How the Republican Party can save itself in the Elections

[ArmedBear]

What's wrong with the North American Marlon Brando Look Alikes? Pleasant enough group of hefty older gentleman discussing genetics. Where's the beef?

Yeah, I have all the DVDs, too. Great stuff!

 

[dmallind]

The funny thing is is that I only very recently saw the Island of Dr Moreau movie with MB in it. Lousy beyond belief as a movie, but makes a lot of South Park jokes even funnier now!

 

[Lobotomy Boy]

Unless you've been reading nothing but Democrat propaganda, you've also read about Democrats who are being exposed as being in the same club as Cunningham. So that's a wash for either party, except that it undermines trust for BOTH.

True enough, unless this case sucks in top Bush appointees at the CIA, which seems increasingly likely. The publicity surrounding this, along with the crap storm that will surround Bush's new appointee, will associate Bush with a scandal that involves bribery and prostitution, whether fairly or unfairly. That will drive his approval ratings even lower and increase the general public's disgust with the Republican party.

Plame? That's a trumped-up case that nobody gives a crap about.

That may well prove to be the case, but there's nothing trumped up about the fact that Scooter Libby is under indictment. If Karl Rove is indicted, which also seems more likely with each passing day, that will damage Bush tremendously, and by association the Republican party.

Regardless of whether or not these judgments are warranted or fair, they will help the Democrats next fall if the Republican party doesn't take some drastic action.

 

[Camp David]

Regardless of whether or not these judgments are warranted or fair, they will help the Democrats next fall if the Republican party doesn't take some drastic action.

I hate to break it to you but both parties are failing to measure up. Case in Point:

Senate deal breathes life into immigration bill
Thursday, May 11, 2006; Posted: 1:00 p.m. EDT (17:00 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/05/11/immigration.ap/index.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Senate leaders reached a deal Thursday on reviving a broad immigration bill that could provide millions of illegal immigrants a chance to become American citizens and said they'll try to pass it before Memorial Day. The agreement brokered by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tennessee, and Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, breaks a political stalemate that has lingered for weeks while immigrants and their supporters held rallies, boycotts and protests to push for action.

 

[dmallind]

Unless you've been reading nothing but Democrat propaganda, you've also read about Democrats who are being exposed as being in the same club as Cunningham. So that's a wash for either party, except that it undermines trust for BOTH.

Not really. That's like saying Abramoff hurts both parties because a couple of his clients, usually before they were his clients or at greater rates before they were his clients, threw a few percentage points of their money at Dems. Does not stop Abramoff from being a Republican dominated scandal, as is Hookergate.

 

[cropcirclewalker]

Nothing can be done to save them. The (insert major party name(s) here) party has screwed the pooch.

Never were any good, never will be.

We are screwed. Our republic is on the way out. We had our chance and we blew it.

Sorry.

 

[DarthBubba]

Oh that is easy

Oh that is easy,

Tell them to stop acting like Euro-Trash Socialists,
Then get them to do Something about the Communist Party of America Whoops I mean The Democrats.
I would love to tell them all, “Get your hands out of my pockets and your noses out of my business”. Oh and get off your Butts and defend Our Borders, Language, and Culture.

DarthBubba

 

[Lobotomy Boy]

Headlines like this make the Abramhoff scandal a Republican problem in the eyes of the general public, and we haven't even touched on the "You're doing a heck of a job, Brownie" debacle, which people still remember well enough for the phrase to become a punch line on a popular television series.

All told, the Republicans have their work cut out for them come November.

 

[30Cal]

Carrying something (anything at this point) to completion would be desireable:
Social Security
Immigration
Iraq

There's also this Bin Laden guy I've heard about but have yet to see in shackles.

8 years now and not one single thing of merit has been done. The AWB died naturally due to inaction and doesn't count.

Ty

 

[Thin Black Line]

And nowhere in there is the treason / sedition of the Democrat party pointed out, or even alluded to.

I'll worry about cleaning my own house before I tear down the condemned
one next door.

 

[Thin Black Line]

Carrying something (anything at this point) to completion would be desireable:....Iraq

How do you define "complete" in Iraq and how many American lives Iraq
is worth?

 

[xd9fan]

"I think people care more about the fact that there's a big deficit and ever more government spending, when the Republicans have said that they were for limited government.

It's more a "why bother with the GOP if they're no different?" than a push towards the left by any stretch."

ArmedBear I think you are right on this. We all know the Dems have absolutely no plan on anything. What is crushing is just how fast the GOP fell from grace on thier ideas of being a reform party to being the warfare/pro govt party.

Now I hear the NSA is asking all phone companies for domestic phone numbers to create a massive database. What the Hell is going on? Are we americans or the bad guys??

I dont know how to stop this. Will it slow down when the Baby Bloomers start dying off??? Who knows.

But american voters are in a bad spot right now. They are mentally trapped between two parties that are really all about more Govt.
Running from one and voting for the other is pointless.

IMHO if the american voter doesnt change their bad habits.....Congress and the Prez will not either. Like always its up to the voter.

 

[30Cal]

How do you define "complete" in Iraq and how many American lives Iraq
is worth?

I define "complete" to mean that we no longer have a massive military presence there. Either win or withdraw. I can't help but think the only thing we're doing right now is shovelling money as fast as we can into a bottomless hole. That's the only plan evident to date.

Ty

 

[cbsbyte]

The Republicans win in November? Not bloody likley! At least not at the current rate. Personally, I want the Dems in control of the house, it would be better if they win both houses Then the impeachment hearings can begin and then Americans will finmaly understand what is happening to this once great country under the Republicans. I believe most Americans are not as conservative, as the Republicans say we are. In truth most Americans have more in common with Moderate Democrats, than Conservative Republicans.

 

[Lobotomy Boy]

Sort of makes you wonder who is down in that bottomless hole scarfing up all the money we are shoveling in there.

 

[dmallind]

Again the people who are calling for arch-conservative purity are answering the wrong question. That may be what the GOP needs to do to please YOU but not to WIN.

I know that gun boards and Fox News make it look like the whole country is 80% hard right being somehow bamboozled and outmaneuvered by the 20% socialist cabal, but that's not the case. You will not win a plebiscite by appealing to the fringes, and even the fringes should understand that. People will NOT vote for pure ideologues - why does the Constitution Party not sweep elections if all the GOP has to do to win is turn itself into a mirror image of the Constitution Party?

Do you want impossible perfection or possible progress? Poor question actually - do you want to spend your political time, money and energy seeking impossible perfection or possible progress?

 

[Lone_Gunman]

do you want to spend your political time, money and energy seeking impossible perfection or possible progress?

If you call what the Republicans are doing progress, then please sign me up for impossible perfection.

As you point out though, the Republicans are pandering to moderate voters, and not their traditional base. I agree the Republicans are very unlikely to decide to return to their core conservative principles. That is why I advocate voting Democrat. If you vote Democrat at least you have a chance of ending up with divided power in Washington, and a political stalemate.

 

[ArmedBear]

Not really. That's like saying Abramoff hurts both parties because a couple of his clients, usually before they were his clients or at greater rates before they were his clients, threw a few percentage points of their money at Dems. Does not stop Abramoff from being a Republican dominated scandal, as is Hookergate.

Like I said, unless you only read Democrat propaganda... Otherwise you would have heard about the Mollahan scandal, and the fact that more are probably forthcoming on both sides.

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Group_of_government_contractors_paid_for_0508.html

In order for something to help the Democrats, it must be seen as a Republican problem by many people OTHER than partisan Democrats. Partisan Democrats will use Cunningham as an excuse to vote Democrat, but they're already voting Democrat and they don't need an excuse. Partisan Republicans will do the same with whatever comes along, but again, they're already voting Republican and any EXTRA reason they might have doesn't change their vote.

The end result, in the election, of committed Democrat partisans voting Democrat, and committed Republican partisans voting Republican is zilch.

Math matters in elections. Only when you can get truly independent voters to vote your way, or even get people from the other party to vote your way, do you really get ahead.

This thread WAS about what it takes to win the election, right?

 

[ArmedBear]

Are we americans or the bad guys??

I dont know how to stop this. Will it slow down when the Baby Bloomers start dying off??? Who knows.

I think you answered your own question. All of us, no matter what our political persuasion, think that some Americans ARE the bad guys. I don't necessarily mean terrorists, of course.

That's why we need Constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties, including gun rights.

 

[dmallind]

Ok Armed Bear let's do this - you list me the Dems involved in Hookergate and Abramoff and I'll list the Reps. What the hey let's add sex scandals of any type and arrests/convictions too.

State or national level pols and key aides - last five years. Wanna bet who wins?

My point is not that Dems are pure and innocent. Good lord give me SOME credit. My point is that current scandals are unearthing a GREATER (and not only just a little bit greater either) number of Rep scumbags than Dem scumbags, so the issue remains viable for the Dems. Giving individual examples does not disprove this at all - that's again like saying Murdoch supports both parties because he hosted a HRC fundraiser. Let me know if you want to tally recent scandals OK?

I don't even want to make the claim that Reps are inherently more scummy than Dems. I suspect that they are probably pretty equal. Anybody who thinks morality can be measured by political affiliation EITHER way is stupid, naive or blindly partisan. It's just that over the last five years the Reps have all the power and influence and are therefore much more likely to be caught abusing/whoring the same. For non-political scandals the fact that there are more Reps than Dems in office right now makes the same conclusion likely there too.

 

[ArmedBear]

None of that matters a whit, dmallind.

What matters is how voters who are not already committed to their party perceive it. And polls, for what they're worth, indicate that the vast majority of people see this stuff as reflecting negatively on American politicians of both parties.

And no Republican Congressman hit a DC cop lately then tried to play the race card, or drove drunk and hit a car, then claimed he was "going to vote", and later that he was addicted to prescription drugs and didn't remember that he'd spent the night in a bar (at least according to the people in that bar).

This is an issue that could drive anti-incumbent voting, but not one that can be effectively used by either party.

I'm only listing Democrat scumbags because you are claiming that this reflects negatively on the Republicans in the final analysis.

I say that it's not going to convert any Republicans to Democrats, plain and simple, and that the independent voters aren't gullible enough to believe that it is so much a partisan issue as a widespread DC epidemic. And campaign managers had best recognize this if they plan to win.

Clinton-administration shenanigans did not kill Al Gore. The guy has no real merit, but won the popular vote. If he were electable, he'd have easily won. By the same token, I don't think that Bush-administration scandals, or a few people caught taking bribes, will kill the Republicans. They can kill themselves, to be sure, and they might. But in this climate of extremist political positions, especially on left, the best that the Democrats can hope for is that Republicans stay home in November. There's no indication that many Republicans would consider any Democrat to be a good alternative to the GOP candidate; letting the Dems win to punish the GOP would be the farthest they might go.

People are cynical; I figure that cynicism is realism in this case.

 

[Lobotomy Boy]

I don't even want to make the claim that Reps are inherently more scummy than Dems. I suspect that they are probably pretty equal. Anybody who thinks morality can be measured by political affiliation EITHER way is stupid, naive or blindly partisan. It's just that over the last five years the Reps have all the power and influence and are therefore much more likely to be caught abusing/whoring the same. For non-political scandals the fact that there are more Reps than Dems in office right now makes the same conclusion likely there too.

Exactly. All the scandal will hurt the Democrats some, but because of the preponderance of Republicans involved in these scandals they will hurt the Republicans a lot. Add to that the fact that some of these scandals involve sexual impropriety, it looks doubly bad for the Republicans, since they claimed the moral high ground on this subject when they prosecuted Clinton. Nothing sits worse in the guts of the average American than blatant hypocrisy of that sort. Sure, they are all con artists and whoremongers and hypocrites, but the way things are turning out the Democrats look like snakes and the Republicans look like creatures so low they can slip under the snakes' bellies.

It wasn't long ago that I thought the Democrats just being Democrats might be enough to preserve Republican rule of Congress. Right now if I had to bet money, I'd bet they will lose control of both houses. That may well be followed by immediate impeachment of the president and vice president, so whoever the Dems select as speaker may end up being our next president.

Good lord. President Pelosi. Time to grab the guns and head out to the woods.

 

[dmallind]

I disagree though Armed Bear. Remember that Reps made a BIG deal out of being the moral upstanding party who would restore dignity to the White House and so on. A lot of their partisans who may be less cynical than you or I believed them. Recent scandals have been heavily tilted towards Reps and tehre's no sign that the indictments and rumors will slow down.

What that does is it turns off the people who voted Republican on the morals issue (which if you recall played out pretty big in 04). It might make some of them vote Dem. It might make some of that not vote at all. It might make some not donate or whatever but it IS NOW hurting and WILL hurt the Reps no doubt about it. Look at current polls on whether the electorate would prefer a Dem or Rep Congress? I don't think that's coming about because of the minutiae of tax policy - it's coming about because of the general malaise and distrust about the current administrations, which is driven in no small part by never ending stories of abuse of power, cronyism and corruption.

The Dems don't even have to be all that less tainted (though they certainly are in recent events) - they just have to be the alternative.

 

[cookekdjr]

Republicans can win the same way they always do: gay bashing and religious fundamentalism. It has worked and it will work.
Bush won easily in 2004 despite mis-handling two wars and lowering wages for five straight years for 80% of Americans. How did he win anyway?
Every swing state had a Constitutional Amendment about gay marriage. Even though we are at war, the #1 issue of exit-polled voters was:
Family Values.
This year, many states will have some chicken-sh%# amendment on the ballot about teaching the bible in public schools or creationism or some such nonesense. Tax-exempt but wealthy PACs (aka "churches") will get out the vote to save all persecuted Christians everywhere (or at least all persecuted Republicans who claim to be Christians).
It has worked. It will worked. Don't worry...its all a part of God's plan.
-David

Edited to add: No, I am not a Christian-basher....I take my kids to church twice a week, actually.

 

[dmallind]

I am not so sure on both counts Lob. Boy.

While Reps will be hurt for sure, recent gerrymandering has made many seats very safe that nothing short of live pedophilia on election eve could shift. I am sure the Reps will lose seats, but I don't think it will be a landslide equal to the poll numbers (49-32 IIRC for control of Congress). The popular vote may look like that, but a lot of it will be Dem seats going from 52-48 to 62-38 and Rep seats going from 68-32 to 52-48, staying in the same hands in both cases.

Plus impeachment? Nah Dems don't have the balls or the political unity to do that. DU will slavver over it. A few wild-eyed idealists will even try to get a vote on it, but no way to the majority vote for it, not unless something really bad comes out - if the current NSA spying scandal comes out to actually be wholesale eavesdropping on anyone not a registered Republican for example. While I don't think that's impossible, I don't think it's likely either. The elected Dems are too timid and compromise-minded. Reps definitely do a better job of the hardball stuff, which like many things is both good and bad for them. Dems will spend too much time arguing over meaningless crap to impeach. Dems are good at grifdlock, which right now is the best I can hope for.

EDIT - sadly, cookedjr has a very strong point. I just hope the malaise and discontent in the Rep ranks at this time causes enough of them just to vote on the amendments etc and leave the other ballots blank.