Where Does the Republican Party Go From Here?

One thing is clear after this election, and it is something I have been saying for years, but the Republican Party has failed on so many levels. Perhaps now they will realize it.

This was the party that was supposed to reflect conservative values and principles of limited government and less spending, but instead they provided the exact opposite, as they got drunker than college kids at a keg party on political power. Ronald Reagan would be highly embarrassed.

In this election, Republicans failed to communicate a message the American people could understand. It took a simple man from Ohio, Joe the Plumber, in the last days of the election to find the message the party could not find on their own. This is simply amazing to me. The McCain campaign and the republicans should have already been pounding away for months at Obama’s socialist plans. The bottom line is the party failed to rally the base that reflected its core values, but then maybe they have had such a problem with this because those core values no longer exist for the Republicans in power. One doesn’t have to look any farther than the last eight years to realize that.

Conservatives have lost control of their party, or rather where pushed out of the party by moderate elite Rockefeller Republicans who believed the party needed to move to the middle to win elections. These elitist in the party lost touch with the base of the party and reality. They hired political consultants who only cared about winning elections and driving the party forward to retain power, not the platform or ideals of the party. They listened to Washington insiders who told them they didn’t need the base to win. All they need to do is appeal to moderates, appeal to these groups. It has been a recipe for disaster!

Some of these same people tell us the political spectrum in America has significantly moved to the left since 2004 and, John McCain lost because he moved to far to the right in order to appeal to the base, but that is not what the exit polls say.

According to exit polls 21 percent of voters claimed to be liberal in 2004 compared to 22 percent in 2008. On the other side of the spectrum 34 percent of voters claimed to be conservative in both 2004 and 2008. If there were a huge leftward shift, shouldn’t there be a high increase in the numbers of people who view themselves as liberals and a decrease in the number of conservatives?

Also, McCain only received 78 percent of the conservative vote and 89 percent of the Republican vote. If McCain moved to the right to appeal to the base, shouldn’t he have done better with them? After all, Barack Obama got 88 percent of the liberal vote.

McCain never shifted to the right, but even if he had it probably would not have mattered to the base. They already knew he was not a conservative, but rather the candidate to reach across the aisle and compromise conservative values, a moderate...or as he tried to sell it, a maverick.

The truth is there was never any real energy from the base until Sarah Palin was introduced to the ticket, but she wasn’t the front of the ticket. Republicans win when they are conservative not moderate.

If the Republican Party doesn’t learn from this, they deserve to remain out of power. They have no one to blame but themselves for the Democratic majority in Congress and the rise of Barack Obama.

It is now up to real conservatives to step forward, take charge and move the Republican Party back to the basic principles of individualism, freedom, economic liberty, self-sufficiency and pride of country, but more importantly, they must believe it, market it and live up to it. It is time the party found the next Reagan.