As I’ve said before, I don’t consider myself a conservative. I describe myself as a “militant moderate.” Last November, I split my vote between two Democrats and two Republicans (President, Senate, House, Governor). Until last December, I was a registered Democrat (albeit accidentally — long story), and now I’m an independent.
I’ve also frequently spoken about my fears and loathings of a one-party system. I’ve repeatedly pointed out just how screwed up Massachusetts is, being utterly under the thrall of the Democratic machine. And I remember some times here in New Hampshire, when the Republicans were dominant. (Although never to the extreme as Massachusetts Democrats, and things never got so bad). With that in mind, I offer this advice to Democrats.
1) Back away from the hatred of Bush. If your strategy for victory is to convince a significant portion of the electorate that the man who won 52% of the vote is the source of all evil in the world, you have a hell of a struggle. People who vote for a candidate feel an “investment” in that candidate, and are naturally resistant to changing their opinions. It’s damned near insurmountable, so find a new tune.
2) Remember your name. You are DEMOCRATS, and currently two nations that were once brutal dictatorships and major supporters of terrorism are now burgeoning DEMOCRACIES, and millions of people are enjoying their first taste of freedom — thanks to America. Get past your loathing of the man who led it, and embrace this tremendous achievement. Remember, history is watching — will it record these achievements as happening with you, or despite you.
3) Find something to stand FOR, and stop focusing on things you stand AGAINST. Look at some recent elections. In 1992, one candidate had clear plans and ideas, and he was elected. (I personally disagreed with those ideas, but the point remains.) In 1996, Clinton took on another Republican who couldn’t spell out any clear message, and won again. 2000 was pretty much a wash — neither Bush nor Gore had very clear messages. And in 2004, Bush ran for a continuance of what he had achieved in the last 4 years, while Kerry… well… Kerry couldn’t master a single message or position for a very long.
Right now, the Republicans hold the White House and both houses, albeit with slender majorities. If the Democrats continue on their current course, those majorities can only increase. Carried to the logical conclusion, the Democrats will end up marginalizing themselves right out of existence.
And as much as I think the current leadership deserves it, the rest of us don’t deserve the consequences.
J.
s9, you are out of your flipping mind. I am a bald faced-liar huh? I included a link above where you most definitely described the U.S. Armed Forces as a murdering, torturing, terroristic regime. Here is the link again,
http://wizbangblog.com/archives/005017.php#048602
And I will take pity on you and paste the specific quote as well since you neither remember ridiculous statements you make, nor know how to use a link to get to them.
s9— “And, wouldn’t it be nice if America had not removed a murdering, torturing, terroristic regime and replaced it with one that wears an American uniform while it murders, tortures and terrorizes Iraqis? That would have been so nice, but alas— THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED, wasn’t it?”
Sounds to me like s9 is calling the U.S. Army a murdering, torturing, terrorizing regime now doesn’t it. Boy, he even accentuates his belief by saying THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED. Get your facts straight before you accuse someone of being a liar, especailly when the facts are your own personal quotes.
You know, s9, PIMF is a good acronym to know. Or was it a Freudian slip of some sort when you call me “Paul”?
If you’ve been paying attention, you noticed that I haven’t called the President a moron or a chimp either. Did I get all huffy about you “putting words in my mouth” or anybody else’s mouth? No.
I didn’t attribute them to you and listed them as examples that might imply one hates a particular person instead of his policies. Oddly enough, your entire diatribe response to me does sound rather huffy, or deranged. In it, you went ballistic and started ranting about quite a few things including pretending I was getting all fainty in response to insults against the current President. Do try another dodge attempt, little one.
That paragraph above is directed at “you” in the singular sense, btw.
Where is that concern all the rest of the time, when folks like Paul come out and openly use eliminationist rhetoric to describe liberals as traitors?
Ah good. In addition to “but MOM they do it too” you go to “but MOM, what about what he did”. Typical. I guess your objection is that I’m not your mother. Oops, did I just put words in your mouth? You may now get huffy. Again.
Oh well. Please keep doing what you do, just please don’t have the audacity to whine when you keep losing elections.
D-Hoggs: He’s certainly angry, at the least. Projecting most definitely. My initial comment could be seen as sarcasm, but lo and behold s9 reads an amazing multi-paragraph-length spectrum of huffiness and faintheartedness into the whole thing. Methinks he’s reading quite a bit of himself into it.
Allow me to point out that s9 has ONCE AGAIN conveniently excused himself from producing these reports in which the Pentagon CONFIRMS that the US military tortures, murders and terrrorizes.
Patrick, me thinks you are absolutely correct.
Specific quote from S9 on the link D-Hoggs provided:
“And, wouldn’t it be nice if America had not removed a murdering, torturing, terroristic regime and replaced it with one that wears an American uniform while it murders, tortures and terrorizes Iraqis? That would have been so nice, but alas— THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED, wasn’t it?”
(…it’s towards the bottom of the quote, but read the entire comment since it reveals much of the world s9 lives in.)
Wow, this is like Usenet after DejaNews came out. Go on, s9. Shriek away.
….twould be helpful if I’d noticed D-Hoggs provided the quote in question. Oops. Oh well, my comment about Usenet and DejaNews is still valid. 😉
Yeah, I posted that again a few posts up, apparently s9 blacks out during his moon-bat rants and can’t remember what he says…then accuses others of lying. Thanks for checking into it Patrick.
….I also noticed that on this thread and others, *s9* is the one who brings up “treason” and “unpatriotic”, and claims that is what the icky pooper people who disagree with him are saying. Even if they didn’t actually say or write anything like that.
Hm. Something I’ve seen before. Point out flaws in some people’s opposition to Iraq, etc. and get things like: “Don’t question my patriotism!” “I support the troops!” in response.
I would trace the Freedom-Forward Republican agenda all the way back to Barry Goldwater
That torch has been carried by John F Kennedy, and Reagan picked it up when the JFK Democrats vanishied.
Yes Newt deserves credit too.
One cannot Ignore the effects of leaders carrying such a torch, in that its shared much more brightly among the grass roots, to the extent that future leaders will benifit when they hold it up.
Really smart for Bush to embrace that theme, because the support and enthusiasm for Freedom is already out here among us.
Amazing that a Moonbat would mention mass murder, something wholly belonging to thugish CommuNazi’s that called themselves socialists
If you want to find mass graves, you have to look at places ruled or once ruled by those calling themselves socialists.
Baath Socialist, National Socialist, Soviet Socialist, the Red Khimer Socialists
Socialists even murdered by death quotas.
(USSR, Veitmin)
Murders by Socialists
Soviet Union,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,1917-1987,,,,,,,,61,911,000
Communist China,,,,,,,,,1949-1987,,,,,,,,35,236,000
Nazi Germany,,,,,,,,,,,,,,1933-1945,,,,,,,,20,946,000
Cambodia,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,1975-1979,,,,,,,,,,2,035,000
Vietnam,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,1945-1987,,,,,,,,,,1,678,000
North Korea,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,1948-1987,,,,,,,,,,1,663,000
Poland…………………….1945-1948,,,,,,,,,,,1,585,000
Yugoslavia (Tito)………..1944-1987,,,,,,,,,,1,072,000
Mass murder and leftism go together.
Leftism is the opposite of freedom
Brad listed
. .2.) Ends do not justify means. Democracy could have been achieved at a lower cost than what has been paid, in $ and lives and limbs.
Thats stupid if you have no alternate means to the same ends. “could have” isnt a plan, just like “I Have a Plan” isnt a plan.
. .3.) Democrats stand for human rights, universal health care,
Socialised medicine is anti freedom,
. .reproductive freedom,
Killing babies is a weird way of looking at freedom
. .separation of church and state,
Thats been America since its founding, but the leftist attacks on freedom of religion is what we see you doing, both are in there and you use one to deny the other, this is a perversion of our freedom
. . the rights of all citizens to be treated equally under the law regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation,
Kool, but the Democrats advocacy of special rights grants violate that. so what you offer is a fraud.
. . Social Security, and a living wage
Communism Socialism, dont work, well except for leftist terror states where a person has the rights of a cow.
. .4.) Democrats have been losing because they aren’t listening to advice from their base but rather from outsiders who do not share our interests. Did the Republicans ask the Democrats what they needed to do in 1965?
Did they need to? or did they just need to pay attention, and formulate an agenda, like the Freedom-Forward agneda, that we used to go on the offensive.
As long as the democrats sleep with marxists, are forced to share the venue and political agenda with the blood stained religion of 100+ Million murders, untill the leftist socialist blood stained totalitarian taint has been washed from their ranks, I dont think anything is in front of them but the ever steeper downward slope into the abys.
One difference between the current president and Reagan and others is that this president actually wants to promote democracy. In the past we had more of a “it doesn’t matter who is in charge as long as they aren’t communist” attitude, which led to the propping up of some dictators/leaders that weren’t so great in the human rights department either.
History shows that the people who are most protected from their government are people who live in democracies. It isn’t enough to just be opposed to communism, but to promote democracy, and that is one thing Bush seems to make clear.
D-Hoggs writes: Sounds to me like s9 is calling the U.S. Army a murdering, torturing, terrorizing regime now doesn’t it.
Actually, it doesn’t sound like that, because that’s not what I did. Nice try, but you should try not to jump to conclusions based on your ill-founded prejudices of me.
The U.S. Army was never the regime in Iraq for very long at all, and I see no evidence that any murder, torture or terrorization took place while it was the regime. That was a very brief period of time between the de facto abdication of Saddam Hussein and the establishment of the Coalition Provisional Authority. The U.S. Armed Forces are and have been called upon to project power and deploy force on behalf of the various regimes that have held power in Iraq since the fall of Hussein. My criticisms have always been directed at the regimes— not the troops that use military force on behalf of the regimes and do so under the procedures and rules of engagement set by those regimes.
It’s interesting to note that you have no real dispute with the basic facts behind my argument: that American military forces have been found to be murdering, torturing and terrorizing Iraqi civilians. You simply wish to place the blame for this activity on “a few genuine bad apples” among the troops and give the regimes that sponsored it a complete pass. I would be willing to accept that as a legitimate response if 1) the U.S. were not actively resisting any effort to hold it responsible for failing to prevent the murder, torture and terrorization of Iraqi civilians, and 2) the reports of murder, torture and terror were to start tapering off noticeably as a result of efforts on our part to prevent it.
I suppose it never occured to you that my principle complaint about the way these regimes have been ordering the U.S. Armed Forces to do their business has been driven largely by a concern for the integrity of the forces rather that out of the more secondary concern for the rights of Iraqi civilians. No, that would never have occured to you.
That’s because you’re a fool.
This
s9 [February 23, 2005 05:11 PM] – …That [few bad apples excuse for abuse] would be a lot more plausible if the United States were not actively trying to defend its refusal to take even minimal steps to comply with the requirements Convention Against Torture to prevent the abuse and torture of prisoners. [emphasis ADriveler and calling this entire statement hogwash]
preceded this
s9 [February 23, 2005 05:11 PM] – The fact remains. U.S. military personnel have been found to be murdering, torturing and terrorizing people, and the Pentagon continues to refuse to take any effective measures to prevent such crimes from happening in the future. [more hogwash]
which was repeated
s9 [(via D-Hoggs’ reference to s9 on another thread) at February 23, 2005 05:26 PM] — And, wouldn’t it be nice if America had not removed a murdering, torturing, terroristic regime and replaced it with one that wears an American uniform while it murders, tortures and terrorizes Iraqis? That would have been so nice, but alas— THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED, wasn’t it?
which was criticized for its unfounded insinuation and was subsequently followed by
s9 [February 24, 2005 08:54 PM] – The U.S. Army was never the regime in Iraq for very long at all, and I see no evidence that any murder, torture or terrorization took place while it was the regime.
I think I’ve just witnessed the splitting of the world’s finest hair or just a futile attempt to backtrack. Throughout, s9, you have implied that the U.S. military as policy utilizes murdering, torturing, and terrorism without any direct support except to say that the press has provided such reports and that the documented evidence by the military is likely priveledged and unavailable. You back this contention by saying that the Pentagon’s non-denial of such documented events or policy is evidence. You have accused the “United States”, “U.S. military personnel”, the “Pentagon”, and “America” of varying levels of complicity in “murdering, torturing, [and] terror[ism]” as policy without a shred of proof and then tried to say that you saw “no evidence that any murder, torture or terrorization took place while it [U.S. Army] was the regime” when challenged.
Would you please retract your scurillous charge or elucidate more clearly your position in view of these inconsistencies? I don’t know if you know if you are coming or going here. Maybe it’s just me but I’m not following your logic or backtracking.
s9, my “ill-founded prejudice” of you is that you are an ABSOLUTE MORON.
ONCE AGAIN, I will quote myself… “Sounds to me like s9 is calling the U.S. Army a murdering, torturing, terrorizing regime now doesn’t it.”
To which you reply…”Actually, it doesn’t sound like that, because that’s not what I did. Nice try, but you should try not to jump to conclusions…”
Right after you say that, you make this baffling statement…”It’s interesting to note that you have no real dispute with the basic facts behind my argument: that American military forces have been found to be murdering, torturing and terrorizing Iraqi civilians.”
What in the HELL is the matter with you?!?! You blatantly say that your argument is that American military forces have been found to be murdering, torturing and terrorizing Iraqi civilians. Not to mention I have blatantly called bulls#*t on your claim, contrary to what you say of me.
Previously you stated… “wouldn’t it be nice if America had not removed a murdering, torturing, terroristic regime and replaced it with one that wears an American uniform while it murders, tortures and terrorizes Iraqis? That would have been so nice, but alas— THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED, wasn’t it?” Right before calling me a liar because I QUOTED you as saying exactly that.
You have your head so far up your ass.