Posted by
Robert the Bruce on Friday, August 07, 2009 3:17:50 PM
Let's face it,fellow Conservatives-the opposition mainstream press has done an outstanding job of villifying the GOP over the past few years leading up to the Obama victory last fall.George Bush was labeled an idiot,and his followers guilty by association.This is the new mantra of the left: The GOP is a bunch of old,angry, uneducated white men.There is no debate necessary with them,so we will just ignore them,obsfucate the truth,and trash them because they are so wrong they don't even merit a civil discussion.
What to do about this? While we have seen a recent backlash against Obamacare whip up some real passioned opposition,the GOP needs to go a step farther : it needs to repudiate much of the Bush/McCain/Rockefeller liberal pragmatism that made our brand barely decipherable from the Democrats in many key areas.
First of all,admit that the Iraq war was a mistake.Not because of faulty intelligence,but the fact that "making the world safe for democracy" was a Wilsonian term used to justify America's entry into WW1.Historically,the Middle East has no history of democratic values and if there is a popular vote it is more than likely going to be for a radical fundamentalist than a democratic leader.There was no sensible reason to think we could occupy the Middle East because,frankly,we don't have the stomach for an American Empire as the British once did.We don't have a large enough standing army to serve as policeman to the world.A better idea would have been to work through proxy as we once did.We are there and President Bush made the decision,and felt justified based on the intelligence he had.Some of us thought it foolish,myself,Pat Buchanan,and a few other old-school conservatives said as much.Once we were fully committed,however,we all supported the President because that's what loyal Americans are supposed to do.But,Bush was wrong on this topic and it cost us dearly.
Second,President Bush never utilized his veto power to cut government spending.He never met a bill he didn't like that crossed his desk.He was certainly no conservative in many areas of his Administration's government spending.You can't be a conservative in theory and yet run up huge deficits.
Yes,we were in a war,which goes back to my first point.The war itself gave the liberals a rallying cause which they used very successfully,just as LBJ's war gave Nixon the Presidency.Even with all the opposition,McCain still had a chance to win the election had he not bungled the GOP response to the Wall Street/mortgage crisis,running one of history's worst Presidential campaigns since Michael Dukakis.