Quote of the Day, Keep Your Hands Where We Can See Them, GOP Elites edition.

Yup, pretty much.

A funny thing happened to the Republican Party on the way to the next election.

Conservatives have started expecting Republicans to actually do the conservative things they say they are going to do. When even the suspicion exists that a Republican politician is going to let them down, conservatives make their lives a living hell.

All of this is in the context of the Defund Obamacare movement, which I support, while being fully aware that it is unlikely to pass, for precisely the reasons that the Daily Caller gets into*, but nonetheless do not think that its failure will hurt the GOP, as long as the leadership tries; and pretty also think that a lot of people online overestimate its urgency to the general population**.

I think that covers my particular heresy.  At any rate, it doesn’t bother me in the slightest that the base refuses trust the GOP establishment one iota.  It’s precisely this mistrust and low growling in the back of the throat that gets results for the conservative base, and I encourage the practice mightily.

Via

 

Moe Lane

*Essentially: if we wanted to pass legislation now, more of us probably should have gone to the polls in 2006, 2008, and 2012.  Yes, yes, I know: there are umpteen billion arguments about why we didn’t, arguments that we did in fact go to the polls, and that that entire observation is illegitimate.  Still.  Elections have consequences.

**Online communities tend to do that.  Bear in mind that I am part of several online communities, and I do not except myself from this analysis.

13 thoughts on “Quote of the Day, Keep Your Hands Where We Can See Them, GOP Elites edition.”

  1. I would only note, Moe, to your first footnote, that “the base”, meaning variously-striped Conservatives, showed up at the polls just fine.
    .
    The gutless, brainless, trust-fund-sucking, testicle-free, weak-minded cowards who make up the D.C. wing of the GOP didn’t turn out *their* base… which is both why we’re enjoying President Carter’s third term, and why the Conservative base has that particular gleam in their collective eye.
    .
    Mew

    1. Alas, Acat, that was not my personal experience. It was the “Real Republicans” who were quite loud about “sitting this one out” because Romney was a RINO who was to blame for Obamacare, while the “GBTFSTFWMCWMUTDCWOTGOP” went to the polls, and not just voted, but tried to get out the vote, and were pollwatchers, and just generally participating. One of the reasons the “D.C. wing” of the party gets their way is because they play the game, while too many “Real Republicans” are unwilling to “bake the bread”…. YMMV…..

      1. Romney’s GOTV fell apart. Please mail me any assertions to the contrary … my garden needs fertilizing.
        .
        Seriously, unless you assert the exit polls were more wrong than usual, there is no reason to believe the failure was on the part of “the base” .. note, “Real Republicans” is your term – I reject it.
        .
        Exit polls show the “GBTFSTFWMCWMUTDCWOTGOP” went to the polls in very small numbers, and cost the GOP the White House.
        .
        Mew

        1. p.s. You can be forgiven for being confused by the large numbers who said they wouldn’t vote for Romney in the general, but later did… it fooled Santorum too.
          .
          Mew

          1. Meh, the exit polls said Kerry won, too, so I take them with a grain of salt. We don’t know for certain, for the vote is private. But certainly the “Real Republicans” were quite public in their despair, in a way that the “GBTFSTFWMCWMUTDCWOTGOP” was not. If you sound like you have left the party, don’t be surprised if people take you seriously….

          2. Umm, the discussion of replacing the public decision-making process was in a different thread .. we pretty much agreed we’d trust Moe to pick the next POTUS nom more than we’d trust Iowa.
            .
            Mew

            p.s. The last one at the party gets to pick up the check.

  2. I don’t know where I stand with the “Defund Obamacare” push. I want this freedom destroying, economy wrecking abomination defunded, but I don’t think we should shut down the government over it. I see that ending in defeat or a Pyrrhic victory. While I do have to live with the repercussions, I almost want this thing to come online and have the pain and chaos be an object lesson to the electorate.

    1. I think, as a country, we’re in need of some Heinleinian “bad luck” .. it tends to focus the minds of the “low information voters” a bit, as well as – in time – getting the deadwood out of the GOP.
      .
      That said, what I think Moe is looking for isn’t “Game on!”, it’s more of a *pulse*. Too many of the limp-minded D.C. crowd won’t move unless 50%+ of the herd has moved .. and that’s not acceptable.
      .
      Mew

      1. I’m not a big fan of McConnell or Boehner, no. Eric Cantor & Paul Ryan have been pushed as conservatives too, but they tend to go a tad wobbly from time to time (especially Cantor).

      2. I just also don’t think you can fundamentally change the course of the country when all you have is the House. Maybe if we had the Senate too, but we don’t. Elections have consequences, right?

        1. A quibble, jbird.
          .
          Things that change the course of the country very *very* rarely originate with D.C.
          .
          Mew

    2. Remember, that idiot bill was passed by “Reconciliation”, because not even the Democrats were willing to push this stinker. The rules for such bills are quite clear, ten years, the END. What we need to do is be in power when the ten years are up (Coming sooner then the Democrats are ready for, because they keep delaying things in their cowardice), and then not pass it again. The Democrats know this, which is why they are going mad with their attempts to destroy Republicans right now. Their plan was to have millions on “National Health Care” when the ten years were up, to hold as hostage, but elections keep coming up…….

  3. Late to the thread. My mountain county in Colorado, admittedly conservative, had high turnout and Romney won. Our county chair came to our TEA Party meeting afterwards and openly said that we of the TEA Party were the campaign. We manned the HQ, did the phone banks, walked the precincts, and did the rallies.

    I am pretty sure that here in Colorado we Conservatives turned out; holding our noses, but we turned out. I am also pretty sure that vote fraud gave the state to Obama. 17 of our 63 counties have more registered voters than people of voting age.

    I want to see the Institutional Republicans fight for something opposing Obama, because there is no point in holding your nose for a party that will not fight. Given the dead silence [except for one press release] of the Republicans over the coming attack on Syria re: the Constitution and/or War Powers Act, I don’t expect any resistance on anything. They’ve gone Whig.

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