This has me outraged. Jeb Bush, GOP: Time to leave Reagan behind.
Conservatism, true big-C Conservatism works every time it is tried. But what is Conservatism? It is more than just positions on a couple of issues. It is a way of life.
First of all, it’s the ability to stand firm on your own principles, no matter which way the public opinion polls go. You look deep inside yourself, find what is important to you, then you articulate them and you stick to them, come hell or high water. That and that alone will most likely get you a win in whatever election you are in.
But you have to know yourself, and a lot of people don’t know who they really are anymore. For most people today, their opinion on just about any subject is defined by the Liberal media’s 5 second sound bite. The people parrot what sounds good to them. And I’ve told you the difference between good, sound ideas and ideas that sound good.
Ronald Reagan, the Great Communicator did just that. He stood up for what he believed in, stuck to his guns and won in two landslide elections. And the Republicans of today want to leave that behind. Why? I honestly don’t know.
I hated W’s remark, “compassionate conservatism.” This is to imply that Conservatism is not compassionate, when in fact Conservatism defines compassion. The difference is Liberal compassion is enabling, while Conservative compassion is tough love.
Liberal’s enabling compassion helps the individual in the short term by giving them what they want or need. It hurts them in the long run however, because the individual becomes dependent, even needy to whoever is helping them and never learns to do for their own. In fact, they become down right greedy. After being supplied what they need, they get tired of just a bare-bones existence and begin to make demands on the giver to give more, so the receiver can have the finer things of life, without regard to those who are doing the giving.
Conservative tough love compassion builds character. It teaches the simple premise, “No work, no food.” Conservatives would not actually let you starve, but I’ll bet if you’re hungry enough you’ll get up off your bottom and find a job. It may not be the multi-million dollar CEO job everybody wants to have, but if you work hard enough, it will pay the rent, utilities and food. Then you get another job that pays better, and a third job that pays better than that, and so on until you are making enough money to enjoy life. Character is self-respect. When you get to the top of the mountain, you can say “I worked hard and made it here on my own achievements. Friends helped me, but I did the work myself. Nothing was handed to me.”
Everything else Conservative feeds off the fact that you are in control of and responsible for your own future. No one else has your self-interests at heart and therefore no one will do your work for you.
Now that we’ve defined basic Conservatism, let’s expand a bit. Here is where the word “Freedom” is introduced. But what exactly is this word, “Freedom?” In the Anarchist definition freedom is the ability to do whatever you want, when you want to do it. Conservatives define it as the responsibility to do what you want within reason. Your freedom to swing your arm, the old saying goes, stops at my nose. Freedom is a responsibility, for if we do not take care of it, it will be taken away from us. And it will, and is, being taken away from us, bit by bit. If you listen to AM radio, I’m sure you’ve heard the commercial where they talk about old and outdated laws still on the books in some states. Like the one, “It is against the law to cross a state line with a duck on your head.” I don’t know why you would want to do such a thing, but just because a group of lawmakers made the decision that people shouldn’t do that made the action against the law. Just because there is a law against something does not automatically make it bad. “The best government governs the least” or something like that.
Now let’s take a look at some political positions. Again, you have arrived at your own positions by examining your own character, so your position may not agree with mine. In fact, I am sure you will not agree 100% with me, simply because we are not the same person.
Abortion. Pro-Life, or Pro-Choice? Well, this one seems pretty simple on the surface. After all, your mother was pro-life about you, wasn’t she? I can understand that there are reasons for abortion. Life of the mother and all that. But it crosses my line when women use it for retroactive birth control. If you don’t want kids, don’t have sex. I can guarantee abstinence is a 100% foolproof birth control. It works every time it is tried. Everything else is 99% or less.
Free Speech. Again, a pretty simple concept. Short of telling lies (e.g. shouting “FIRE!” in a crowed theater), there should be little, if any restrictions. It’s funny how Liberals welcome “diversity of opinion” but shout down and call anything “hate-speech” that doesn’t agree with them. You can go all skinhead and proclaim your love of Hitler and I can understand that. While I won’t stop you, my freedom of speech in return is to laugh at you.
Firearms. Most people have the Second Amendment (Or RKBA, the “Right to Keep and Bear Arms”) backward. It’s not a law telling the people that they have the right, it’s the Constitution telling the Federal government that they shall pass no law restricting ownership. There are common sense restrictions, like children, felons and people with a mental health history. But beyond that, there should not be too much, if any at all. Banning a weapon because it has a bayonet lug, a pistol grip, a detachable magazine, or worse yet, ALL THREE is extraordinarily stupid. Oh, wait, that’s right! California wants to ban black painted cars because they are hotter inside, and require more fuel to power the air conditioner, thereby increasing the cars “carbon footprint.” That is the same reasoning, and just as stupid. If this makes sense to you, check your thinking.
Debt. Article I Section 8 of the Constitution says, “To borrow money on the credit of the United States;” and was meant for temporary measures, and to be paid back as quickly as possible. It was not meant to spend trillions of dollars that we won’t have. It would be very difficult to cut programs, I admit this, but sometimes amputation is necessary to save the patient. Right now about 15% of the total budget of the United States goes toward paying the interest on the debt. Nothing on actually paying off the debt itself. And we’re likely having to borrow to pay the interest right now. Over half of the budget right now is “transfer payments,” which includes Social Security, food subsidies, Welfare and every other social program on the books. Let’s cut spending and raise more money by cutting taxes (See below) and paying this debt off.
Size of Government. The Federal government has become a bloated leech, sucking on the blood of the American people. The simple cure for that is to cut spending. The answer is more complex than that I realize, but when a cut is considered a cut in growth (“Our budget is only going to grow 12% instead of 15% this year”) then there is a lot of room to cut.
Social Security. This has long been considered the “third rail” of politics, i.e. touch it and your career is over. Someone better do something about it, because it’s going to get all of us soon. Social Security is nothing but a giant Ponzi scheme. It is getting ready collapse under its own weight. When it started, there were 7 workers for every recipient, now there is about two. All of the surpluses from the system have been tossed into the general Federal fund for years, and unless something drastic soon, Social Security could collapse the whole system. W tried to include everybody in the Federal Retirement Account, which every Federal employee already contributes to, but the Democrats excoriated him over it. So it will collapse and I will never see a penny of all of the money I put into the system.
Taxes. It is a mathematical proof that when you raise taxes, you get a short term increase in income, followed by less than if you had done nothing (e.g. Smoking. You increase taxes on tobacco, money goes up, then down lower as less people smoke). However, it is also a fact proven circumstance if you cut taxes, revenue jumps past all expectations. Kennedy, Reagan and W all proved it.
Immigration. Punish those who hire “undocumented” immigrants, instead letting them complain to their Congressman and have ICE stop the raids and not deport the immigrants. If there are no jobs here for them, if we do not recognize “anchor babies,” if they are denied public assistance they have no reason to come.
Wrapup. Like I said, you probably won’t agree 100% with me, and I would be surprised if you did. But someone has to take a stand, clearly voice their beliefs, and most of all stick to them.
