I am registering as a republican

AspenValley wrote:

RenegadeCJ wrote:

AspenValley wrote:

jmc wrote: I've always been unaffiliated but with the gerrymandering of the parties, I need to push for less wingnuts and since I live a republican elrction cinch, I am going to become a partisan to vote in the primary and hopefully get a more rational representative. Wish me luck.

I've been considering this myself, for the very same reasons. I feel like the Republican party ran out moderates like myself 25 years ago, but maybe it's time to come back and give the nutters a run for their money.

Of course there are some "nutters" on both sides, but on balance, the fiscally conservative reps are flexing their muscles to take the party back. What is nutty about wanting to live within your means?

My problem with the Republicans is they didn't care if we lived within our means when times were good, which is the sensible time to be building up surpluses for the inevitable recessions, at which times it makes more sense to be running something of a deficit. We wouldn't be in the hole we are in now if these same flakes hadn't insisted on slashing taxes while failing to lower expenses. They believed in a bunch of unicorn dust that was somehow going to allow them to have their cake and eat it, too. To me, there is absolutly nothing "fiscally conservative" about the way the Republicans have been behaving for decades.

And I am not impressed at all with the tantrums of the Tea Party, which make no internal sense and often are contradictory. They, too, want their cake and to eat it. They don't want the "government touching their Medicare" and at the same time want to practically dismantle the whole government. If their "policies", if you could call them that, are allowed into law it will probably destroy not only the government, but the whole country. They are not the "conservatives" they claim to be, they are as radical a bunch of ideologues as I have seen in my lifetime.

You have been indoctrinated very well by the mainstream liberal press.

I agree with you that for too many decades both Dems and Republicans gave Americans both guns, butter, and tax cuts. Kicking the impending debt down the road, but now that earnest Republicans/TEA party people want to see honest reductions in spending you dismiss them as radicals.

Next time you listen to the press, see how many times you hear a Dem described as "radical", almost never. But anytime a Republican wants to trim spending by 5%, the cuts are labeled as "dangerous" or "to the bone".

If you actually talk to real TEA party people, instead of the radical ones that the press will only show, you will see people like you who are just more worried about the ballooning debt than any other issue.

But guess what? Boehner, Obama & Reid (Beltway Wshington) will win, like they always do. They will beat down the new Republican congressman by denying them campaign funds and make them beautiful promises that will never come to pass.

Liberal Republicans? There are at least three Senators in New England, Scott Brown, Olympia Snow and Susan Collins. Once again, you have been told there are no moderate Republicans, but there are. And because they are centrists, they exercise a lot of influence in the Senate because both sides need their votes to get bill passed. Just like how independent Lieberman exercises a lot of influence.

SS109 wrote:

AspenValley wrote:

RenegadeCJ wrote:

AspenValley wrote:

jmc wrote: I've always been unaffiliated but with the gerrymandering of the parties, I need to push for less wingnuts and since I live a republican elrction cinch, I am going to become a partisan to vote in the primary and hopefully get a more rational representative. Wish me luck.

I've been considering this myself, for the very same reasons. I feel like the Republican party ran out moderates like myself 25 years ago, but maybe it's time to come back and give the nutters a run for their money.

Of course there are some "nutters" on both sides, but on balance, the fiscally conservative reps are flexing their muscles to take the party back. What is nutty about wanting to live within your means?

My problem with the Republicans is they didn't care if we lived within our means when times were good, which is the sensible time to be building up surpluses for the inevitable recessions, at which times it makes more sense to be running something of a deficit. We wouldn't be in the hole we are in now if these same flakes hadn't insisted on slashing taxes while failing to lower expenses. They believed in a bunch of unicorn dust that was somehow going to allow them to have their cake and eat it, too. To me, there is absolutly nothing "fiscally conservative" about the way the Republicans have been behaving for decades.

And I am not impressed at all with the tantrums of the Tea Party, which make no internal sense and often are contradictory. They, too, want their cake and to eat it. They don't want the "government touching their Medicare" and at the same time want to practically dismantle the whole government. If their "policies", if you could call them that, are allowed into law it will probably destroy not only the government, but the whole country. They are not the "conservatives" they claim to be, they are as radical a bunch of ideologues as I have seen in my lifetime.

You have been indoctrinated very well by the mainstream liberal press.

I agree with you that for too many decades both Dems and Republicans gave Americans both guns, butter, and tax cuts. Kicking the impending debt down the road, but now that earnest Republicans/TEA party people want to see honest reductions in spending you dismiss them as radicals.

Next time you listen to the press, see how many times you hear a Dem described as "radical", almost never. But anytime a Republican wants to trim spending by 5%, the cuts are labeled as "dangerous" or "to the bone".

If you actually talk to real TEA party people, instead of the radical ones that the press will only show, you will see people like you who are just more worried about the ballooning debt than any other issue.

But guess what? Boehner, Obama & Reid (Beltway Wshington) will win, like they always do. They will beat down the new Republican congressman by denying them campaign funds and make them beautiful promises that will never come to pass.

You know, you TOTALLY lose me when you make the stupid, stereotypical accusation of my supposedly being "indoctrinated" by a "liberal" press. You have no idea, no idea at all, of where I gather my information, although it is a safe assumption I don't get it in pre-digested form from slanted venues like Fox News or MSNBC.

And you are totally wrong again in assuming I get my impression of Tea Partiers from the press. I got it from Tea Partiers themselves, including ones I met at three different Tea Party events as well as ones I am related to, friends with, or work with.

And I don't need the press to tell me what "radical" looks like, all you have to do is listen to the rhetoric of people like Michelle Bachman or Rick Perry or Rick Santorum and you will know.

SS109 wrote: [Liberal Republicans? There are at least three Senators in New England, Scott Brown, Olympia Snow and Susan Collins. Once again, you have been told there are no moderate Republicans, but there are. And because they are centrists, they exercise a lot of influence in the Senate because both sides need their votes to get bill passed. Just like how independent Lieberman exercises a lot of influence.

And this! THIS! This is exactly what I am talking about! You lump in moderate centrists as "liberals" Only someone who has been thoroughly immersed into the rhetoric of the far right would even think of doing that. And only within a party that had gone so far to the right it could hardly see the center anymore, let alone the left.

Interesting that some here would take exception to a liberal registering as a Republican to vote in their primary because they live in a primarily Republican district but I don't recall them complaining about Republicans putting up sham Democratic candidates in Wisconsin to force a Democratic primary.

Fiscal conservatives would acknowledge the need to raise revenue until we have paid off the debt. The utter unwillingness of the GOP to even consider this obvious piece of common sense is what makes them radicals. Americans happily accepted the tax cuts, accepted the wars, grabbed all the subsidies, entitlements and voted for more. Now it's time to pay the tab. Write a sane budget next time, that's the solution.

AspenValley wrote:

SS109 wrote: [Liberal Republicans? There are at least three Senators in New England, Scott Brown, Olympia Snow and Susan Collins. Once again, you have been told there are no moderate Republicans, but there are. And because they are centrists, they exercise a lot of influence in the Senate because both sides need their votes to get bill passed. Just like how independent Lieberman exercises a lot of influence.

And this! THIS! This is exactly what I am talking about! You lump in moderate centrists as "liberals" Only someone who has been thoroughly immersed into the rhetoric of the far right would even think of doing that. And only within a party that had gone so far to the right it could hardly see the center anymore, let alone the left.

Liberal Republicans and Blue Dog Dems are pretty close to moderates.

Republicans are all moon bat to the right in your book right? Like the NY Republicans who passed legal homosexual marriage? Like "W" who increased spending on Medicare by starting the drug prescription plan?

Have the Republicans moved to the right? Maybe in tone, but they are still spending like always. I didn't see big cuts to social spending since they took back the house, in fact, food stamps has increased to 1 in 7 Americans.

Have the Dems moved to the Left? Clinton passed the anti-homosexual Defense of Marriage Act and Don't Ask/Don't Tell, but less than a decade later, President Obama has repealed DADT and will not fight DOMA in the federal courts. Obama, Pelosi, & Reid have passed the most sweeping healthcare bill in US history, something Bill Clinton or anyone before him was able to pass.

chickaree wrote: Fiscal conservatives would acknowledge the need to raise revenue until we have paid off the debt. The utter unwillingness of the GOP to even consider this obvious piece of common sense is what makes them radicals. Americans happily accepted the tax cuts, accepted the wars, grabbed all the subsidies, entitlements and voted for more. Now it's time to pay the tab. Write a sane budget next time, that's the solution.

Negotiating tactic?
If it appears you won't budge on the tax increases, Obama has to throw out more spending cuts to get you to compromise.

SS109 wrote:

AspenValley wrote:

SS109 wrote: [Liberal Republicans? There are at least three Senators in New England, Scott Brown, Olympia Snow and Susan Collins. Once again, you have been told there are no moderate Republicans, but there are. And because they are centrists, they exercise a lot of influence in the Senate because both sides need their votes to get bill passed. Just like how independent Lieberman exercises a lot of influence.

And this! THIS! This is exactly what I am talking about! You lump in moderate centrists as "liberals" Only someone who has been thoroughly immersed into the rhetoric of the far right would even think of doing that. And only within a party that had gone so far to the right it could hardly see the center anymore, let alone the left.

Liberal Republicans and Blue Dog Dems are pretty close to moderates.

There are no liberal Republicans today. There are a few moderate Republicans. Some or even most of the Blue Dogs are moderates, but some are really very conservative, especially socially.

Republicans are all moon bat to the right in your book right?

Nope, never said that. I will say they have moved as a group much farther to the right than they were even as recently as Ronald Reagan, especially in the "culture wars" area. The spending spree seems to be an artifact of the most despicable bunch of holligans of all, the Neo-cons. They pandered to the religious right to get away with pushing their nutso agenda, which as far as I can see very ingeniously combines the worst excesses of Democratic-style social-control spending with the worst-excesses of a hawkish right wing military obsession, with the aforementioned unicorn dust ideas of taxation thrown in to be sure to make the most toxic (and predictably fiscally disasterous) mix imaginable.

AspenValley wrote: I wouldn't see it as cheating. I would see it as nudging the Republican party back onto the rails from which it ran off at least 20 years ago. There are still some conservative Democrats but when was the last time you heard of a liberal Republican? I can still remember when there used to be some. I think it hurt this country to see the parties (especially the Republicans) lose the full range of viewpoints. The Republican party has become increasingly narrow and paranoid and obsessed with political "purity", which keeps driving it farther and farther to the extreme right. I think it would be a good thing if the political parties became inclusive enough of differing degrees of orthodoxy to the point where it wasn't uncommon for people to cross party lines when voting for Presidents. Right now I cannot picture the Republicans coming up with a candidate I would vote for. Maybe if more moderates and even liberals became part of the political process within the party that would change.

The shame of it is, in my view, is that at heart I agree more with the principles of the Republican party than I do with that of the Democrats but they have pretty much gotten off course on those principles in pursuing the agenda of the religious right. The whole "culture war" thing has almost destroyed the ability of the political process to actually effect any positive change.

I suppose McCain fails to qualify as a moderate Republican, as would Snow, Brown, Collins, Lugar and quite a few others. You've never heard of these names? Lugar was the the honorary co chair of the Obama/Biden inauguration, supports the DREAM Act, and ran unopposed in Indiana last time around because he was so popular among the state's Democrats that they didn't even field a candidate to run against him. Don't give me this nonsense about no moderate Republicans to be found today, the DC government has them in spades. Simply because they oppose most of the radical left policies of the current executive doesn't mean they aren't moderates. Now, I'm sure that those in the left wing, who think Obama is a centrist, would conclude that there are no moderates to be found, but that simply isn't the case, not even close.

And yes, there are a few hard right elected officials, but are they any different than the hard leftists? Bennet, Boxer, Feinstein, Franken, Kerry, and how could we leave out Reid from inclusion in that elite group of who's who. We can also find examples of extremes and moderates in the House if we wanted to take the time to do so, but folks seem to get upset when an accusation is answered completely these days, so I'll keep this one short.

I never said there were no moderate Republicans, but their numbers get fewer every year. I can't imagine they find the party a very comfortable home these days at all.