The Democrats Need to Govern. The Republicans Need to Hold Them Accountable.

As far as I can tell we don't need more power with the Republicans nor the Democrats we need to be left alone. You seem to think all of us need to line up behind someone. I don't want to follow a group who has a plan or discredits the others plan. Just get out of our lives. We've already seen how well they spend other peoples money let us choose.

They need to be elected and promise to eliminate their jobs. Take the power away from themselves. Patrick has a plan to regain power which is wrong, we want Washington to give up power and control. No one is brave enough to do that.

So this blog is about trashing the Dems, but if you point out how the Rep keep pissing into the wind and can't even figure out why they are all wet---you don't want to hear that---lol--when Republicans start holding themselves accountable---maybe the rest of the country will start to listening--but till then keep on pissing in the wind!!!!!!  ----

Mr. Ruffini seems to be one of the few conservative bloggers who truly understands the dire straits the GOP is in. There is no way in hell that the GOP is coming back any time soon because, as pointed out, the general electorate has given the Obama administration a broad mandate to undo the damage done by the last adminstration.

There is nothing wrong with the GOP voting "No" but, as stated, those no votes have to come with a reasoned explanation of why the GOP alternative is better. That implies, of course, that the GOP has an alternative.

However, voting "No" on everything simply to please the base is not going to help the perception of the GOP with the remaining 75-80% of the country. They have to be conscientious objections, not simply obstructions. In addition, they have to hope that the Obama programs ultimately fail so that the GOP alternatives will ultimately be given a chance.

And there's the rub. If the economy does recover under Obama's plans, the GOP is going to be in a hole for a long, long time and there's nothing that they can do about it.

I'm not going to lie. Even though I was a Republican for so many years, there's a lot of things in the Democratic party that I now like. Some of them are positions they've co-opted from the GOP and others, like SSM, are positions that appeal to my libertarian streak that is so unwelcome within the GOP base now.

That said, there is still plenty that I do not like. I really want the GOP to return to political viability. We need that political check so that I have another responsible party to vote for if the Dems get drunk with power in the next few years.

As a die hard leftist socialist obamaphile, I just wanna say this is a great post, as are many on the next right. Seems to reflect reality and although I'd disagree with some of it, this is the type of thought we need to be having more of.

The style of "debate" one sees on places like redstate is not debate at all. It's simply group therapy for petulant children.

so hooray, this is my fav conservative site!

This is one of your better posts, Patrick.  I would have to agree that to wait for the Democrats to screw up, however, is still a little too much No-ism for the Republicans' own good.

You have to admit that the party has regionalized itself and trapped its own representatives in primaries controlled by an every angrier base that does not understand what is happening to its once powerful message.

Again, I think this goes back to a disconnect between talking points in Republican ideology and empirically verifiable facts (or strong probabilities).  I'll just pick one example: deregulation.  Republicans would have been in a much stronger position in their evolution if instead of beating the all-regulation-is-bad, government-is-evil drum, they had actually chosen a philosophy of what constitutes effective regulation--regulation that, for example, promotes the cause of free-market capitalism.  After all, free-market capitalism, as proposed by Adam Smith and refined by his successors, does not support the idea of a complete absence of regulation. Transparency, so market participants can work with full information and thus promote efficiency, and antitrust laws to prevent the ascension of monopolies are necessary conditions for free markets.  To oppose governmental action that supports transparency and curtails monopolization and its effects is not the sign of a free market capitalist but of a corporatist. 

Until Republicans realize that they need to promote an ideology based on how the world works and not how they imagine it-might-work-if-only-but-when-it-doesn't, its base will continue to shrink.  Talking points in an Internet age where refutation is a mouse-click and Google-search away is just not a viable option anymore, especially by the newest generation of digital-savvy, information-oriented voters.  Rovian tricks just don't work the way they used to and mis- or bad information-based ideology is going to have to give way to one predicated on better data.  In brief, Laffer Curves and ACORN spies in every voting precinct just won't fly anymore.  Arguments will need to be more fact-based.  The problem with the Republican base is it has shrunk to the most fact-challenged.

democrats.. very good:)
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