The one way street: “conservatives better play nice.”

By: Erick Erickson (Diary) | November 1st, 2009 at 04:55 PM |

RESIZE: AAA

We hear this all time — conservatives in the GOP have to play nice with the moderates.

We never hear the other, that moderates should play nice with conservatives. Why is that? Consider the facts:

In Michigan’s 7th Congressional District, conservative Tim Walberg challenged the very liberal Joe Schwartz in the 2006 Republican Primary and won. Walberg went on to win the general election.

In 2008, Schwartz endorsed Democrat Mark Schauer and Shauer used that endorsement to squeak out a win in this +2 Republican District.

In Maryland 1, conservative physician and state senator Andy Harris ran in the Republican Primary against Wayne Gilchrist. Harris defeated Gilchrist only to see Gilchrist throw his support to Democrat Frank Kratovil, who won with 49.12% of the vote.

In Arizona 5, conservative David Schweikert won the Republican nomination, but then lost to liberal Democrat Harry Mitchell. Why? Schweikert’s primary opponent refused to help him and sat on his hands rather than help Schweikert pick up his opponent’s primary support.

In Alabama 2, Jay Love beat Harri Anne Smith in the Republican Primary and ran against Bobby Bright in an R +16 district. Smith endorsed the Democrat and Bright went on to win 50.23% of the vote.

In New York 23, the liberal Dede Scozzafava drops out and instead of supporting the guy the GOP crawls on bended knee to, she endorses the Democrat.

All the time we hear “conservatives can’t win the general” and “conservatives should play nice with moderates.” The record shows that the moderates cannot take losing and conservatives don’t win the general because the moderate GOP stabs them in the back.

If we are a team, it can’t just be the conservative players in trouble for not passing the ball.

Tags: Conservatism, NRCC

COMMENTS

POSTING RULES | LOGIN TO COMMENT | REGISTER TODAY

http://hillbillypolitics.com Steph C

This is what always happens and exactly why the TEA parties and grassroots have come alive. We are being dictated to by both parties, called names, and treated like nothing more than servants to their will. We step out of line and we’re eviscerated.

I don’t believe they’ll be able to stop Hoffman as they’ve stopped many a conservative before. The squishes and the radical liberals woke the sleeping giant that resides in the center right’ and the center left if the truth be known.

They can call us names and continue trying to marginalize us with their words but it’s not going to work. The slings and arrows have ceased having the intended effect and is more solidifying the grassroots’ resolve that this will not stand anymore.
http://fairfaxgardener.blogspot.com ddstrain

Someone for outside the Party hierarchy. Someone not tainted by the country club schmoozing with liberals. Someone who does not have “higher office” as their sole motivating factor in running for office. I’m tired on professional politicians. Oddlly that’s the exact description of 95% of Democrat pols and 90% of GOP pols.

We’ve lost the citizen legislature concept and are stuck with an American version of aristocracy of hereditary entitlement (how may Kennedys are in office somewhere) and profesional party apparatchiks.

Most of the appeal of Sarah Palin to the grassroots (and threat to the apparatchiks) is that she is from outside. Unfortunately right now she has far too much baggage attached to her courtesy the neo-prog media and GOP pro-pols.

The right person carrying the flag, will have an ARMY behind them.
merryj1

Yesterday, at word that what’s-her-face dropped out of the 23rd and was “releasing her supporters,” I thought and said “she did the right thing” and we should drop the name-calling. Well,I stand corrected.

What a scuz! How much did the RNCC spend on her? $900,000? Serves ‘em right.

You’re right, EricK. I say, “No more Mister Nice Guy.”
merryj1

Yesterday, at word that what’s-her-face dropped out of the 23rd and was “releasing her supporters,” I thought and said “she did the right thing” and we should drop the name-calling. Well,I stand corrected.

What a scuz! How much did the RNCC spend on her? $900,000? Serves ‘em right.

You’re right, EricK. I say, “No more Mister Nice Guy.”
nelsa

When Dede endorsed the democrat in the race she did two important things.

She made Newt look like and idiot and she totally PO’ed the base and moderate republicans.

That will fire up conservatives and republicans to punish her and they will vote for Hoffman just to spite her.
Oz

One who doesn’t apologize for being conservative but one who also doesn’t alienate every moderate (McDonnell is showing how to do this in Virginia).

I agree with the comment above about Palin having perhaps too much baggage.

I’m not happy with Huckabee, Newt, and Pawlenty on their previous big government solutions / pro-global-warming positions.

I like Romney although I know others don’t because of Romneycare.

So is there someone else?

The name I keep thinking of when I lay awake at night is Jindal.

Here’s hoping that someone stands up and leads.
eburke

for chronicling all of these betrayals by the moderates in the GOP who continually bray at the conservative wing of the party for wanting ‘purity’ when history shows that time and time again it is the conservatives who are much more likely to hold their noses and vote for the party than it is these mushy, my-way-or-the-highway moderates.

I still remember John Warner recruiting a 3rd party candidate just so Oliver North wouldn’t win the VA senate race. I mean, you can’t have those Neanderthal, knuckle-dragging war heroes serving in the patrician Senate, now, could you?

Anyway, I have printed this out for future reference for the next time one of my ‘moderate’ friends starts bagging on how ‘uncompromising’ conservatives are.
johnt

or childish hissy fits, ot total lack of principle. Just how in any sense of the word does a lump like Dede Scozzafava qualify for that label?
Straddlers, now that may be an improvement, not as accurate as cynical opportunist, or cowardly self-seeker, or habitual back stabber, but it will have to do.
As normal people who follow the trail of slime known as politics realize, you can’t have everything.

PS, Over at the Times Frank Rich is using the word “Stalinists”. I hope he didn’t use the word hate also.
udtiger

After the “Gang of 14″ saw fit to sacrifice a number of well qualified judicial nominees in the name of “bipartisan cooperation” and the party did not exact any “punishment” from those Republicans involved.

Despite this, I have continued to received e-mails and letter solicitations for money from the RNC, NRCC and NRSC. I have repeatedly told them I left the party (and why), to no avail. I will be sending them all a nice little note about their abyssmally stupid campaign “strategies” and I suspect that at that point, they will realize I am not in the party.

The last 3 years have made me wonder if the Reagan years, and the “revolution” of 1994, ever even happened.
Flagstaff

who should be offered the “choice” of joining the ranks of Independents.

Republicans can have differences among themselves, no problem. Endorsing a Democrat goes beyond a difference, it amounts to treason. Democrats would have had their right to be furious with Joe Lieberman for endorsing John McCain in 2008, had he not already left their party.

As you see, I make a distinction between endorsing a Democrat and endorsing an independent or a conservative.

This is not a call for ideological purity, but for common sense. You don’t continue to support a traitor.
Scope

You can say whatever else you wish against Palin, but, to say she has too much baggage from “the neo-prog media and/or the GOP pro-pols, is to argue against your own argument. She has weathered the media biased storm and isstill standing. Are we not saying that that is exactly the kind of thing that the Conservatives must stand up against, and vocally? Was that not exactly Erick’s point of the diary?
Scope

You can say whatever else you wish against Palin, but, to say she has too much baggage from “the neo-prog media and/or the GOP pro-pols, is to argue against your own argument. She has weathered the media biased storm and isstill standing. Are we not saying that that is exactly the kind of thing that the Conservatives must stand up against, and vocally? Was that not exactly Erick’s point of the diary?
redtillimdead

Lets go to work. Online phone-banking launched for Doug Hoffman
redtillimdead

Forgot to include the link
http://phonefordoug.com/login.php?return_url=/phone_banking/index.php
Scope

articles I have read today thanking Dede for “doing the right thing for the party.” I can’t wait for the Monday morning news cycles talking about her supporting the Democrat. I suspect that those that were so civil yesterday, will not be so civil tomorrow. Hey Newt, how’s that let’s support the Republican thing working out for you today?
Scope

and don’t forget what total incompetents she made the NRCC look like.
http://www.theprecinctproject.wordpress.com ColdWarrior

Really? Unless you were a voting member of the GOP, a precinct committeeman, you didn’t really “leave” anything. All you did was change your voter registration.

I hope you’ll change your mind and come into the Party and try to change it. With half the precinct committeeman slots “open” right now, conservatives could hijack the Party by filling up all those open seats. It’s a numbers game. Precinct committeeman vote in the leadership elections; registered voters don’t.

Become a “player” in the Party and help change it from within.

Go here to learn more:

www.theprecinctproject.wordpress.com

Thank you.
ColdWarrior
www.theprecinctproject.wordpress.com
libertymt

We never hear the other, that moderates should play nice with conservatives. Why is that?Because most people in this country are somewhere in the middle. Left on some issues, right on others. Desirous of attention to the real and substantial issues that effect them in their daily lives, and frustrated at overly ideological stances.

Moderates and independents are persuadable because of this. You can get their vote, or the other side can get their vote. It changes from one election to another, one decade to the next. Put simply- if we give up the moderates, the Democrats will get them.
nelsa

I posted this on an earlier post by Ercik today:

By the way George Will may know what a conservative looks like and he said on ?This Week? withGeorge Stephanopoulos today:
?ABSOLUTELY, HE [Marco Rubio] WILL WIN GOING AWAY.?

He also said that Independents are moving to the right in droves.

Here is a link to the video and also the text of Marco Rubio?s article in National review about the NY23 race and conservatism.

http://voterubio2010.blogspot.com/2009/11/george-will-rubio-will-win-2010-fl.html

You see it’s not that we are ANGRY voters. We are INFORMED voters. That is what the MSM does not want people to believe.
proudgop

I get some of you are angry but stay focused on victory on tuesday

what is done is done ( you can learn from it) but 24 hour quarter backing should be done on wednesday
Martin Knight

… the question is how? By watering down our principles and beliefs and appeasing and echoing the other side with windsocks held aloft? Or by holding fast to those principles and beliefs and using all the means at our disposal to convince them that our way is the right way?

So called “moderate” Republicans – much of the GOP’s Leadership apparatus believe the former is the way to go. The grassroots believe the latter.

And by way, simply based on the sum totality of her views, if Scozzafava would have been a comfortable fit in the House Progressive Caucus. Wearing R does not suddenly make a person with Left-Wing views on social, economic, fiscal and civic issues a “moderate.”
libertymt

When you reject any moderation, compromise, or deviation from the base as traitorous activity, you are not appealing to the persuadable.

The fact is, the ‘principled’ people in both party bases are not persuadable, it’s the mushy, non-ideological moderates that are. Our system only supports two parties, so whichever party is able to persuade those people is going to win. Simple as that.
http://andrightlyso.com/ civil_truth

…instead of pandering crook who try to buy us off with trinkets while they plunder our treasury, bending to the popular prejudice of the moment.

Our indepedents and persuadable moderate are sick of this retail bribery – they want someone whom they can respect. And you don’t gain respect by whoring. Which is why our party lost Congress in 2006 and did worse in 2008; they couldn’t see any difference between Republicans and Democrats on the integrity issue.
E Pluribus Unum

Arlen Specter, Linc Chafee, Jim Jeffords.

And the problem is, the actual conservative or center-right crowd has so many enablers.

Like John Cornyn, Pete Sessions, Lindsey Graham, Orrin Hatch, Trent Lott, Newt Gingrich, and most of the National Review types.

THOSE are the ones who need to be removed from leadership positions. They need their butts kicked and walking papers delivered.
Rod_Patrick
Rod_Patrick
bs

That’s a pretty piss-poor reason for her to not exert leadership. Screw the media. What she says is true. She has already had a HUGE impact on the health care debate and on the NY23 race. It is obvious that she is a force.

Now that doesn’t mean that we should be out there printing “Palin 2012″ bumper stickers. But she is definitely a mouthpiece for the conservative and GOP cause and she is effective.

And frankly, I don’t agree with your original assertion anyway. We’re doing fine with the variety of personalities we have right now. What we should be working at is developing the young GOP representatives and Senators who are the future of the conservative movement. They are out there. We don’t need just one.
http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

That’s enough.
Rod_Patrick

House Minority Leader John Boehner, though, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” that New York represents an “unusual circumstance” and that “we want moderates in our party.”

Ref:

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/11/01/democrats-scramble-prevent-gop-victories-key-local-races/

I’m sick of this “moderate” thing.
ciscoguy

They could, after all, legitimately call themselves “Jefferson” Democrats.
Achance

they vote in lockstep with San Fran Nan’s communists.
bs

…named Ulrickson who’s pretty good too.
mbecker908

You want to change the party, get involved.
http://spendenforcer.com/ vortigernpendragon

I agree with you Erick. Let’s MAKE them all listen to us regardless of what party they are in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LXojeOX69A
http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens
ZeusKingoftheGods

especiallly with both parts. But she also did something else. She made herself look like a moron who ran crying to Owens after conservatives picked on her.
skorrent1

What have you been smoking? The ongoing rightward shift has ten percent more self-identified conservatives (4 percentage points) than moderates, and twice as many as liberals. Admittedly, self identification can cover a wide spread of views, but we need attract only slightly more than one quarter of those who consider themselves “moderate” while the liberals need to get nearly all of them. The ongoing display of what the liberals do when in power should make that attraction easy.

We will never have a uniformity of views, but if there was ever a time to offer a clear “Choice, not an Echo” it is now.
The_Gadfly

I’ve been off the nets for the weekend (was staying with a friend who only has dial up) so hadn’t heard the breaking news about the traitor in NY until I logged into Redstate. I was doing some searching to see if the NRCC had released anything further since she threw her support to the Dem, which I could have told them she would. I found this article http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20091101/pl_politico/28975 which is mostly a rehash of things that have already been posted elsewhere on Redstate. Here’s the quote I find most telling:

Davis said the party was now confronted with what he termed ?a good problem to have.?

?We need to capture this lightning in a bottle,? he said of the conservative energy. ?They?re now the energy base of the party. But you can?t let them run the show or you?re going to lose all the independents.? (emphasis added)

Frankly, I don’t give a damn what logic you provide, when you automatically disenfranchise 50%+1 of your base, you risk ceasing to function in as a democratic institution. When that base exceeds 60%, you have left democracy way behind and are well into the realm of liberal fascism as we’ve been discussing in the booknotes section. I for one want ALL LIBERAL FASCISTS OUT OF OUR PARTY NOW! The whole point of our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution is precisely the point that we the people do run the show. We have chosen the form of representative government because we believe it best enables the largest number of us to engage in the pursuit of happiness. But quite frankly, if you elected idiots don’t stop frelling it up, we can do away with it. It will be messy and history says the odds of something better coming out of it on the other side are worse than the long shot at the local horse racing track, but if the catalog of abuses becomes sufficiently long and abhorrent, it will happen.

Okay, I’ll get off my soapbox now.
AceInTX

I’d forgotten that one…there are more such cases as well…but they escape me…I must be getting old…LOL
AHALgal

and we won’t know it until half the army would’ve already died.

A recent yet persistent thought of mine is that we’re not supposed to have a leader right now. We already have one – GOD. And frankly, our country – conservatives included – haven’t been too good to Him recently.

What if we leaned on Him more and stop looking for some man (or woman) to save our hides…
AceInTX
AceInTX

The problem we have is a bunch of unbelievers trying to sell a product they don’t believe in…or…they’re trying to give people who have no guiding ideology what they want…when they don’t know what hey want because they have no ideology…
AHALgal

So for the buddies of Newt (here to forth called BON-BONs), they went into hard damage control yesterday within 2 minutes of the Dede-drop announcement. The talking points were “let’s all thank Dede” and “unite now or be labeled a meanie.”

Then, today BON-BONs were silent after Dede endorsed Owens and essentially told Newt & Steele to shove it.

We don’t need to play nice, but we don’t need to be hateful either.

We need to be honest and hold them accountable for the $900,000 of our money they gave to Friend-of-ACORN Scozzafava. I would expect no less from my government and I will expect the same level of scrutiny of Steele/RNC and Sessions/NRCC on Wednesday morning.
AceInTX

the numbers for self identifying Republicans keeps dropping….how do you explain that without considering the possibilities that Conservatives are leaving the Republican Party behind and simply voting their conscience…I’ve got dozens of friends who vote Republican but have changed party registrations to independent because the party no longer represents them.
AceInTX

Pro 29:2
AceInTX
gator_hoo

But looking at how successful radical progressives have been in infiltrating the media, the universities, the schools, the bureaucracy, and now are making major inroads into the clergy, I would not be shocked to find out that there are progressives at high levels in the GOP as well.
gator_hoo

I have been trying to explain this to a number of conservative friends of mine. The indepenents and moderates are not attracted to someone who is unsettled on the issues – they are attracted to the candidates who can clearly say, “This is why my vision for America is better than theirs,” This “vote for me, and I will maintain the status quo.” strategy is a major loser.
gator_hoo

I have been trying to explain this to a number of conservative friends of mine. The indepenents and moderates are not attracted to someone who is unsettled on the issues – they are attracted to the candidates who can clearly say, “This is why my vision for America is better than theirs,” This “vote for me, and I will maintain the status quo.” strategy is a major loser.
http://cooperscopy.blogspot.com/ cooperscopy

There has always been this double standard, and I think it’s about conservatives began to play hardball with all concerned especially the squishy GOP bigwigs. You know the kind.The kind that selected Scozzafava as their standard bearer in th NY 23rd. Well. No more Mr. Nice guy for this conservative. It’s time to stand on principle and effect change, first in the republican party and then the nation as a whole….
blaze422

The Spending, Deficit & Debt Control Act of 2009

?This year?s explosion of spending and unprecedented deficits ? and unapologetic promises for more of the same ? has made clear that Washington is either uninterested in, or incapable of, responsibly managing our nation?s finances. Perhaps both. The time has come to require Congress ? by law ? to control its dangerous spending appetite.?

? Paul Ryan
http://www.house.gov/ryan/welcome.htm
http://www.house.gov/ryan/CCAGWearmarkpledge.htm

Disclosure: I have only a superficial knowledge of his positions, but apparently he has a conservative score around 93. Past speech write for Jack Kemp. Telegenic and articulate. Young.
The_Gadfly

They would be more in the sense of “useful idiot” than active subversion. Having been indoctrinated by the progressives, they truly believe things like “the extreme right and the extreme left eventually meet in tyranny.” They truly believe the job of politicians is to engage in sort of bargaining Art Chance described here: http://www.redstate.com/achance/2009/10/01/comrade-obama-hahvud-and-interest-based-bargaining/ and it’s a losing proposition for Republicans.
jasonmvass

loyalty to liberal dogma come before party. Its sad that for Newt Gingrich and the puppeteers at the NRCC don’t treat Conservatism the same way.
redpens

Did the Steelers play nice with the Cardinals in the Super Bowl? Will the moderates get their feelings hurt and take their ball and go home?
No country clubbers allowed!! They only lose elections.
dclamage

So what you’re really saying is that after the so-called moderate Republican loses, they show their true colors — Democrats in GOP clothing. RINO’s. Arlen Specter look-alikes.

The Conservative Republicans should be playing nice with Independents and Blue-Dog Democrats, so they can move forward with conservative policies and values. Everyone else gets the cold shoulder.
soljerblue

Palin is a conservative’s conservative, and she’s become much harder for her RINO and prog enemies to hit or get a handle on since she left the governor’s job and went on the road. She can pick her battles, throw her weight behind conservative candidates in promising races, and expand her base of support far beyond one state or one state’s party organization. Maybe Palin herself doesn’t know exactly what her next run for office will be, but she also leaves her opposition guessing — splitting its forces, trying to defend everywhere and doing a good job nowhere. This lady is dumb — yeah, like a fox.
realskinny

in Kansas. If a liberal Rep wins the primary, conservatives are supposed to support them. When a conservative wins a primary, the liberals vote for the Dem and publicly support them..

We must purge the anti-Americans from the party if the Reps are to be the vehicle to restore the Republic.
mikek369

Be your own. I started a blog as a counterpoint voice to our two daily liberal newspapers. I was in Washington DC on 9/12 and will probably drive back again this Wednesday night, 10.5-11 hours, to be at the Capital to hear Jon Voight, at michele Bachmans’s request. Then we can talk to our congresspeople, republicans and democrats alike.

I will run against Dick Lugar for sure and I voted to put him in two years ago. I might have to run against Mark Souder first depending on where he stands on issues and his commitment to stand up and be counted.

http://www.fortwaynevoiceoftruth.blogspot.com

People can rise within movements and within states and we can certainly come up with an agenda to ensure that our views are either represented or we have a candidate to fill the bill. I am an American Liberty Alliance member and I am one voice of WE THE PEOPLE.
independenttom

Fifty years ago in Georgia I proudly declared I was a “Conservative”. I am still a fiscal conservative, for small federal government, for free trade, and strong defense & immigration policies. Back then there were very few Republicans and there were very few liberals in Georgia or the South. Today the designation “Conservative” includes some additional people who really would prefer a “theocracy” and this scares many people away from being called a Conservative – including me. Perhaps we need a brand new name for people in the center left and center right which I believe are the majority of the country – too include Blue Dogs, moderate Republicans , many Libertarians, many Independents, Ron Pulistas, etc. Most of us are fed up with both the main parties , the earmarks and the corruption through lobbying and the tax code.
No one will ever get everything they want but we should go for those things most important to the existance of the nation and the economy. Whether you or I like it or not family values are already changed, abortions have been done for centuries and will go on for ever and gays will always be with us. While we’re talking names, we should begin referring to the libs as the “Socialist Democrats” to reflect their true Marxist position.
http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

It’s a free country. You can do your foolish third party stuff anyway you want.

But not on this website.

Ditto your slanderous ‘theocracy’ nonsense.
regent2009

the country that exported religious freedom is a “theocracy.” Defending America’s Judeo-Christian heritage does NOT equal religious intolerance.
eburke

either anymore. It’s why I’m so glad Erick chronicled all these for me and why I printed it out. The ol’ gray matter ain’t what it used to be.
eburke

NRCC/NRSC mantra of “Please vote for us because the other guys suck worse than we do.”

Now *that’s* a message to rally around.
memez

What does this refer to please?

RS

EDITOR OF REDSTATE

The one way street: “conservatives better play nice.”

COMMENTS

ALL

COMMENTS

POPULAR

#RSRH

PICK YOUR STATE & GET LOCAL