Mustard and Blue

Well, you would have to define conservatism. Are you a religious conservative? Are you a Constitutional conservative? These are two very different ideals.

worstfaceoffmanever wrote:

Joetimo wrote:
I would agree with you on that point. I think Conservatives need to revamp their image a little and go back to the small government side and stop doing the whole abortion and stem cell thing.

However, with the Bible Belt at the heart of the Republican constituency, the party is unlikely veer away from that platform for some time, and will continue to push that platform until the party collapses or something changes in the ideological landscape of the Southeast.

Disagree. If there was a time, NOW is the time. The Dems are falling backward from party infighting and middle America is PISSED at just about every politician. Why not introduce them to a small government, "we don't stand in your way" kind of Republican party? I guarantee the gains from moving now will be substantial in the future. The people are currently unhappy and frankly in duress. If the GOP leadership had the balls to do it, this the perfect opportunity. Now or never...

Joetimo wrote:
Disagree. If there was a time, NOW is the time. The Dems are falling backward from party infighting and middle America is PISSED at just about every politician. Why not introduce them to a small government, "we don't stand in your way" kind of Republican party? I guarantee the gains from moving now will be substantial in the future. The people are currently unhappy and frankly in duress. If the GOP leadership had the balls to do it, this the perfect opportunity. Now or never...

The Democrats have been infighting for quite a while, and it has yet to really do them in. The Republicans will not change until a new generation of politicians comes along (that would likely mean those of us in college right now) and forces that change, or until they lose their "home run" states (specifically, Texas, Tennessee, Georgia, and Kentucky).

You can call it cynicism if you like, but the current Republicans in Congress are more focused on retaining power than they are on the health of the party and a small minority of conservatives that believe there needs to be reform.

Again, watch what the liberals do to win elections. Racial and ethnic minorities, union members, government dependents and employees, religious leftists all magically underplay what divides them around election time. Rather, they rally around the Democratic Party with the knowledge that with only 20%+ of the population they must stick together and not step on each others toes.

Of course, as libertarian/conservatives we are generally more educated and temperamentally independant than the leftists so we are not as easily led. No matter. We simply have to get over our litmus tests and unite around the many things about which we agree and purge the Republican Party of as many centrists as we can by challenging them in primary after primary. No rest for the Republican moderates!!!!!

Some people are soooooo eyes wide shut and they are the ones screaming the loudest.

Oh, don't let me forget humble....definitely a quality not wasted on the righteous.

After Roe v Wade, abortion should have gone back to the legislatures for some serious debate and reasonable laws. Instead it became some untouchable third rail and magically gained the status of a "right". It is a medical procedure and limits should exist on its use. After 36 years of demagoguery by both sides, it's too late.

The fact that there are groups advocating that kids should be able to get an invasive procedure without parental notification or consent when those same kids can't even take a Tylenol for a headache at school without the parent's permission astounds me. It is an elective procedure for a very preventable condition and there is virtually no debate if tax dollars should pay for it.

Abortion fact .... 100% of those who support it weren't aborted. The sad thing is that one of my heroes was the governor who signed the Therapeutic Abortion Act into California law.

American democracy has morphed into a choice between A or B with very little when it comes to actual policy debate between the two. The smaller parties (Libertarian, Green, Socialist, All Night, Reform, etc) are nothing more than the Tucker to the Big Three like major parties. Every now and then a small party may have a better idea that one of the majors can co-opt, but sheer size and inertia keep the two major parties in place. To change it requires a constitutional amendment or two .... elimination of the Electoral College, requirements for a popular majority of votes cast, run offs, etc. When a "third" party starts to gain some momentum and garner a following in the voting booth it usually comes at the expense of one of the major parties and the other ends up winning with less than a majority of a splintered opponent. See Perot/Clinton/Bush.

That probably makes almost no sense. I'll re-read it after some sleep and fix it if needed.

It makes sense.

The UK has always had 3 main parties.

Conservative / Labour / Liberal Democrats.

The LibDems could do a lot of good but they are always running 3rd, and the downside is that they took a lot of votes from the Conservatives which allowed Labour into power with less than 50% of the country voting for them. So Labour wins but more than half the country voted for somebody else!
Proportional representation would help but that isn't the case.

101st wrote:After Roe v Wade, abortion should have gone back to the legislatures for some serious debate and reasonable laws. Instead it became some untouchable third rail and magically gained the status of a "right".

After Roe v. Wade there is no way that abortion could have "gone back to the legislature for some serious debate and reasonable laws" because the liberal majority of the U. S. Supreme conjured up the fact that laws against abortion were unconstitutional which made abortion a right protected under the U. S. Constitution. THAT'S IT, GAME OVER!!!

There are only two ways out after the American people stop electing liberals;

(1) there has to be a constitutional amendment preferably declaring that there is no "right of privacy" protected by the U. S. Constitution or at least declaring that laws against abortion do not violate the U. S. Constitution. Such an amendment needs to be proposed by a vote of two-thirds of the U. S. House and Senate and must be ratified by three-quarters of the state's legislatures or state conventions, OR

(2) a conservative U.S. President and a consevative majority in the U.S. Senate has to see to it that conservative justices are appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court until there is a conservative majority so that the indiocy of conjuring up "rights" under the U.S. Constitution stops and previous conjured rights like the "right" to an abortion is reversed.

So the only problem is the old and continuing problem, [i]viz.[i] THIS COUNTRY ELECTS TOO MANY LIBERALS.

ChasUK wrote:It makes sense.

The UK has always had 3 main parties.

Conservative / Labour / Liberal Democrats.

The LibDems could do a lot of good but they are always running 3rd, and the downside is that they took a lot of votes from the Conservatives which allowed Labour into power with less than 50% of the country voting for them. So Labour wins but more than half the country voted for somebody else!
Proportional representation would help but that isn't the case.

ChasUK am I not correct in thinking that on many issues the LiberalDemocrats take positions that are even further to the left than Labour? In addition, for those unfamiliar with UK politics, please do not harbor the notion that the UK Conservative Party ("Tories") is "conservative" in any red-blooded U.S. sense of the word. NOT ON YOUR LIFE! Ever since the super-wonderful Margret Thatcher left the scene (and before her too since Churchill) the Tories can best be thought of for U.S. oberservers as a party that roughly corresponds to the far left-wing of the U.S. Democratic Party.

So if there is any question of why Great Britain is not so Great anymore, its because the electorate is apparently content come election time with a choice between a moderate socialist party (Labour), a far left non-socialist party (Tories) and a third party that tries to wedge itself into the fray always attacking from the Left Wing position (LibDem).

Does that pretty well sum things up ChasUK?

"We, therefore, conclude that the right of personal privacy includes the abortion decision, but that this right is not unqualified and must be considered against important state interests in regulation."

"Although the results are divided, most of these courts have agreed that the right of privacy, however based, is broad enough to cover the abortion decision; that the right, nonetheless, is not absolute and is subject to some limitations; and that at some point the state interests as to protection of health, medical standards, and prenatal life, become dominant. We agree with this approach. "

And those are from the majority decision, not the dissension.