Going Against the Tide
“The Republican Party has become the party of the working man.” When is the last time I heard a quote like that?
If memory serves, 1988. It was Ronald Reagan, the candidate who brought the “Reagan Democrats” into the Republican Party. It feels so good to hear politicians talking like that again.
I’m sure the Democratic Party resents our “muscling in on their territory,” but hopefully, they’ll have to get used to it.
Congratulations to Linda Rapoza and the Fall River Republican City Committee for talking like Republicans who want to widen the Republican tent and represent small business people and blue collar workers who are being over regulated, over taxed, over burdened and under represented.
~~John Cronin~~
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080515/PUB03/805150429
By SEAN McCARTHY
Fall River Spirit correspondent
May 15, 2008 12:00 PM
Southeastern Massachusetts is one of the most liberal regions in the entire country.
So what has inspired a group of local Republicans to think they can make political inroads?
The Republican party has become the party of the working man,” says Linda Rapoza, chairwoman of the Fall River Republican City Committee which held its inaugural meeting last April 15. “The Democrats have a stranglehold on the business community and you can’t run a business without being suffocated with bureaucracy.”Rapoza talks about the “New Republican Party.”
“The New Republican Party is dealing with issues that affect the working person.
This means less business regulation, lower taxes, and smaller bureaucracy. If you can’t run a business then you can’t create jobs.”One of the more popular topics at the group’s first meeting was fund raising which would help support candidates running for office in Massachusetts.
C.J. Ferry is running against Kevin Aguiar in the 7th Bristol District, Jeff Beatty is running against John Kerry for the U.S. Senate, Earl Sholley is running against Barney Frank to become the 4th District Representative, and Bob Heroux is running for Bristol County Registrar. The elections will take place in November.
Rapoza points out that of the four candidates, three run small businesses. Ferry runs a computer business, Beatty runs a security business, and Sholley is a landscaper.
“The Democrats have become elitists,” Rapoza says.
“They’ve become limousine liberals. One of our major goals is to alert people to this distinction. We want to see Fall River become a two-party system.”
The Republicans’ next meeting is May 19 at the Elks Club on No. Main St. near Airport Road.
It will begin at 6:30 p.m. The group can be reached through their website at www.fallrivergop.org.
May 20th, 2008 at 3:45 am
Me, always the contrarian. I’ll tell you why Republicans have been avoiding phrases like “the workingman, etc.” It is because the phrase has become code language for screwing the rich, or anyone else who is successful. The unsaid implication in the phrase is that everyone earning over $100K is not a workingman and the cause of all of our problems (years of media broadcasts have convinced me that I’m right on this). Indeed, The phrase has been so misused (remember another good one, “let’s do it for the children?”) that it has become anathema for thinking people everywhere. Also consider: “widen the Republican tent” which has become another way of saying “give up your core conservative principles for victory” and come over to the dark side! Whenever someone says let’s “widen the Republican tent,” I always respond: “Right, and let’s do it by educating people about the virtues of conservatism.” THAT is the Reagan way. Unfortunately, the big tent phrase has now come to mean that Republicans should adopt the Democrats ideals in order to widen their appeal. Well, here’s a way to have a HUGE tent! Have all Republicans convert to Democrats–you can’t get a bigger tent than that! Prior to the 2006 elections, Republicans tried to govern contrary to their stated promises and engaged in “smart politics” instead. They spent, and they spent, and they regulated, and they built bridges to no where. Smart politics? Today, not one DC Republican can seem to understand that the massacre in 2006 was the result of such so-called smart politics–and now they want to go even further downhill with global warming, health care, etc. It was Reagan who said that the government which governs least, governs best–do any of you doubt Reagan’s wisdom?
My diagnosis: The two great political parties are now more interested in becoming dominant than in promulgating a particular philosophy. If Republicans want to win because they have a philosophy that I can agree with, then I’m on board too. But if they want to win so that they’ll be the predominant political power: well, have at it, but I’m not participating.
An ideal becomes a cause; a cause, a movement; a movement , a business; and, finally, a business, a racket. Today, conservatives are losing their place in the Republican party and it feels like, more and more, Republicans who claim to be conservatives, are just part of the old racket.
May 20th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Andrew,
Excellent comments. I agree that, over time, many movements that started out very idealistically, morphed into entities that were nothing more than cynical enterprises.
Sadly, the Republican Party now seems to be a case in point. That’s the bad news. The good news is that the party can be changed. We have to return to our roots. Let the Democrats be Democrats, Republicans will return to the idealism of our party’s first President, Abraham Lincoln, and our current icon, Ronald Reagan.
When I use the expression, “big tent” it is not code for, “let’s sell conservatives down the river,” it means let’s bring into the party’s ranks segments of the electorate who are getting shafted by the Democrats, i.e., small business people and blue collar workers who drive employment, build the bridges, drive the trucks, pave the roads and are the backbone of this country. A traditional component of the Republican Party is also the business owners and capitalists who provide the opportunities and are vitally important in the process as well. I hope we can move away from the class envy and gender and race identity politics and move toward the realization that we all have to produce something of value to society. We are getting to a point where we can no longer afford the luxury of indulging ourselves in nursing real or imagined grievances. Our sworn enemies around the world have a long way to go before they catch up to us, but they are gaining ground. It’s time to put aside all the petty bickering and finger pointing and get back to the old fashioned virtues of hard work, thrift, education and moral rectitude. It’s also time and past time for the Republican party to stop trying to elect the next “Panderer-in-Chief” and to return to the conservative values that made this party great and helped make the country great.
May 20th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
Mr. Cronin, I do appreciate your remarks and I think that you understand what conservatives are up against. If I may quote you:
“We are getting to a point where we can no longer afford the luxury of indulging ourselves in nursing real or imagined grievances. Our sworn enemies around the world have a long way to go before they catch up to us, but they are gaining ground. It’s time to put aside all the petty bickering and finger pointing and get back to the old fashioned virtues of hard work, thrift, education and moral rectitude.”
Truer words were never written and this quote is really the gospel for today’s politics. If we do not get our act together, we shall surely see the folly of our own political selfishness.
Andrew
May 20th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
I find McCain as the “conservative” candidate an unacceptable voting option. Generally speaking, the Republican party sounds like something quite foreign to me. There needs to be a NEW party, with the right leadership, because there are lots of disenfranchised conservatives like myself about to waste a vote this election cycle. The corruption in elected political leaders and the judicial activism in the coastal states especially is also unaccaptable. Mitt Romney possesses unusual competence, grace, integrity, statesmanship and a solid understanding of the constitution. There have to be more like him. This country deserves better that McCain or Obama, where are those qualified, tested people? Looks like this cycle is a waste, but things could be resolved and improved by 2012.
May 20th, 2008 at 9:30 pm
Lizzy, your mentioning that you are about to waste your vote; does that mean Bob Barr? Honestly, if Barr would get off of the knee-jerk anti-Iraq war diatribe, folks would be utterly shocked at how well he does in November.
No good candidates? That’s not true. The problem is the primaries. There are far too few voting in the primaries and when they do, they vote for a name that they’ve already seen or heard. They really don’t look at the issues (in most cases).
Something needs to be done at the primary level, but you don’t want to get me started with that one!
Andrew