Much of the discussion going on now and that has gone on in the last 12 months regarding who we should choose for president is based on what one believes will happen if a certain candidate is nominated or elected to the office. Some have said that in the primary you should vote for what you heart tells you and in the general election follow what your head dictates. This was perhaps the reason that many Republicans chose not to vote for John McCain in primaries after it was clear that he would be the Republican nominee. They wanted to vote for who the really liked.
Now we see the general election campaign beginning and Obama is moving to the right to try to enhance his chances of getting elected. He has said he agrees with the US Supreme Court decisoin supporting the right of individuals to own fire arms, while he supported the Washington DC law that was overturned by the decision. He has also voiced his opposition to the ballot measure in California to define marriage as between one man and one woman.
His campaign is saying that will take the unprecedented move of spending money in every state regardless of whether or not Obama has a chance to carry the state. In fact, Texas is one of those targets and not because he believes he can win the state, but because Obama hopes to turn out enough Democratic voters to help his party win down ballot races. He hopes that his supporters will vote for Democrats all the way down the ballot so he can usher in Democrat control of government at the national, state and local level.
Many have responded to this blog saying that they will not vote for McCain and that is certainly their right to do so. McCain certainly has many positions that I disagree with, but the fact remains that either he or Obama will be president of the United States of America. There are no guarantees about what a president will do on a host of issues but we can judge general based on past statements and records. I strongly disagree with those who say that there is no difference between the two.
Although the Supreme Court has given some rulings that have heartened conservatives it has also disappointed. While we may be uncertain as to McCains possible appointments he as said he will appoint judges in the mold of Roberts and Alito. Obama will without doubt appoint those in the mold of Ginsberg. Add to this the issues of the war against terror and our desperate need to become energy independent and in my view John McCain is the only viable choice for president.
Tim Lambert
President, THSC
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19 comments:
It is amazing how the "Support McCain" talk rarely includes why McCain is the man for the job. The entire McCain push right now can be summed up as "McCain: Because he isn't Obama."
Let's get this straight: Few people in the Republican party want McCain (just add up the numbers for all the other candidates). He was not "elected" but railroaded in as the candidate because his corrupt party disobeyed its own rules and Texas law (which is why this blog exists). And his entire campaign is "I'm not Obama."
The Republican party has done this to itself. If you offer voters the substance of true limited government and personal liberty, then they will vote for your party and not Obama. Keeping Obama out would have happened had the conventions all followed the rules.
If your party acts lawlessly, they will reap lawlessness.
The "McCain is not Obama" campaign needs to die. It is simply declaring publicly "We have no platform, no candidate, no morals, and no unity." How embarrassing to be on the record supporting him.
McCain won the Republican nomination because he won the most primaries. In spite of the abuse of power at the RPT convention McCain won the Texas Republican Primary easily, i.e. he got a majority of the votes.
This is no longer about the convention it is about which candidate is the best choice for president and again I point to the fact that either McCain or Obama will be president.
It's actually all about the convention, and I don't know how you can't understand that:
1. Had the rules been followed, McCain would not be the candidate. Just ask the Pat Robertson RINOs from the past about how much delegates matter outside of the "vote".
2. Without McCain as the candidate, the message of liberty and a true conservative platform would have emerged.
3. With a platform so encouraging, so passionate, and so different than Obama's, you would not have to be begging for people to vote "not Obama".
4. But because the party broke the law and alienated all the fresh energized, new blood at all the conventions (county and state), they're now between a rock (Iraq?) and a hard place - a situation that was created by the party, via their disregard for all of us who wanted to be a part of the process.
Obama's fate was sealed at all the conventions. Don't blame the non-voters for him winning.
Now that the convention is over, the Republican party must lie in its own bed, and sleep there awhile. In the meantime you can't blame everyone else for Obama's win because they won't vote for McCain. Blame lies solely at the feet of the law-breaking Republican party.
I'll modify your "fact" by one level: McCain does not have a chance to be president. Those of us spurned by the party will not vote for him, and the Democrats' primary turnout was twice that of the Republican party turnout. A meaningless "let's support our corrupt party" vote will do nothing to change that fact, and should not be part of anyone's legacy.
McCain can't win. Therefore, why should anyone vote for McCain, and forever associate their name with supporting him?
I have voted straight Republican all my life, and I don't want Obama in any more than you. But it is easy to say, with confidence: "There is no Republican candidate in this race." And that is the "fact" that you seem to not want to address.
True Republicans don't have a candidate, so asking us to vote McCain is the same as asking us to vote for Obama, save the fact that Obama can actually win.
The saddest factoid is that the conservative agenda actually moves forward better under a liberal democrat than under a liberal republican and the conservative movement will do better and accomplish more under an Obama administration than under a Mccain one.
Look at the debt level under the Clinton vs Bush administrations as just one indicator, but there are plenty more. I don't think it is enough for me to actually vote for Obama, but it certainly is enough for me to skip the presidential race and move down ballot to vote for someone truly conservative.
It is time to save our breath and our votes and our energy for someone who stands for our values. It is time to move down ballot to support and elect people of principle to lead our country and take back the Republican party.
For Life and Liberty,
Sandie
http://www.scrosnoe.com
I'm afraid Sandy and Brad are right. It's easy to see where conservatives conclude there is no benefit to voting for Mccain. Republicans need to learn that they cannot win with candidates who lie to their constituents and betray the values of conservatism. If politicians like McCain do not receive conservative support, maybe so many of these ignorant, misinformed senior citizen republican women (who seem more concerned about women's reproductive rights, or preserving their social security or their right to receive 18 different taxpayor funded medicaid prescriptions than the future of their children and grandchildren) will then think twice about voting for sellouts like McCain. He's going to lose anyway -and even if he did win, Sandy is right - he'll just set back the conservative movement far more than if Obama won.
We will have to take our well deserved lumps, regroup, and hopefully learn from our mistakes. If we don't, the republican party will be on the road to oblivion - destined to fall into the ash heap of History. The Ron paul and Buchanan Conservatives will either take over the party -or leave it for another. Without their ideas, energy, and adherence to traditional conservative principles, the Republican party is bankrupt. Demogoguing the phony war on terror is not only bankrupting this country and destroying our standing in the world community, but it will no longer fool Americans who are finally starting to figure out the enormous damage caused by such actions. Our economy is a disaster. It will take decades to fix the harm that has been done -longer if we keep nominating lying, corrupt politicians like Obama and McCain.
From my observations at the recent texas GOP convention, Republicans have not yet learned their lesson. They will after November. Mccain's "I'm not Obama" campaign, with so little else to offer, is destined for failure.
Maybe if he had the integrity to start telling us the truth, (like Ron Paul and Buchanan) I could cut him a little more slack.
For how many election cycles have Republicans been voting for "not the other guy.?" Has government intrusions into our lives and Constitutional usurpations by the central government really been slowed down by the GOP? Nope.
Didn't McCain once talked with John Kerry, the Democrat senator, about switching parties?
I watched the MSM news. I do remember when McCain was all but out of the race. What did the MSM do? Have McCain interviewed all over the place. Suckers like a good underdog story and they went for it. In the mean time, other "second tier candidates" were ignored and marginalized. McCain is the GOP Establishment's and MSM's candidate.
It is odd how McCain's camp can't even land a body blow on Obama, even though Obama leaves himself wide open. Obama's surrogate, Wesley Clark, opened Obama up when he denigrated McCain's military service. Weird, isn't it?
Does voting "present" over a hundred times in the Illinois state legislature prepare one to be President better than knowing the responsibility of command. NO. I don't think every President needs military service, but come on, we are talking about Obama.
McCain's camp better kick it in gear and also reach out to conservatives in a genuine manner, or he is going to make it easy for folks to avoid voting for President.
Regardless, it is imperative that all Republicans find a candidate they can support and work for. Examine them all and find someone from President to state legislature, from Congress to the constable's office to support and work for.
Yeah, McCain, tTell us what we want to hear so that you can get elected. Nevermind historical, actual, actions. What really counts are the election day words. And I esp;ecially include Gov. Perry and Lt. Gov. Dewhurst.
Thus we come to today.
I call it: battered GOPer syndrome.
Bring out the mat and vote for McCain?
Not me!
Tim is right that McCain has the nomination because of the primary vote, not the state conventions. Yes, we live in a republic and the delegates retain their ability to vote what's best for the party and country but they do that at the direction and advisement of the voters, or it's not a representative system at all.
The problem is that the primaries were themselves a farce, because we have allowed the mass media and other interests to subvert the people's authority under their parties and to take complete control of the electoral process. The party asserts no authority over who runs on its ballots. With the kind of fragmented, dysfunctional party we currently have that opens the door to all kinds of candidates the media can use to further divide us and make sure the last man standing is someone like McCain, who is nearly the worst of the options available at the beginning and has very little real chance to win in the fall but still wins primaries because people "know" they "must vote" to be a participant and not have a guilty conscience, and they must vote for the person the media tells them is winning. So the media divides us, declares a winner, and we line up behind that person and make them right.
This is still very much about the conventions, not because of the delegates elected to national, but because the party needs to assert control over its ballot again and deny outside interests the ability to manipulate our outcomes. Someone like John McCain should never have been seen as eligible to run for President as a Republican, simply because he does not vote like a Republican. If he wants to run and if people want to vote for him, fine, but the Republican Party shouldn't grant him their ballot and debate access without any regard for his demonstrated principles. He can always run under a banner more fitting what he actually believes and does.
The party needs to continue to have this conversation and sort out what happened this time so we can make sure it doesn't happen again. Some are afraid if we keep talking about it we'll somehow harm our unity and chances in the fall, but I don't see where we have much to lose at this point. A party that will so easily attack its own activists has no unity, and our odds in the fall are dismal enough. We need a plan now so that if we get slammed as looks likely people know we are prepared to move forward with lessons learned and don't just leave.
A great many Republican activists agree with Jeremy,as do I, that the party does not assert enough authority over candidates on its ballot. That is why we tried to, by party rule, move to a closed primary in which only registered Republicans could participate in the nomination of Republicans.
Delegates were not allowed to vote on that issue, because it would have put the party in conflict with state law. Therefore the party was not allowed to increase its control of its nomination process because party leaders refused to allow the delegates to do so. Our only way to exert control at this point is at the ballot box.
I agree with Jeremy that we need to continue to deal with the abuse of power issue with the party leadership and that we should not quit but learn from these lessons and change things in the RPT.
Jeremy Blosser, your point is well taken!
I am skeptical that closing the primaries would fix the problem; it would limit the voting pool, certainly, but it would only limit it to those who register as Republican year after year. This is not the same thing as maintaining some control over the ballot based on what the party believes. It would most likely result in further control by moderates over idealists, since idealists are the ones most likely to go away in disgust on some cycles, then try to come back later if they see a candidate that gives them hope conservatives are going to assert themselves again.
The simplest way to make sure it's those that understand the platform who pick the nominees would be to only allow previous delegates to vote, which starts to smack of oligarchy, or to move to a caucus system, which is still open to anyone that wants to participate but at least requires more out of people than showing up and pulling a lever.
These all still make the decision only at the ballot box, however, which is only even very relevant in states with early enough primaries. It's debatable Texas falls into that category. Plenty of established Republicans who didn't like McCain voted for him in Texas just because he was winning at the time.
I think I speak for many of us when I say that I am a conservative first and a Republican second. I wasn't born a Republican - nobody is. I'm not a Republican because it's the "home team" - there are Democrats in my home town as well. I'm a Republican because in my estimation, that was the party which reflected my values as a conservative. And so long and insofar as those values are represented there, I will stand by the GOP. But insofar as they are not, my true allegiance lies with my principles, not a body which denigrates and betrays those principles.
By backing McCain, they are betraying those very principles, and I will have no part in it. There is a poison pill we are being asked to swallow in the name of "stopping Obama". If we silence ourselves on the evils of a McCain Presidency, then, supposing he is elected (not likely, but bear with me), we will be caught in the same situation we were caught in with George W, only this time we cannot claim we did not know better. We will have set the precedent that no evil shall be spoken of our nominee, and make no mistake: that will carry over after November.
This wicked precedent having been set, it will be much more difficult to mount opposition to McCain's proposals once in office. For example, it will be all the harder to have the defenses up when McCain announces a plan to ban "assault weapons", or to impose more environmental regulations.
No, I will not be silent. Rather that worrying about unity within the party, we should be more concerned with unity within the conservative movement. And on that score, McCain is not with us.
First, I don't agree that one "voting their heads" means that one should entirely ignore "their heart". Second, the recent Supreme Court rulings that heartened me were the ones denying "near tyrannical" powers to the executive branch. They are the ones that reinstated Habeas Corpus. They are the ones that said the government can't detain and torture anyone it pleases. These are the decisions I take heart in and the GOP was on the wrong side in every one.
Third, and this is for those who believe that we must think politically if we are to win. This country is in for an economic storm that it hasn't faced in a generation, at least. This is nearly inevitable. We, the conservatives, can take the blame by placing McCain in office with his small government rhetoric or we can let the blame fall on the Democrats, that will have control of the Whitehouse, Senate and House. We can position ourselves for a triumphant 2012, or we can have our message sullied for decades to come. This is the choice before us.
Does the conservative wing of the party have any leverage? If conservatives line up behind RINOs, the party will keep nominating RINOs. By voting for McCain, conservatives cede our power to the moderates in the party. I for one am not going to vote for McCain/Romney or McCain/Crist or any other RINO pair. If conservatives dutifully fall in line behind McCain, we have given up any leverage we had. Moderate Republicans must understand they cannot win without the conservative base. If they think they can win without us, they are free to ignore us. A vote for John McCain is a vote against our conservative bloc.
I think that it is very sad that it comes down to Republican or Democratic. (Who is the lesser of the two evils of these reining powers.) IF you vote for the lesser of the two evils, you are still voting for evil.
MY GREAT and MIGHTY GOD has provided ME with a way out of the disparing looking future.
There are other canidates running for president, one being a CHRISTIAN PASTOR named CHUCK BALDWIN. I'm tired of the excuse that "he's 3rd party and doesn't stand a chance to win, so I'm not going to throw my vote away". Your right, with that attitude, he doesn't stand a chance to win! (As if voting for Obama or McCain isn't throwing your vote, morals, convictions, etc away.)
If the people who call themselves CHRISTIAN in this country keep voting for the lesser of two evils, GOD will give us what we deserve, evil. How can GOD BLESS AMERICA, if AMERICA will not BLESS GOD and vote for "rulers" who uphold GOD'S standard of truth?
I don't believe that any true conservative can vote for an author of 'McCain Feingold': A blatant repudiation of the 1st amendment. A candidate that can author that can author anything.
It was stated that we have a right to not vote for McCain. This is not true.
Nevada:
Louisiana
Washington
Texas (no link needed)
Hawaii explanation
Hawaii Script
These are just examples.
I realize that you have not updated recently. Maybe you are overwhelmed with something you are working on; I’d love to read about it. Perhaps you are frustrated. Just because I may not agree with you doesn’t mean that your point is not valid. Either way I am sorry to see this blog become outdated.
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