The Conservative Party

It was 1980, and as my friends and I approached voting age, we started asking each other how we were going to use our vote. Democrat? Republican? A few Libertarians... At that age, I was too cool to be a “joiner”, each designated party felt like a millstone around my neck. I knew I didn't like Carter, and Reagan was a little known commodity at the time. My youthful experience of Republicans was Nixon and Ford, not exactly inspirational.

So I studied the third parties, the Peace and Freedom Party had a great name, but I quickly discovered they were die hard Socialists. Even in my teens, I knew that Socialism wasn't the answer. The Libertarian party was at least interesting, I certainly agreed with the limited government principal, but
legalization of all drugs and prostitution seemed to take a good idea too far. I also disagreed with the Libertarian's isolationist doctrine.

The John Birch Society seemed to think that everyone was a communist, including many former presidents. I agreed with their anti-Communist stance, but these guys made Eugene Mc Carthy look like a flaming liberal. Barry Commoner of the Citizen's party claimed that you could put the difference
between Republicans and Democrats in a thimble. This sounded good until Commoner revealed himself as a Socialist who wanted to nationalize the oil companies. So I ended up reluctantly signing on as a Republican.



The GOP served as a happy home for me for a few decades, but after watching the three Republicans of my relatively short lifetime, I'm beginning to wonder if there is a conservative party. This is a shame because there is dire need and desire for one. It's no coincidence that the most popular president of our
time is also the most conservative. Reagan transformed the Republican party that had been a minority party in congress since the Eisenhower administration. Newt Gingrich unified the conservative vote with the Contract with America, gained control of both the House and the Senate. Once again, a strong leader moved Republicans forward with conservative ideals and then following through with them. To be a conservative first and a Republican second is not just the right thing to do, it's a politically sound decision as well.

To further prove my point, what happens when the GOP tries to please liberals? Did Bush Sr gain any left wing friends by recanting his “read my lips” pledge? Did “W” win any friends with his liberal attitude towards border security? Of course not, the left will never vote Republican or even praise a Republican on a individual issue. The economy is running smoothly but you'll never hear that from a Democrat. Bush sent boatloads of Yankee dollars to Africa to help the AIDS epidemic there, where's the gushing accolades from the gay community?

Conservatives win by being conservative. Liberals win by pretending to be moderate. Two weeks after Clinton's first term, he recanted the middle class tax cut promise that helped him get elected. In '94, the Dems lost congress, Clinton announced “the era of big government is over”, followed through with welfare reform and was rewarded with reelection in '96. Once again political savy leans to the right.

If Bush can learn from Harriet Miers, Dubai, and the border issue, the GOP can stay in power for the forseeable future. While the Dems seem content to wallow in the left-most wing of Micheal Mooreland, it's time to paint the map red.