When you really get your butt kicked, the way we got our butt kicked last night, the post-defeat depression is very real. Having spent the past week blogging almost non-stop about this ObamaCare cramdown, I’m as bummed out as anybody.
And yet good came out of it, because truth was revealed. I hope no conservative henceforth labors under the delusion that there is any such a thing as a “conservative Democrat” in Congress.
Bart Stupak covered himself in shame, a shame shared by all those who told us that “pro-life Democrats” could be useful allies. Stupak and the Blue Dogs (all of them, even those given permission by Pelosi to vote “no” last night) provide the fig leaf of moderation that enables this radical regime.
I encourage everyone to contribute to That Dog Won’t Hunt, a political action committee dedicated to the eradication of the Blue Dogs.
What comes next? We fight. Obi’s Sister is fighting mad. Before that fight begins, however, allow me to express hearty agreement with Philip Klein of the American Spectator:
The question conservatives should be asking though, is how did we get in this position in the first place? How come, over the course of two elections, Democrats were able to take back the White House and amass substantial majorities in both chambers of Congress, allowing them to enact this sweeping legislation with no Republican votes – and huge defections in their own party? How could a generally right-of-center nation be taken over by liberals from Chicago and San Francisco?
The answer, of course, is that none of this would have been possible without George W. Bush — or more broadly speaking, Bush era Republicanism. While they were in power, Republicans squandered an opportunity to push free market health care solutions. When they did use their power to pass major legislation, it was for policies like the big government Medicare prescription drug plan, which was (until today) the largest expansion of entitlements since the Great Society. They took earmarks and doled out farm and energy subsidies. They earned a reputation for fiscal recklessness and corruption and incompetent governance. President Obama ultimately forced through the health care bill in spite of the political consequences to his party because he’s ultimately a true believing liberal. But it was only because of the failures of Bush-era Republicanism that an ideological liberal with little experience was able to capture the presidency on the abstract notion of change.
Today will be largely remembered as the biggest legislative victory for liberals since Medicare in 1965. But it should also be remembered as the day that Bush cemented his legacy as one of the most destructive presidents for advocates of limited government.
Which is to say that what happened Sunday night was not the birth of a new era of liberalism. Rather, it was the death of a kind of “conservatism” that was never really conservative at all. It was the “conservatism” of No Child Left Behind and ethanol subsidies, of unprincipled compromise and cynical self-dealing, of “shamnesty” and kowtowing to CAIR.
If the Republican Party can offer America nothing better than that in the future, the GOP will go the way of the Whigs, passing unlamented into political oblivion.
Now, however, is not the time to dwell too much on that. There’s going to be some long overdue payback in this year’s GOP primaries — J.D. Hayworth is gaining ground in Arizona — but the much bigger target is Tuesday, Nov. 2. We can look forward to that fight with hope. We need fighters for this fight, and Allen West is ready to fight:
Sunday’s vote by the House of Representatives was a travesty of policy, politics and process.
The liberal troika of Obama, Reid, and Pelosi has once again conspired to trample the will of Americans and strong armed Congress to pass healthcare legislation the public simply does not want.
From all across America citizens flooded Congress with the message that a government takeover of healthcare, complete with an exploding bureaucracy and massive tax increases, is not the reform needed to solve our healthcare problems.
Congressman Ron Klein was complicit in the tangled tactics used to move an unpopular bill past the public and toward the President’s desk.
Klein did not hold a single town hall meeting where the general public was invited to ask questions or present their views. Klein hid behind controlled environments such as telephone conference calls and tightly controlled meetings. He refused my offer to debate him on this topic at a place and time of his choosing.
Klein has ignored the public’s will with his vote Sunday. On November 2nd Klein will pay the price for his arrogant approach to representing Florida’s 22nd District when the people flood the ballot box with their frustration for Mr. Klein.
My pledge to the people of the 22nd District is simple-once elected I will do everything in my power to repeal the repugnant portions of this monstrous piece of legislation.
Go West!
