HappySqurriel on 22 May 2009
| akuma587 said: For there to be a viable conservative party, they have to quit taking a hard-line on some (but not all) of the following issues: Energy (there current policy doesn't even really make that much sense as it goes against there strong national defense attitude) Environment (why is the environment a partisan issue?) Abortion Gay marriage Health Care (completely dropped the ball on this one - McCain didn't even try to fight Obama on this issue) Approach to war on terror (I'm sorry, but even if Dick Cheney is right, he still hurts Republicans. Guy has a 19% approval rating) Religion in politics (don't really see this going away, but worth listing) Taxes (don't see this changing either, but worth listing) Military spending (current stance goes against fiscally conservative principles) Relationships with minorities (minorities currently trust the Republican Party about as much as they trust the police) Purity in the party (another big one - big parties and "pure" parties usually don't mix. The Green Party may be very pure, but when is the last time it won any national elections?) Really, some of the Republican Party's stances on those issues don't even qualify as "conservative," so I don't think changing some of them will do any injury to Republican principles. But I don't think anyone would say that the strategy the party has had in the past years is politically viable. |
Just as a note, the environment is not a partisan issue and most conservatives and libertarians fully support protecting the environment through the use of reasonable measures. There is a large collection of people who use questionable science, distortion of facts, and outright lies to generate an "environmental crisis" in order to promote international socialism. Even one of the founders of greenpeace (Patrick Moore) saw the abandoning of science by the "Environmental" movement in favour of sensationalism and political agendas, and it was one of the main reasons why he abandoned the organization and focused on sustainable development (typically helping corporations balance their concerns about the bottom line with concerns about the environment) ... The beautiful thing that (almost) no one will pay attention to is that he has probably done far more for the environment by abandoning the "Environmental" movement then he ever could have by being part of it.
