the republicans have a problem, and it’s more serious than the prospect of losing power in november. as much as we would like to think we have an advantage because howard dean is leading the democratic party, we can’t ignore the leadership void in our own party. who’s in charge here? the president is supposed to be running things, and providing leadership. he is doing his level best to defend himself, and to explain his policies to us. i acknowledge that effort. unfortunately, people on both sides of the aisle are losing faith in president bush. what the republicans need is a strong voice who can effectively defend our political philosophy and to explain why we have the right ideas for the country. unfortunately, tony snow’s kind of busy right now with that whole press secretary thing.
who will step up and be the leader that we need? sure we have official republican party leaders, but there’s no spark there, and there’s no big picture vision beyond keeping themselves in power. that’s what made us different from the democrats in the beginning. what was cool about the reagan years? big ideas. optimism for the future of this country. strength in the face of a communist threat. oh yeah, and those infamous tax cuts. that’s what i believe is missing today from both political parties – that expression of optimism about the future. what we have is a bunch of chicken littles running around trying to convince us that the sky is falling.
we need someone who is inspiring and positive, someone who has a bold vision of how to lead this country. we need someone who understands the problems that we face, both foreign and domestic, and who will aggressively deal with those problems. do we have an ’08 candidate who fits that description? we will find out soon enough.
tags: republicans, ’08 election, leadership
I think the big ideas of the past have been replaced by the big reality that our civilization is being threatened by Islamic fascists.
In a perfect world we could seamlessly balance national and international security with domestic programs.
In the future, I believe Administrations will be better equipped to juggle all the different policies. But you’ve got to give mad props to the Bushies for essentially learning on the fly.
You’re right that the biggest and most important issue we face is with the Islamic fascists. That should be priority one for any administration. But I don’t think that Republicans need to surrender the discussion on domestic issues to the Democrats just because our first priority is national security.
I think Rudy, Mitt, George and Newt are going to craft some very savvy policy that bridges the gap between national security/foreign policy/domestic policy that will ensure the GOP majority for years to come.
Hey, come to R.F.L. and post some comments. Lotsa great topics to pore over.
Newt seems to have a head start on the rest of them as far as policy suggestions, so I hope that the other candidates will follow his lead.
You are a posting fool, man. 😛 There is no way I can keep up with comments when you post something every five minutes.