THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume X, Issue # 129, May 22, 2008
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
GOP CONGRESSIONAL DISASTERS: THE "MCCAIN EFFECT"
By Christopher G. Adamo
CONSERVATISM & GOP ELECTION DAY FORTUNES: THE CONSISTENT PATTERN OF REPUBLICAN SUCCESSES &
FAILURES IN FEDERAL ELECTIONS DURING THE LAST FOUR DECADES -- HOW HAS THE REPUBLICAN PARTY FARED ON
ELECTION DAY WHEN ITS PLATFORM & CANDIDATES' POSITIONS WERE OVERTLY CONSERVATIVE? HOW DO
REPUBLICANS FARE WHEN THEY CLOUD THE ISSUES & SEEK "COMMON GROUND" WITH THEIR LIBERAL LEFTIST
OPPONENTS IN THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY? THE INHERENT DIFFERENCES BETWEEN AMERICA'S TWO MAJOR
POLITICAL PARTIES, THEIR FOUNDATIONS, & THEIR CURRENT COMPOSITIONS -- THE RELEVANCE OF ALL THIS TO THE
CURRENT REPUBLICAN PARTY LEADERSHIP, JOHN MCCAIN'S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, & REPUBLICAN PROSPECTS IN THE
2008 CONGRESSIONAL ELECTIONS
FULL STORY:
For nearly the last four decades, a consistent pattern has been established in the Republican political arena, whereby both
good and bad fortunes can be directly correlated to the overt Conservatism, or the lack thereof, in the Republican Party.
The more Conservative the Party and its candidates are, the better they do on election day. Conversely, as GOP members
seek “common ground” with Liberal Democratic rivals, their prospects at the ballot box diminish.
Republicans ignore this relationship at their own peril. Yet, it appears that they are about to do so once again as they go
into the 2008 general election season. The two dismal defeats in the recent Alabama and Mississippi congressional special
elections should be construed as a warning sign, but, thus far, the Republican Party seems intent on critically
misinterpreting them. So, more calamities are likely to follow.
That such a simple and reliable pattern of cause and effect can be so casually refuted or ignored by the Republican Party
hierarchy is a testimony to the power of the Liberal press to mischaracterize events, as well as a grim reflection of the
corrupting effects of the Washington, D.C., environment, where truth, right, and reality are utterly flexible, to be defined by
the latest public opinion
polls.
Having enjoyed past successes only in those situations where Republicans have effectively contrasted their Conservatism
against the transparent Liberalism of the Democrats, some may wonder just why they would ever think they could, instead,
play by Liberal Democratic rules. In order to understand the aspects of the political landscape that often spell doom for
Republicans, the inherent differences between the parties, their foundations, and their current compositions need to be
properly understood.
The structure of the current Democratic Party is a conglomeration of numerous, and often completely disparate, special
interest groups. It is of secondary consequence that these groups may often conflict with or even oppose each other,
since their political support from the Democratic Party most often manifests itself as access to the public trough.
Thus, with few exceptions, the leadership of these organizations are chiefly indifferent to the fact that another
constituency within the Democratic Party’s voting base might be receiving largess, even though its goals and purposes
conflict with the first. The government has plenty of pork to go around.
From its inception, the Republican Party has fundamentally differed in this respect. It, instead, coalesced its members
around a series of principles and ideals, interwoven into a complex “tapestry” that requires intellectual and philosophical
consistency in order to function or survive. Thus, the Republican Party has far less latitude to pursue opposing courses,
if it is to maintain any sense of coherence. And, every time its leaders lose touch with this actuality, the Party’s standing
slips precipitously in the eyes of the public.
As a result, while aspiring Democratic Party candidates can associate themselves with their Party leaders (even someone
carrying as much political baggage as Barack Obama), while still maintaining their own perceived identities on issues of
importance to their constituencies, Republicans are assumed to be politically joined at the hip with their Party leadership.
Such a prospect bodes particularly ill these days, given that the presumptive Republican presidential nominee and default
“Party leader” is John McCain.
Congressional candidates Don Cazayoux (Democrat - Louisiana) and Travis Childers (Democrat - Mississippi) could thus
credibly present themselves to the voters as “Conservatives,” despite enjoying close ties to Barack Obama. Both won
their states’ special election. Republicans, on the other hand, who attempt to ride McCain’s tenuous “coattails” severely
undermine their reputations as Conservatives.
This is an option that they simply cannot choose, without reaping a severe backlash in the wake of every McCain gaffe
and pander to the Left. So stark is the contrast between the operation of the two major parties that, unless GOP
candidates actually distance themselves from McCain (and few if any are willing to do so), they will risk being tainted by
every past and present betrayal of Conservatism by the Arizona Senator.
At this crucial time in the nation’s course, an ambiguous and diluted platform from the Republican Party will serve no
useful purpose, either for the Party’s sake, or that of the nation. Yet, by the character of its presumptive leader, John
McCain, the GOP appears to be stumbling into just such a morass. Worst of all, as a result of the two recent losses,
Republican Party leaders are actually being cowed into believing the flawed premise that their Party’s candidates were
dispatched for being overly Conservative.
Such a conclusion and reaction is altogether astounding, considering that, in both congressional elections, the
Democratic opponents were avowed “Conservatives,” and clearly connected with the voters on that basis. Yet. the signs
that Republican Party bigwigs are now expressing their openness to the idea of shifting the Party even further Left (the
very action that caused severe voter backlash in 2006, and the Party’s current unpopularity), are alarmingly numerous.
Just this past week, Republican Deputy Whip Eric Cantor suggested as much, claiming that McCain “is a demonstrated
vote getter among independents.” U.S. House Minority Leader John Boehner erroneously concluded that McCain
“appeals to almost all Republicans,” suggesting a possibility that the rest of the Party may drift further from its
Conservative roots in order to better align itself with McCain’s seeming appeal to the “middle.”
In truth, neither of the recent races prove any such thing. Rather, they suggest that the American public, which was once
inspired by the audacity of a truly Conservative message, has since concluded that the GOP will never deliver on it. The
prominence of John McCain and his message of acquiescence to and accommodation of the Left only proves that a fight
to put Republicans in office will do little to further the Conservative cause.
As was the case in 1992, when Bill Clinton took the White House with only forty three percent of the vote, the current
political winds suggest nothing of a Democratic surge, so much as a total disillusionment with the “me too” wing of the
Republican Party.
In an ironic twist, McCain himself may yet prove to be immune to this effect, though he is the primary force motivating it.
And this is not owing to any political prowess on his part, but only to the obvious radicalism of his likely Democratic
opponent. Having now been revealed to the public for who he really is, no amount of political posturing and
backtracking can detach Barack Obama from the Far-Left fringe of the Democratic Party.
Yet, as defeated Republicans Woody Jenkins and Greg Davis learned in the two special elections, one cannot count on
every Democratic opponent carrying the sort of baggage weighing down Obama. A believably “Conservative” Democrat
poses a formidable rival to a Republican whose Party has clouded and, to an appalling degree, abandoned its once
inspiring Conservative message.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
American Politics & Political Competition:
Elections, PACs, & Political Parties
American Government & the U.S. Presidency:
Presidential Politics & National Leadership
The American Political System:
Politics & Government in the U.S.A.
The American Political & Cultural Left:
Liberals, Statists, Socialists, & Other Leftists
Liberalism Versus Conservatism in American Politics
-------------------------
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY & POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES:
COMPETING SYSTEMS OF POLITICAL THOUGHT
Conservatism
Traditional Conservatism: Questions & Answers
Conservatism: Attitudes, Types, & Present Status
Constitutional Conservatism: American & British
Liberalism
Classical Liberalism: Intellectual Foundations
Classical Liberalism: Conservative Liberalism
Manchester Liberalism & Social Darwinism
Modern Social "Liberalism": Statist "Liberalism"
Radical & Totalitarian Ideologies
Radicalism, Utopianism, & Totalitarianism
Christopher G. Adamo is a freelance writer who lives in southeastern Wyoming and works in the field of industrial instrumentation.
He is actively involved in Wyoming's political process, serving as a delegate to successive Wyoming State Republican Conventions
and as a member of the Wyoming State Republican Central Committee. He has assisted Republican candidates for local and state
legislatures and for the United States Congress. His articles, which appear regularly in The Progressive Conservative, U.S.A.,
and on a number of other websites, reflect a major concern with the damage being done to Conservatism and Conservative causes by
the Liberal Leftist faction in the Republican Party as well as by the much larger and more powerful Liberal Leftist faction in the
Democratic Party. During the early and middle 1990s, Adamo was Editor of the Wyoming Christian Coalition's official news organ,
The Wyoming Christian.
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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Conservative Government Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity