Another RINO Holds On
13 September 2006While the Republican leadership wasn’t too happy with Katherine Harris’ win, they are pretty happy with Chafee’s. This race was similar to Harris’ in that the Republican leadership pulled out all the stops to support the least conservative candidate. In both cases they believed that the more conservative candidate could not win in November.
In the case of Lincoln Chafee the Republican leadership may well be right. Still, outside of the majority status it is difficult to see how a Democrat would be worse than Chafee who votes with Democrats more than 90% of the time. He famously announced that he would not vote for President Bush and he is currently blocking the nomination of John Bolton as UN Ambassador.
Chafee is truly an embarrassment to the Republican party. He is a genuine RINO (Republican in name only) who loves to thumb his nose at the party. Former Cranston mayor, conservative Steve Laffey opposed Chafee for the nomination. While Laffey has excellent conservative credentials, he was considered unelectable in the general election in liberal Rhode Island.
In other primary news, Vermont Socialist Congressman Bernie Sanders won the Democrat nomination for Senate. Sanders is running to replace Jim Jeffords who is retiring. Jeffords, you’ll recall, was a RINO who left the Republican party and became an independent when he didn’t get his way. Most conservatives applauded Jeffords exit from the party.
As expected Hillary Clinton easily secured her nomination to continue as the junior Senator from New York. Republicans saw little chance to defeat Clinton so no real effort was expended on the attempt.
In Arizona the National Republican party again backed a less conservative candidate. Randy Graf, the conservative candidate, beat state representative Steve Huffman, a moderate. Once again the national party was concerned that a conservative candidate would lose to the Democrat come November.
I am all for victory for the Republican party IF victory means we are electing conservatives. However, the national party has time and again taken the position that the party needs to be more moderate in order to win. Nothing could be further from the truth! In race after race all across the country true conservative candidates who run on solid conservative platforms have been winning. Certainly there are exceptions, as in Rhode Island, but generally speaking this country is closer to conservatives than to liberals. If it was not the liberals wouldn’t run from the liberal label.
I am losing patience with the Republican party. Just as a number of Democrats have left their party over the last decade or claiming the party left them, so many Republicans are considering jumping ship because the Republican party is leaving them. In national politics there is a jerky move to the left and it is not good for this country. If Republicans insist on moving the party to the left, I hope they are prepared for ultimate defeat in November. Rank and file Republicans will not come out in large numbers to support a party that is no longer conservative. While we are willing to make some compromises, we are tired of nothing but compromises, each more left leaning than the last.
It is time for grass roots Republicans to speak up. Write your Congressman and your Senators. Tell them to support conservative causes and candidates. Tell them you are sick of RINOs. Tell them your party affiliation hangs in the balance. If they hear from enough of us they will get the message and do the right thing. Only then will the party be rid of troublemakers like Chafee, Specter and Graham who care little about anything but reelection.
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