A Conservative for Clinton? It’s Possible!
I’ve nearly had enough of this pathetic excuse for a presidential campaign. Last week, I was fully planning on not voting at all. I know some people belly-ache about that, citing some version of “too many good men died to secure my right to vote!” Yeah, whatever…they died to secure our right not to vote at the same time. Sometimes a non-vote speaks louder than a meaningless “lesser of two evils” vote. Our forebears didn’t fight to free us from king George III just to put us under the subjection of political parties in our own country. I will NOT vote for a Republican just to keep a Democrat from office if said Republican doesn’t represent my principles and values.
A few weeks ago, I found my candidate…Fred Thompson. I was hopeful that his support and voter base would expand as he emerged to be the only proven conservative candidate in the running…but that was not to be. I’ve already pontificated at length as to the reasons why I would not support Mitt Romney (principally a lack of trust in his current positions and his LDS loyalties…I won’t help promote a cult that gets most of its converts from evangelical congregations). I didn’t blog at length on it, but Mike Huckabee is a liberal in social conservative clothing, and Rudolph Guiliani’s the exact opposite. And while I agree on a lot of what he has to say, it doesn’t make Ron Paul less of a fringe nutbar.
I never gave a lot of attention on John McCain, as I never felt he had a chance. Once again, I underestimated the depths of liberalism to which the GOP could sink. When Mitt Romney’s the strongest conservative candidate, something’s wrong in the state of Denmark. Not to mention the U.S.
Simply put, McCain’s a RINO…you’ve probably heard this applied before, but if not, it means “Republican in name only.” If you look up RINO in the dictionary, McCain’s picture is in it. But to carry it even further, what he really is, is a CINO…”Conservative in name only.” This man is not unprincipled…his principles are just non-conservative for the most part.
To most folks of the conservative and Republican persuasion, this is a plus: they assume that he’ll draw some from both sides, and the conservative base will automatically fall in line and put him over the top, assuring a Republican will occupy the White House in the next term.
Well, I’m not playing that game.
Why, you ask? Here we go.
First of all, his senatorial record is an orgy of unusual bedfellows involved in some serious hanky-panky: Russ Feingold for the free speech abridgment that is their campaign finance “reform” bill, Ted Kennedy for the shamnesty immigration bill, and Joe Lieberman for whatever the crap they were in on. This is common talk radio fodder. The man is no good on conservative issues other than the war, and I don’t even consider the war in Iraq a conservative issue (more of a neoconservative issue, actually…nation-building is not an aim I support).
Second, the man is a sleaze-ball par excellence. Just recently he’s proven that he’s a liar, specifically when it comes to mischaracterizing Romney’s comments on time-tables. Had he said “goals” rather than the buzz-word “time-tables,” it would have gone nowhere. He’s shown himself quite adept at Clintonian fact-smudging politics…slamming opponents while whining about “attack ads” which factually highlight his liberal Senate record. Plus I’ve never forgiven him for trying to go after Mississippi’s military bases by saying the area’s too susceptible for thunderstorm activity (which has never been a problem in the past…and the Meridian NAS’s flight line is even named after his dad!)
Finally, I will not vote a party line when that party cannot or will not field candidates that meet my standards. Granted, there are few, if any, high profile Republican conservatives that can take charge and start leading. Thompson was the last best hope for the party. As far as I’m concerned, the death-knell might as well have sounded. Even if McCain wins the overall election (which I doubt), what does that mean for the GOP? A liberal CINO RINO is now the leader of not only the Free World, but also the Republican party, which will change and shift and mold itself in his image. Where does this leave those of the conservative persuation? Out in the cold. What does it mean for the Democratic party? A shift ever-further into the crazy left.
It’s so similar to the 1976 election that it stinks. Here we have a strong but highly controversial presidency (Nixon/Bush) nearing its end. The conservators of the party will mount an attempt at retaining power by fielding what they feel is a more palatable and uniting figure (Ford/McCain) rather than a forward-looking conservative (Reagan/Romney or Thompson) while the Democrats submit a looney socialist (Carter/Clinton or Obama) who blinds the offered opponent with brilliance while baffling the electorate with BS.
The Republican party must reconstitute its conservative core before being worthy of the presidency, or it’ll accomplish nothing.  Electing a socialist president from the Democratic party might be the only viable means of accomplishing this end.  I’d rather sacrifice two years to the Democrats in hopes of a strongly conservative Republican party rising to a 2010 landslide congressional election that results in nothing for the Dems in 2012 than allow the Republicans to win at this juncture and marginalize the conservatives who revitalized the party and made it politically viable twenty-eight years ago.
Therefore, I may vote for the Democratic nominee (I’m almost certain it’ll be Clinton) as a means of voicing my displeasure. It’ll be lost in the millions of votes cast by rank idiots, though. Here’s hoping that Nader does in fact enter the race, or that Paul runs the Green ticket….
