Conservatives: A Warning

This article is not an attack on conservatism. It is a warning.

Nor is this a suggestion that conservatives should moderate.

In fact, each of you knows that I’m solidly conservative in my views. I believe not only that conservative principles are the only political principles that will make the world a better place, but also that they are the only truly moral principles one can hold. Only conservatism respects the rights and dignity of man, while liberalism seeks to make us slaves of others’ charity. And while we occasionally make mistakes, it is usually more the result of poor execution or demagoguery from opportunists than it is the result of our principles.

Thus, take it in good faith when I warn you that conservatives are about to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

The Good News

Obama is this generation’s Jimmy Carter. He is discrediting liberalism to an entire generation, and quickly demoralizing the left flank of his party. These should be good times for conservatives.

These should be good times for conservatives within the Republican Party as well. McCain the RINO King convinced everyone that we had to be moderate to succeed. His crushing defeat discredited the RINO cause. They still scream “moderation,” but no one is listening anymore. The RINO philosophy is dead and buried within the party. . . for now.

Indeed, while the Republicans are blowing the Democrats away in fund raising (with Blue Dogs having a particular problem), the RINOs are finding their easy support within the party vanishing. Remember McCaindidate Van Tran (Cal.)? He’s been out raised by another Republican Vietnamese challenger. Trey Grayson, a neocon who supported Clinton, is being blown out by Rand Paul (son of Ron Paul) in Kentucky. Even RINO Charlie Crist (Fla), another McCaindidate, who out raised his Democratic opponent 3-1, is suddenly facing a surging conservative Republican challenger in the primary who has raised more than one million dollars.

Now in New York 23, conservatives have forced the Democratic far left Republican to withdraw from the race so that an actual conservative can win the seat.

Sounds like good times for conservatives, right? Actually no. Conservatives are in danger of turning stunning victory into crashing defeat. Here’s why.

The Problem

Conservatives have the momentum. The Republican Party lies open, ready to be reshaped into the vehicle that brings the great rebirth of conservative America. But at the very moment conservatives should be streaming into the party, filling every empty chair, and seizing control of all levels of power, conservatives instead are throwing a tantrum. Rather than seizing the party, conservatives are talking vaguely of forming a new party. Rather than building and guiding the party, conservatives are destructively tearing it down. This must end lest we squander this victory.

Drop The Third Party Idea

Let’s start with something a lot of people don’t want to hear. Forget the idea of forming a conservative party. First, it can’t be done. Secondly, even if it could, it will only hurt conservatives.

The fact of the matter is that America is a two party system: Republicans and Democrats. Our electoral system and human nature mean that won’t change. A third party can briefly hurt one side or the other, but that’s about it. The only real power that a political movement can achieve is in using the threat of withholding its support to hurt one side or the other. If that threat is great enough, the movement can pull one party into the direction that the movement advocates.

Right now, conservatives have the attention (and fear) of the Republican Party. That is the path to conservative victory, to seize and shape the Republican Party. To fail to do this, because conservatives have utopian dreams of creating a new party, would irresponsibly squander our victory.

Moreover, let’s assume a conservative party of some size did appear. What do you think would be the effect on the country? Would the Republicans move to the right? No. Why should they? Everyone within the GOP who would advocate a turn to the right would have left. Would the Democrats move to the right? Hardly. With the right split in half, they’d be free to move as far left as they wished, knowing they no longer needed even the support of 50% of the population. Would the conservative party become the new majority party? No. If that were likely to happen, the Republican Party would represent 60% of the population today because they are closer to the right than the Democrats, but they don’t. If that were likely to happen, the Conservative Party in New York (where you can be a conservative without hurting the Republican Party because of fusion voting) could attract more than 155,000 registered members compared to 3.1 million Republicans.

Also, New York has had a Conservative Party since 1962, would you say that they have helped move New York politics to the right? Why should the result be different on a national level? And lest you think that New York is somehow just unique, keep in mind that the Libertarian Party has been a national party for decades, but hasn’t managed to move the Republicans or the Democrats one degree toward their cause.

The truth is that parties don’t listen to outsiders, and separating yourself from the inner workings of a party makes you an outsider. Outsiders are the people who refuse to join the committee that selects the location of a banquet and then wonders why they never choose their favorite restaurant. If you want the Republican Party to bend to your will, you must participate within its structures.

Stop Destructive Attacks

And that brings me to the second problem. Conservatives need to stop making destructive attacks on the GOP. Not only do you not want to damage the brand of something you are looking to own, but ill-informed, blanket attacks are not constructive. They do not help what we are trying to achieve.

Criticism that is not constructive is destructive. Criticism that overstates a problem, that falsely accuses, or that fails to give the accused an understanding of what you want changed, is not constructive. Conservatives right now are guilty of all of this. And since the Republican Party is the vehicle we must use, this must stop.

For starters, we need to stop making blanket attacks. Not all Republicans are bad and not everything they do is wrong. If you have a restaurant that you generally like, but you don’t like their hamburgers, does it make sense to categorically trash the restaurant? The same analogy holds for political parties.

People claim that the Republicans aren’t conservatives. But is this true? Do those people who complain know what the leadership believes? Do they even know who the leadership are? Did you know that the House leadership have all earned extremely high lifetime ratings from the American Conservative Union?

• House Minority Leader: John Boehner (ACU rating 93.89)

• Minority Whip: Eric Cantor (ACU rating 96.25)

• Republican Policy Committee Chairman: Thaddeus McCotter (ACU rating 84.5)

• Republican Policy Committee Vice-Chair: Dr. Michael Burgess (ACU 93.83)

The Senate leadership is less conservative, but still firmly conservative:

• Senate Minority Leader: Mitch McConnell (ACU rating 89.4)

• Minority Whip: John Kyl (ACU rating 96.96)

• Republican Conference Chairman: Lamar Alexander (ACU rating 80.83)

• Republican Conference Vice Chair: Lisa Murkowski (ACU rating 70.56)

• Republican Policy Committee Chairman: John Thune (ACU rating 86.77)

Compare these ratings to Olympia Snowe’s 47 rating and Susan Collins’ 49 rating, and Democrats in the teens. Do you still think it’s fair to say these aren’t conservatives?

Ok, you say, they may be conservatives, but they sure haven’t acted like it. Under Bush certainly, but let me point out what they’ve done since the election:

• Only eight House Republicans out of 178 voted for Cap and Trade.

• Only nine Senate Republicans out of 40 voted to confirm Sotomayor.

• Only one Republican in the Senate has voted for ObamaCare.

• No Republicans in the House voted for ObamaCare.

• No Republicans in the House voted to support Obama’s stimulus.

• No Republicans supported Obama’s budget in the House or the Senate.

• The Republicans in the Senate held up two of Obama’s State Department Appointments in protest over Honduras.

• And lastly, they announced last night that they will unveil, this week, their own health care plan. It’s not CommentaramaCare, but it’s not just handing out more money to insurance providers.

What part of that don’t you like? And if you don’t like it, what did you do to make it better?

When conservatives continue to whine that the leadership isn’t conservative and they haven’t acted like conservatives, you’ve unfairly failed to credit them with a fairly resurgent form of conservatism. You’ve also made it impossible for them to know how to please you because your feedback is nonsense.

And that’s a critical point. Conservatives must outline what they want from the party. Conservatism means different things to different people. Some see it as only a strong foreign policy. Some see it as purely an abortion issue. Some see it as a smaller government issue. Some see it about personal freedom, others about law and order. And these groups often disagree.

Thus, when you complain: “I want conservatism,” that doesn’t help because the term is largely ambiguous. In other words, if you want your criticism to mean anything, i.e. to be constructive, you need to go further and tell us exactly what conservative policies you want. Just demanding “conservatism” is like taking hostages and then demanding “stuff."

Look beyond the buzzwords and be wary of politicians who wrap themselves in them, and hide behind their ambiguity. Look at people's real records, not just their words (FYI, after the new year, we're going to start looking at the records of possible presidential candidates). Ask yourself, what does "traditional values" mean, what does "conservative" mean, what does "smaller government" mean?

In Conclusion

Conservatives stand on the crest of a dramatic victory. But to complete that victory, they need to recognize it for what it is (it is victory over the Republican Party, not the birth of a new party). They must act accordingly by seizing the Republican Party at all levels. . . participate. They must stop tearing down the party, they must build it up. And they must focus their criticism: aim it at the people and policies that deserve it, and tell us what specifically you want done differently.

Now is the time. We must stop complaining and start instructing. We must recognize the victory that lies before us, and seize it, lest we squander this moment and thereby allow the RINOs to continue on happily, ruling a minority party as Democratic majorities continue to strip away the America that we love.