The "Electable" Candidate

Listening to talk radio, I have heard conservatives on both sides of the issue. I am glad to finally hear some sense of reason slowly take over the "party first" mentality. There are, however, many morons who are still stuck on the idea that electability is more important than core principles. Sadly, some of these morons are very high profile.

I understand the view, held by these partisans, that a candidate who supports some of your ideals, and has a chance at winning, is better than losing to one who totally disagrees with you. It makes perfect sense to consider a grat, but "unelectable", candidate a non factor and choose to vote against the worst of the evils. This is especially true when the elections are permanent.

The problem comes when these elections are short term, as in our political system. The current state of our country, both socially and economicly, is a direct result of this mentality. Hopefully I can clearly explain my position on this debate, I will try. I will also use conservatism in my example but I would like for you liberals to apply the same logic to your side as well.

Starting with Ronald Reagan, since he represents the closest thing to the perfect Republican, and following through to today, we have seen a stady movement towards the left from Republicans. This has happened because voters have allowed it to.

Think about this, after Ronald the great we had to choose between George H. W. Bush and Dukakis. Nobody knew anything about Bush, other than his having VP to Ronnie, but Dukakis was an easy target. Republicans learned that conservative ideology did not win elections, the fear of liberal ideology wins elections.

In 1992 we saw a three way race involving Bush, Clinton and Perot. Perot drew votes from both sides but mostly the right. This split gave a very narrow win to Slick Willy. This became the "posterchild" election for those who fear a third candidate.

The following election had a Bill Clinton who had suffered the first loss of both houses of Congress in several decades and was presenting himself as a moderate. This crowded Bob Dole and Perot into a small corner of the electorate and taught the Republicans that elections are won in the middle.

After Clinton, Republicans chose a moderate to go against Al Gore, giving us George W Bush. He ran, not as a right wing conservative, but as a compassionate (progressive) conservative. Republicans learned that Unhappy right wingers would hold their nose and support a potentially liberal Republican over a left wing Democrat.The strategy worked and republicans eventually gained both houses as well as the presidency.

As Republicans moved leftwards they gained votes. They only needed to stay just right of the opposition. Whilst many right wingers were vocal about their opposition to this method, they continued to throw their grudging support behind the Republican with the best chance of beating the Dem. This showed up in internal polling and only served to encourage this leftward slide.After all, as long as we keep accepting progressive Republicans at the threat of losing to the socialists, why would the party look for true conservatives?

This phoenamena has a natural oscillation to it. As the over confident Liberals move to the left they will begin to lose votes to the right. When they finally notice the trend they will push back towards the center and the Republicans, who have been easily winning, will start to slide to the right. This cycle will repeat until, either the end of time, or everyone starts reading this blog.

I want to force the tide. We can stop this cycle if we just vote our conscience. If the Republicans start losing two things will happen. First, they will start looking at where their votes are going. When they realize they are losing a great deal of votes to conservatives they will be forced to move towards that direction and regain their base. Meanwhile, the left will be screwing things up so bad that even the moderates will be compelled to try voting for the right wingers.

It will suck during the short term but our kids will love us for it. Oh and I don't want to hear about Supreme Court Justices. SCOTUS can only review law, not make it. The liberal weenies in that branch of government cant force socialism, they can partially stifle capitalism but that is still a short term problem. As time passes, so will the hippies in our Judicial branch.