Month: May 2009

Posted on Random Musings

being the opposition

I’m sure there are many good reasons to oppose President Obama’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court.  What concerns me is the decision-making process that produced this nominee.  We seem to be more interested in a candidate’s personal story or appeal to important minority groups than his or her ability to, you know, actually do the job.  It’s good to have more minorities holding positions of power in our country.  But I’m not sure that President Obama looked far enough before picking this nominee.  In general it’s a good idea to spend significantly more time on this choice than it takes to order a latte from Starbucks.  Her record as a judge should be the most important factor in determining whether she would be a good choice as a Supreme Court justice, not whether she has “empathy” or whether she appeals to the right constituency groups.  That doesn’t appear to be the case here.  But at least she paid her taxes (We think).

Should the Republicans vote against this nominee?  Why not?  They have nothing to lose by doing so.   It’s clear that this nominee shares the President’s judicial philosophy, and that’s enough reason for me.  There have also been questions both from the left and the right about her judicial record that suggest an unsuitability for the high court. However, the Republicans do have to be careful in their opposition, because even legitimate criticisms of her could be considered as an attack on her as a minority.  We are already seeing this in the national media, and there’s nothing we can do to change the narrative of the MSM.  That’s just the way it is for the party out of power these days, folks.

1 Comment Posted on Conservatives, Democrats, Liberals, Republicans

thursday news bites

Former VP Cheney provides an impassioned defense of Bush administration foreign policy.

President Obama continues to insist that Gitmo must be closed, even as the Senate attempts to block funding for his grand scheme.

Senator DeMint writes an NRO op-ed critical of government-provided health care.

And my great gov Sanford continues to fight the state legislature after they overrode his veto of most of the stimulus money.  I’m cheering him on, but I’m not sure how this will all play out in the end.  He does tend to get a little scorched-earth about the things he passionately believes in, and some supporters might be turned off by his approach.  But he’s right in what he’s doing and the people of this state who aren’t brain-dead sheep (or dependent Democrats – same diff) will support our governor.

Nothing wrong with my state…the Republican Party here in SC is alive and kicking.  We have thrived under the outstanding outgoing Chairman, Katon Dawson, and our red state status will continue with our new Chairman (chairwoman?) Karen Floyd.   However, Senator Graham still has some work to do with the conservatives in this state, who he continues to tweak, even though we decided to vote for him in spite of a couple serious disagreements we had with him.

Posted on Conservatives, Liberals, Republicans

know your role

What makes Michael Steele great on TV and talk radio makes him controversial as the RNC Chairman.   There are very few Republicans currently holding political office who could be successful pundits, and there are even fewer Republican politicians that would continue to win elections saying things that the members of their party don’t want to hear or acknowledge.   Those who have survived doing this, like Senator DeMint, most likely come from solid red states, where the base completely supports their efforts to fight the Washington mentality.  We are more likely to find honest political dialogue from those who never intend to make a profitable career out of politics than from anyone currently engaged in that pursuit.

This is the difference between Michael Steele and Rush Limbaugh.  Each man has a different objective.  For Michael Steele, the goal should be to get back to basics on core principles of our party, and to regain the confidence of the country in the Republican brand — which can only be done by acknowledging where our politicians have failed and increasing the level of accountability to show that we are serious about more than just winning elections.   His job is also to present our party in the best light possible, which means he cannot continue to speak off-the-cuff when the media is now closely paying attention to every word he says and looking for an opportunity to further divide the Republican party into factions by using our Chairman’s own words against him.

Rush Limbaugh is an entertainer, and a darn good one at that.  You don’t get paid what he gets paid without delivering the goods and the advertisers 3 hours a day / 5 days a week.  In the process of that entertainment, he shares his own opinion on the present administration and what he believes the next steps should be for conservatives who don’t agree with the direction of this country under President Obama.  Love him, hate him, or call him a drug addict — it doesn’t have any effect on the guy at all.  It might make lefties feel better about themselves to rip Rush every day, and good for them if that’s the case.  It just doesn’t do much to move the leftist/statist agenda forward.  At some point,  surely even the leftist might question the wisdom of all Barack’s free spending.  Or maybe not.  Some people are just hard-core enough that they don’t care that these bills will be paid by our children and grandchildren just as long as they get their “free government stuff”.

To Michael Steele, I offer these words of advice from former (?) pro wrestler and current Disney “star” The Rock, “Know your role”.  There’s a time to speak out, and a time to shut up.   A wise chairman knows what time it is.

Posted on Conservatives, Republicans

expand the message

I don’t think there’s much I can add to Matt Lewis’s post on the Townhall blog.   Republicans need to stop surrendering issues like health care, jobs, and the environment to the Democrats.   This limits our ability to compete when national security and cultural issues are not the most important things on the minds of voters.  We need to recognize that our inability to challenge the common belief  that the Democrats have the best answers on health care, the economy, and the environment not only damages our chances of winning elections, it also enables bad policy to be implemented without a fight.  There are so many areas where viable conservative solutions can be discovered if we choose to compete in all arenas, not just the ones that are traditionally strong for Republican candidates.

As Matt says, this is not a call to water down our core beliefs and to become Democrat-lite.   We win converts to the conservative cause not by pandering or making easy compromises  — we do it by standing for the ideas we believe in and standing LOUD for those ideas.  In the absence of conservative alternatives, the Democrats are more than happy to fill that void with sweet-sounding promises of more government care and benefits that the working people of this country will never be able to pay for.