tinyurl.com/6m4xsv -> tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/11/poll_data_gop_fast_becoming_ru.php
Gallup poll shows that the Republican Party as an institution has a 61% unfavorable rating, with only 34% favorable. And the numbers have only gone downhill since the election -- in October they were at 40% favorable and 53% unfavorable. A separate question in the data set showed 59% of Republicans saying the party needs to be more conservative, compared to only 12% who say the party should be less conservative. So not only is the pool of Republican voters shrinking, but the ones who remain are really nuts. We could be seeing the emergence of a pattern common in democracies, when a ruling party is turned out of power in a landslide: The folks who are left to pick up the pieces are often the most extreme elements, and are in fact the least fit to actually clean things up. The best examples of this are probably the UK Labour Party after they were beaten by Margaret Thatcher in 1979, the Conservative Party after Tony Blair finally ousted them in 1997, and over here the Democrats when they lost in 1980 and then nominated Walter Mondale in 1984.
are you impling that the administration of the last eight years has been conservative? People speaking for the Republican Party are saying that the party needs to let voters know what they stand for. They seemed perfectly content to go wherever Bush led them and to support his policies. Now the results of his policies are clear, they are repudiating them.
SFC is one of those stalwart members of the 'Republican Base' for whom the nasty thought that two terms of Bush/Cheney have been a disaster for the nation is only now surfacing, like a turd in a public pool. After voting for him twice, SFC now sees with clarity that Bush must be a Republican impostor. No doubt many former right-wing cheerleaders for Bush/Cheney take this hypocritical and self-righteous view.
user-pic However, they are well defined in their conservative views as a party, anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, pro-war, and so forth. Therefore, expressing a desire to be more conservative is pretty striking, and frightening, actually.
Social conservatives are still the strongest with their anti-abortion, anti-gay positions but there seems to be a split happening with issues like science (versus creationism), the environment, and even the war. Fiscal conservatives have split too between pro-governing and anti-governing.
user-pic If one defines conservatism as fiscal responsibility and "small" albeit effective government, then yes that party should be more conservative. If one defines it as religioue right wing nuttery, well then they are "nuts"!
user-pic If one defines conservatism as fiscal responsibility and "small" albeit effective government, then yes that party should be more conservative. I've got to disagree with this mythological description of "conservatism". If Reagan was the standard bearer of this supposed brand of conservatism, then it fails its own definition. The government saw no shrinkage under Reagan, in terms of the total size of government. And Reagan's brand of fiscal conservatism was nothing more than "borrowing our way to prosperity". It's quite a feat to be able to quadruple our national debt in 8 years.
The republican party really isn't conservative, it's reactionary. It really is annoying when they throw the word around and apply it to the b-movie actor. If you look at the true definition of conservative, the democratic party is more conservative than the republican party.
user-pic Your example about Mondale leaves one to wonder why only a mere 8 years later the Democrat won! W/o this viable third party candidate Clinton was a likely loser.
It is a new day and we finally have a bright future, notwithstanding all the huge problems right now. I actually feel good about where we are going with obama at the helm.
user-pic My original mention of Mondale wasn't clear enough, I've fixed it. I mean Mondale as the poster boy for unelectable jokers that get nomianted by parties who are just beginning their wilderness years. It'll take at least 12 years for the Conservatives to come back, depending on how the next election goes. And it took the Democrats 12 years to come back after Reagan's big win in 1980.
user-pic Eric: "It'll take at least 12 years for the Conservatives to come back" I personally don't think they will come back, at least not in the cloak they wear today. The world is changing very quickly and the next generation is viewing "conservatism" in a totally different way. I just don't see them making a comeback from where we are now which is pretty in the middle.
I see your point and I share your hope that the GOP will spend at least the next 12 years in the wilderness. " He was definitely lacking in the charisma/communication department, but he was not an extremist at all, and he was a smart, substantive leader who kept his human decency. I am quite certain he would have been a very effective mainstream president, which is not something one can say for the Goldwaters or Palins of the world.
user-pic Totally wrong--Clinton would have won in 92 without Perot, he may not have won certain states (Montana, Georgia, New Hampshire) but he would have won, he led significantly in the polls before Perot re-entered the race, and the exit polls showed Perot drew evenly from Bush and Clinton.
user-pic Obama isn't helping them either by reaching out to Republican moderates and non-ideologues. It's sounds like Obama is going to run a moderate Republican Foreign Policy and a Moderate Democrat Domestic/social policy which is where I think solid majority of the country finds itself.
user-pic Obama's genius, if he can pull it off, is that by running a "moderate Republican Foreign Policy" it eventually ceases to be "Republican" at all and just becomes Democratic. In other words, Obama is willing and seemingly determined to co-opt the traditionally perceived strengths of the Republican party (defense, fiscal responsibility), while leaving behind the failures (social policy).
user-pic I just heard that scowcroft from bush I is advising obama on his foreign policy team. Bush I had probably the best foreign policy of the last 50 years or so. Maybe obama can send baker to syria and iran and knock some heads. Also, it would evidence that we speak as a country with one voice regardless of party.
The wingnut freakazoids are taking this unequivocal rejection as a defining moment for "ril murkins." They are literally hunkering down with weapons, waiting for the n****r hordes to come rampaging over the horizon. By the 2012 Iowa caucuses, Palin will be out of the race because she's too liberal.
I went hunting this weekend here in Northern California, and there was a racist sign some yahoo had put up on the gated access point for the BLM land we were hunting on. I immediately tore it down, but one of my hunting buddies (African American) asked for the sign as a souvenir, and said something about there being ignorant people everywhere.
user-pic The folks who are left to pick up the pieces are often the most extreme elements, and are in fact the least fit to actually clean things up. The best examples of this are probably the UK Labour Party after they were beaten by Margaret Thatcher in 1979, the Conservative Party after Tony Blair finally ousted them in 1997, and over here the Democrats when they nominated Walter Mondale in 1984. Interesting analogies, though I'm not sure your domestic example works. Mondale was hardly an extreme candidate, but he was ill-suited for the television age and was running against a popular incumbent in a year when the economy was going strong. Four years later, Dukakis was a poor candidate for a variety of reasons, but he was anything but an extremist ("this election is not about ideology, it's about competence" -- a line that will live in infamy). The closest US parallels are Goldwater in '64 and McGovern in '72 and in both cases, the party on the losing end of the landslide won four years later, albeit by nominating more centrist candidates. Hopefully, these versions of history won't repeat themselves, and instead the wingnuts will control a shrinking, increasingly irrelevant GOP for a decade or longer, rather th...
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