Firing a Few Rounds

Honestly, you can not be completely surprised I have a few rounds left to fire off in the circular tent squad.  I already unleashed most of the clip in my first election analysis.  However, there are two other things I want to address.

First is Chris Christie.  I have heard a lot of people blaming him for the election loss, though I feel that is a lot more emotion than deep analysis.  It is pretty easy to knee-jerk against a guy who embraces the most dangerous president since Woodrow Wilson.

That said, I think they may be preparing to kiss here.

That being said, I do assign a very small portion of blame to Chris Christie.  The problem was not Governor Christie's complimenting of Barack Obama.  The problem is that he complimented him, at best, for getting nothing done.  At worst, he complimented Obama for a job badly done.  Power was inevitably going to return slowly considering how widespread the damage was.  The real problem lay and still lies in what is happening while the power remains unrestored, particularly the logistical nightmare triggered by the disruption of commerce.  People starve, freeze and live in filth as long as that has not recovered.

Yet, FEMA under Obama, much like under Bush, was woefully unprepared to deal with a disaster of this magnitude.  And Chris Christie complimented him on a job well done, a move which I have no doubt helped to solidify the appearance of Barack Obama being in control, despite people suffering a week later when the polls opened.  He complimented the president for doing a few photo-ops in a bomber jacket.

Ultimately, I think that the governor killed any prospects he had of national office.  While I do not hate him like some seem to now, I am immensely disappointed in the man.  No one should be in the business of giving undeserved accolades, whether because they are blind, for the sake of their own reelection (Christie will be up for reelection next year) or just to seem bipartisan.

Finally, my last problem is with those people who believe that the Republican party should divorce itself from the social wing.  This seems to come up every election (often from liberals...hm...) and frankly, I think is a foolish idea to consider.

For one, social conservatives bring the bulk of the energy and enthusiasm to the GOP fold.  Additionally we have numbers that moderates lack.  Splitting the party along these lines would shrink the influence of conservatives and right-leaning libertarians as they would fight amongst themselves more to vie for influence than come together.  The Republican party serves, in many ways, as a means to smooth over the differences between the two and allow them to face the left side of the aisle with greater unity.

The other problem is approaching moderates as some sort of monolithic block.  I believe this to be silly, at best.  The fact of the matter is, everyone who claims to be moderate/independent leans one way or the other.  It is not a matter of dumping social conservatives to appeal to these people; it is a matter of making a cogent argument to them in the first place.  I do not believe conservative values will fail to resonate with people when articulated clearly. 

Moderate candidates cannot do this and that, I believe, is where the problem truly lies.  As long as we keep selecting Doles, McCains and Romneys to represent conservatism on a national stage, we will continue to fail.  Now, I do think it is reasonable to debate which issues should take precedence.  Dropping certain planks because they are politically inconvenient is not the solution, however.

I believe the Democrats and progressive recognize our weaknesses when we choose moderates.  It is why they goad us into considering dumping certain ideologies and morals, particularly when elections go their way.  They wish to use this period of post-election soul searching to divide us further.  The least I can ask is that we don't fall for this kind of silly, knee-jerk stupidity.

Since there is one more big, very important topic that I wish to discuss, there will be one last blog post tomorrow or Tuesday.  Until then, readers!

Also, I hope you spent at least a little time today thinking about the veterans in your life.