The Conservative Hand – Part 1

It has been thrilling to be part of the Tea Party movement, and see power move away from the political elite and back to the grass-roots. The sleeping giant has awakened and slowed the liberal freight train, but slowing the train isn’t enough. We must reverse its direction and set it on a conservative track. To do that we need more than protests and signs; we need a strategy to achieve conservative goals. This manifesto lays out a set of rules, procedures, and a new political structure that if implemented will do just that.

• We’ll look at how we got here and what hasn’t worked in the past, then make a commitment to stop doing those things (if you get nothing else from this book, please take away the idea that we must stop doing the things that don’t achieve our goals).
• Then we’ll create a new system—using some insights from economics and the free market system—that will achieve our political goals.
• Redefining ourselves and the other political players we interact with from our perspective will allow us to quit interacting with them based upon their definition of who they are, and start interacting with them based on our definition.
• We’re going to create a new political organization. Not a primary party (like the Republican Party) or an independent third-party (like the Reform Party). It will be located in between those two entities, being part primary party and part third-party—a second-party. This party will operate unlike any existing political organization.
• We’ll define a new standard for politicians: productivity. Rather than accept vague campaign promises, politicians will commit to accomplishing our goals.
• Borrowing some tools from the business world will enable us to create those goals and measure a politician’s productivity.
• We are going to formulate incentives for politicians that reward them for achieving our goals, and punish them for failing.
• Finally, we’re going to define a set of rules—something to guide us in our daily activities.

The result will be a new political framework that will allow us to achieve our political goal—enacting conservative legislation. Expect to hear frequent negative comments about this strategy (even from steadfast conservatives). After you’ve listened to their negative comments, listen to their solutions. Odds are they will just be rehashing the same old haven’t-worked-in-the-past ideas. It’s time we do something different—something that works.

Establishment Republicans and Republican politicians both jealously guard their positions and power. Sadly, many are anything but conservative. The term “Rockefeller Republican” is decades older than the term RINO (Republican in name only), but both stand for the same thing: a liberal leaning Republican. The current system—the Republican Party drifting to the left and no one closely examining their actions—works great for them. They aren’t going to be any happier with us than they are with the Tea Party movement.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I didn’t get involved in politics for fun, as a hobby, or because I have too much time on my hands. I became involved to achieve a set of goals—goals I know will create a better country for my family, children, and grandchildren. I’m sacrificing part of my life to achieve those goals. I don’t need good intentions or a strong effort from politicians, I need results. A politician that tries hard and fails needs to be replaced with a politician that tries hard and succeeds.

It’s time to unleash our conservative hand, leave our fingerprints on the political system, and put our country back on the right track.

I’m going to post the entire book to Red State one chapter at a time. This book was written as a “next step” for the tea party movement. The approach is different from what we’ve done in the past (“out of the box” would be a gross  understatement). But, given the recent election, the time is right for conservatives to  take a hard look at their past approach to politics and try some “out of the box” strategies.

For those that would like to read ahead, the entire book is available online at TheConservativeHand.com or in print form at Amazon.com (and yes, I am the author, so no copyrights are being violated by my posting the book here).

The Conservative Hand – Part 3