Redstate

Toomey makes a questionable point that when given a choice the Republican voters expressed their frustration by voting for the challenger in the GOP primaries.

My conclusion is the GOP voters liked the challenger better than the incumbent. The incumbent stood for certain issues and was voted out.

The same logic should apply to the general election. Let us use Mike Dewine as a good example. Many voters are unhappy with Dewine because of his Gang of 14 involvement, but he carries an 80% lifetime rating with ACU. Where his challenger Brown has an ACU rating of 6%.

As a Republican and a conservative the choice is simple I would rather have 6 years of Dewine than 6 years of Brown.

The frustrated GOP voters who decide to stay home are not staying home, but are actually standing in line for Brown. The satisfaction of seeing Dewine fall will provide for some short term gratification, but when the next SCOTUS nominee comes toward the judiciary comittee and Chariman Leahy refuses to give him a vote and the majority needed to exercise the nuclear option is no longer there. I do not want to hear the frustrated voter complain.

Republican officeholders have very little time left to demonstrate to these voters that it's still worth coming out to vote.

For some inexplicable reason, the party leadership appears dead set against providing voters with any such demonstartion. It's almost as if they want to lose. Perhaps the next time the directors are on a conference call with some party spokesmen they should enquire about what the * the party thinks it's doing.

Also in today's WSJ online there is an article by Mike Folmer about the Republican uprising in PA.  Mr. Folmer ousted the incumbent State Senate Majority Leader while being outspent 20-1.

And that is why "The Promise to Pennsylvania" was so important. The Promise--drafted by my campaign and that of three other candidates--codified the elemental Republican principles of lower taxes and less government and sketched out how these principles should be applied at the state level. For all intents and purposes, it was a Contract With America--for Pennsylvania.

The Promise gave Republican voters an opportunity to re-evaluate exactly what it was they believed in. Did they want to continue down the path of higher taxes and growing government, or did they want to see real tax reform and constraints on spending?

For the many Republican reformers who won their respective primaries, the Promise holds the key for eventual victory in the fall. It is a standard around which other Republicans can rally, clearly outlining an agenda for the next legislative session and defining the critical, core issues for the party.

It is also my conviction that while the leadership of the Republican Party is still trying to figure out how it will deal with the fallout from May 16, it is imperative that the GOP come together in time for the Nov. 7 election. There are critical races to win--most notably Rick Santorum's fight to beat back state treasurer Bob Casey Jr. and keep his U.S. Senate seat, and Lynn Swann's campaign to upend Ed Rendell and become Pennsylvania's first black governor.

Read the whole thing if you get a chance.

It's almost as if they want to lose.

It's funny you mention this. I've been feeling the same way lately. As soon as I think it can't get any worse for the GOP...BAM!...they find something else to bungle. Miers, Dubai Ports, illegal immigration, "...in his freezer". How low can they go? I'm stupefied by the whole thing.

Thanks for adding that.  Toomey and Folmer were describing the same dynamic, and the party does have to realize it.

The PA Party chair, Eileen Melvin, stepped down recently and the party PTB are backing Cambria County chair Jim Gleason to replace him after the vote this Saturday.  That's not a done deal, though,  as some in the "reform" movement are backing Glen Meakem.

I thought it was interesting that Folmer and Toomey had written similar pieces in a local and national paper on the same topic.  Almost planned, one might surmise.

It is an interesting conclusion if you live in a world void of reality. The GOP according to you has done everything wrong and nothing right.

Miers, Dubai, illegal immigration, scandals, and more. But with all these problems mentioned above it was GOP members having a great debate of what was right and what was wrong among themselves. In respect to Miers the GOP base and Senators let President Bush hear there concerns and he listened. The final outcome was Sam Alito. In respect to Dubai ports there were many conservatives split on the issue, but at the end of the day more conservatives voiced opposition and the House forced Dubai to walk from the table. In respect to illegal immigration the story is still developing but once again the party is split on the issue. Let's wait to see what comes out of the conference comittee before we react.

There are many things that the GOP has done over the last few years that I am proud about. And sometimes I feel people do not reflect on the positives as they should.

I rather belong to a party that has honest and strong debates on issues and sometimes the outcome will be satisfying to me and other times it wil not be. But is clear to me that our party has debates and addresses big problems that our country needs to address. There is no doubt in my mind if the Dems were in charge we would not be fighting a war on terror, trying to solve Social Security, or addressing the illegal immigration debate. The easy thing is to pass the buck on the issues as Clinton did. I am proud to see my party tackle thses issues.    

The GOP according to you has done everything wrong and nothing right.

I didn't say this nor do I believe this. Please don't put words in my mouth.

even if a lot of attention isn't being paid to it elsewhere. They don't want to lose. They want to keep their phoney baloney jobs, pensions and unlegislated emoluments. But they've lost touch with what the voters want and they're trying to get back on track, albeit too slowly.

Here is exactly why he won, in his own words:

"It is my conviction that Republican voters were just as desirous of a positive vision that they could embrace--a vision that demanded accountability and reform at the state level--as they were to remove those incumbents who had failed to uphold the traditional ideals of their party."

Positive Vision is what the base is yearning for.

This is how Ronald Reagan was so powerful in his tenure and so revered in his death. He was a leader with a clear vision who communicated that vision to the nation. It was a time when the people were desperately needing a leader with vision, and when he appealed to them, they gained hope, rose up and got behind him. In his death, we all remembered and longed for those heady days of excitement.

This is exactly what Mike Folmer did, in a time when Republicans are looking for a principled leader with vision. But imitating his actions in getting this message out to the people will be the difference between Republicans staying home or going to the polls.

In Mike Folmers own words:

Rank-and-file conservatives do not gravitate toward candidates simply because they are "not the other guy."

We have to give conservatives someone to gravitate to.

... but in the 30th, the vote was against "Pay Raise Bob."

It is with good reason that Gleason is has been chosen as the standard bearer for the Corporate/Country Club Republican set. He is deeply attached to the status quo, as evidenced by his $10,000 contribution to RINO Bob Jubilere. In addition, according to campaign finance records The Gleason Agency $2500 to the same campaign. (As an interesting aside it is against PA's finance Laws for a corporation to donate money directly and there is not record of a Gleason PAC. Certainly an oversight.)

I think the idea the GOP Congress , or the GOP for that matter has accomplished anything is "void of of reality".  The examples you site fall apart under examination.

Social Security debate?  When and where has that been happening?  The President attempted to address the issue early last year, but the Congress dumped it like a hot potato.  They wanted nothing to do with it.

Immigration debate?  You assume the answer lies within legislation, it's just a question of what that looks like.  A common consvervative position is enforcing the law and repsecting the rule of law is a better answer.  To those conservatives, the immigration debate you're so proud of is irrelevant and is happening because of the Executive branch of government has not been serious about existing immigration law.  We don't want a debate or legislation, we want the law enforced.

Tell me what the Congress has accomplished in the last two years of any significance to conservatives.  Please don't site Roberts, I don't consider a Republican Congress approving the judicial nominee of a Republican president to be a significant accomplishment.  Among the following key issues for conservatives; Social Security reform, restrained government spending, energy supply, tax reform (not tinkering but real reform), Latin America or pick your own... which ones do you expect a Republican Congress to produce results on from 06 to 08?  

Debates on port deals that only reflect decades old policy or the rewrite of laws only to accomodate the fact there is no desire to enforce existing law are not real debates.  They are side shows while important matters go unattended and the law goes unenforced.  I don't expect Republicans to seriously campaign on any of the issues I've listed, much less address them in the next session of Congress.  

I just wish we would demand at least one of the issues I listed be campained on natinonlly and dealt with in the next session of Congress before we turn over our blank check support.  Rather, we've made it pretty clear that as long as they're a few clicks to the right of the socialists that make up the Democrat party , we need nothing more and should be expected to show up in droves.

The GWOT is fought from the Executive branch of government and has been done so for the last two years while Congress has done little more than moan about the NSA and Gitmo, so please don't go there.  Reagan defeated the Communists in Latin America and across the pond while the Dems in Congress fought him every step of the way from Congress, so yes, it's done from the Executive branch.

Yes, I'll be there in November but please stop asking me to be excited or proud of it when I'm getting none of what I believe to be key conservative issues in return.

I am sorry you are unable to see the forest through the trees. Hard to tell you what conservatives feel has been done that is significant to them.  Usually there are moving the goal or putting disclaimers on their request as you did. Don't include Roberts and only things in the last 2 years. As a conservative I understand not everything is done the way I would hope or like, but I voice my opinions and try to make changes within the party. I do not understand this my way or the highway a few conservatives have taken.

I don't think it's my way or the highway.  I'm just asking for one of the core issues I've listed, not all or even most.  I've been at this too long to know that's not a reasonable approach and I certainly haven't succeeded in life with that approach.  I've always been there for the party since I could first vote in 1985 and will continue to do so as a proud Republican, a proud Republican from the party of Lincoln, Ike, Reagan and all the other keepers of freedom.

I don't mean to be the one out here continually raining on everyone's parade.  I just believe we need to acknowledge the reality of the situation for what it is.  Rush is right, there is no elected conservative leadership at this time.  That is what is sad, not my response.  My questions still have gone unanswered, which conservative agenda items will the Congress be running on this fall and what conservative accomplishments have taken place the last two years, or even four years that we can run on?  As long as those questions go unanswered I'll assume none and all we're offering is we're not Nancy Pelosi, Howard Dean, John Kerry, Michael Moore, Ted Kennedy....

Just doing well enough so that others like you didn't want to obstruct your line of fire. :)

I agree with your point that if you follow the postings here, the good items on which people agree are pretty much coming out of the White House. (I'm not even 100% sure the whole Miers thing wasn't a Rovian "you asked for it, you got" ploy to show them how bad things could get if Bush were to let the Senate get its way over what he wants to do.) And even then at best we are getting 50/50 out of the White House, with some of the bad 50 being REALLY bad.

One of my pet peaves with republicans is a tendency to produce this false alternative when confronted by unrest over RINO's..You know, either hold you nose and vote RINO or a 'democrat' will win....

Sigh

This would be so much more a valid argument if the party did not move heaven and earth to squash conservative primary challengers. Look at the Specter debacle. There was a real republican in the race but the entire political class up to and including the president, funded by all the wine and cheese check writing republicans in the state, killed the opportunity to fix the seat.

Until the party stops its unconditional and blind strong support for RINO's like Specter and Chaffee at the expense of real republicans, the either/or argument will be a canard.