes the capitalist economy work) are legitimate. But they should not come from the rich because they need their money to invest in ways that create jobs. [[What the left pejoratively calls “trickle-down” economics.) :mad:
Government should NEVER do what the private sector can [[even with a little government help like tax subsidies and tax breaks) can do. Business is unlike government: it is never bureaucratic, impersonal, or wasteful. The private sector [[read large corporations and their subsidiaries) is so much more efficient that government, that even our military is being privatized.
I don’t have time to go any further but you can see these time-tested values are what the GOP needs to stick with. It helped grow the party after Goldwater, through Reagan, up to the Contract with America.
Returning to these core Principles as Rush, Sean, Glenn, Sarah and Newt suggest won’t make the tent too small. Sticking with these principles will help everyone see that the GOP wants to continue along the line of thinking that gives hope to the poor, downtrodden and discriminated against…if they only put their nose to the grindstone, work hard, and play by the rules…someday they will achieve the American Dream.
I could go on and on preaching more core GOP values like the virtues of selfishness [[ala Adam Smith), a profit-maximizing greed-driven economy, but I will pause for now. I sure hope you have been tuning in and seeing the now shorn Stephen Colbert as he broadcasts from Iraq. :D
