Time To Rebuild From The Ground Up

American Federalist Blog has an outstanding post on the desperate need for people to get involved and rebuild our party. I cannot agree more. I found it frustrating as a volunteer that several of my fellow conservatives will do nothing more than talk. They refuse to vote and many of them don't even know who their local officials are. If we are to bring the party back to a conservative agenda it must start at the local level.

I will not and cannot cast a vote for John McCain, but I will be voting. If there is a third party candidate who shares my beliefs I will vote for them otherwise I will leave the President spot on the ballot blank and vote for all the other offices. We don't have to sell out our soul, but we do have to vote. When I was volunteering in 06 many Republicans I contacted were so furious with the President and Congress that they refused to vote or voted Democrat. Not only did this cost us the House and Senate, but it got Jim Doyle, one of the worst governors in America, re-elected in a landslide and the Dems control of the Wisconsin State Senate something all of us here in Wisconsin are paying for. So please get out and VOTE! The alternative is to stay home and watch state's rights and federalism completely disappear, leaving amnesty and the liberal take over of this country unopposed.

Saturday, February 09, 2008

The Conservative Manifesto

A man is talking to a friend about politics. Both men are fairly conservative. The first man is bemoaning the awful state of the government: runaway entitlements, ethical lapses, wrong-headed policies, and a sense that the governors have contempt for the governed. His friend, the second man, nods in agreement at the indictments the first man rattles off. The discussion turns to an upcoming election. The second man asks his friend "Who did you vote for in the previous election?"

"No one" says the first man, "I don't vote."

We've probably all had some variation of this story happen to us. And anyone who has will readily admit that such an admission elicits a fairly consistent response: we admonish others that voting is critical and both a right and responsibility, and without exercising that right and executing that responsibility, one forfeits his right to complain about our governors and our government. Fulfilling the duties of responsible citizenship is the burden one must bear to have the right to criticize the outcome. This concept goes back to the story of the little red hen which we remember from childhood. Everyone wants to share in the fruits of the labor, yet no one wants to share in the labor.

Across the blogosphere, I hear the same ideas repeated, if only slightly differently. These themes are: the GOP is broken; the Republican party has lost its way; we need a third party; where are our leaders; and what can we do now? While the blogosphere provides a critical service - that is, to say, news and commentary that would otherwise be unavailable via traditional media channels, and a means for like-minded people to connect with each other - it is far too easy to sit, comfortably, at our desks and "write fiery prose" as Mr. Hargis once said, when real change requires real action.

I've tried to share in this space some of the things I've actually done - other than sit at a desk and type. Perhaps other bloggers prefer to maintain some degree of anonymity, and therefore they don't catalogue for their readers the extensive volunteer activities they engage in politically. Perhaps. But I think it is more likely that bloggers like their comfort zone; getting out and working for a candidate involves trudging through eight inches of snow in January (and even falling down a set of icy stairs, as I did two weeks ago), and those things, are, well, just downright work; and in my case, actually very painful.

So I write this today for all of the inactive impassioned out there. You've got great ideas, and I think that's half of the recipe. The other half is you need a kick in the a.. um, pants. No one likes to hear it, but here's my advice, and I guess you could call this my Conservative Manifesto: [read more]