Is this a joke??? And you Dem's want to tell me what doctor to go to, what drink my kids can have, whether I can smoke, whether I can wear my crucifix on my neck in public, etc. etc. etc...

Actually the Democrats might be able to respond better to why Campaign finance reform failed and their "gray area" ties - Specially Kerry.

Again, I don't want to take this thread off track.

-Rudey

Do you feel it's the party in general or Bush that has gone slightly off-kilter? I think he has the right general idea, but is misguided in a lot of the finer details of issues. I don't usually pay much attention to politics--meaning I hear the big stuff but that's about it--unless it's to yell at our idiotic Gov. (I hate that man). I am a registered Republican and most of my views align with that.

No, I think it's the party in general (or should I say party leadership) that has gone farther and farther to the right.

I personally think that he's trying to shoot at too many different issues at once. And it's not just a Bush thing - I think there is just so much pressure from different groups on him.

For example, my views on the economy all of a sudden have become tied to a whole load of other issues. All of a sudden I find myself dealing with a religious agenda that I don't want to deal with.

I think I'm not the only one to feel this. There was an article on the Gay membership of the Republican party. 25% of homosexuals voted Republican in the last election. Funding and membership in the Log Cabin Republicans increased as soon as Bush proposed an agenda limiting gay marriages. The group will now try and exert more influence and pressure in the party.

How do you balance all these different issues?

Historically issues started getting combined over anti-slavery and it was actually the precursor to the Republican party to do this.

-Rudey
--I wish I could vote on separate issues as opposed to one unified agenda.

Haha.

The problem is that people tend to think Republican = small government and fiscally conservative, but clearly with the Bush administration this is not true. So anybody who considers themselves a Republican based on those factors (which is a lot of the conservatives I know) is not getting what they counted on when they voted for the GOP. Ditto the Democrats and any sort of social progressivism -- there are very few truly progressive Democrats left out there. So those of us who vote Democratic for social reasons and those who vote Republican because of the small government/financial conservatism -- which from what I've noticed basically covers most of Americans -- are really getting screwed.

While I agree with 33girl that the country has shifted to the right in recent years (and will probably start shifting back to the left in a little while), I disagree that the country has polarized to the extremes. In fact, if anything I'd say the opposite is true. I don't consider my political views radical at ALL but most of the Democratic presidential candidates were too moderate for me. Of course that's not really surprising -- all of the candidates, Bush included, have been catering to the middle to try and get votes, and that's not exactly a revolutionary political strategy. But -- although I'm not old enough to have really studied this phenomenon in depth yet -- it seems to me like it gets worse with every passing election.

On a complete tangent, there has been talk of a Kerry/McCain ticket and although I think it has about a snowball's chance in hell of happening, it would be really interesting and a great move on Kerry's part for attracting more moderates without isolating too many liberals (who, for whatever reasons, seem to like McCain quite a bit . . . "you know, for a Republican").

I didn't say the country had shifted right, I said the leadership of the Republican party had.

I like the vote on each issue individually idea...then tally them all up and whoever wins on the most gets to be Prez. With our luck we would end up with LaRouche. :)

I also agree with that to an extent ;) although I think that's been facilitated by the country's shift to the right. Bush and friends know they can openly support more conservative policies if the country's more conservative.

Given the results of our last Presidential election and the polls I've seen "if the election were held today", it looks to me like we're split just about 50/50. Perhaps some areas of the country have shifted right, but I don't see it in my geographic area. I tend to agree that we are polarizing. As the Republican party shifts further right, it makes them Dems go further left to balance it out.

I would love a Kerry/McCain ticket. I would have voted for McCain in 2000.

Dee

Actually I was a confused Republican growing up but then I saw the light:)

1) The current leading prospect for the Democratic party has stated that he would, indeed, choose spending programs over tax initiatives.

2) Clinton only cut the deficit on paper. It has actually been increasing steadily. And, he certainly didn't shrink government spending!!!

No vote is a wasted vote! I can't believe you even said that!!!

Let's get back on track on who else feels confused. The reason that there are only two people to choose from lend to the confusion. And at the end of the day, the people running aren't running to get elected - they run to bring issues to the table.

-Rudey

1) How is he "against" tax initiatives when he's stated he wants to raise taxes (removing the Bush administration sponsored tax cuts)? Your statement is contrary to one of his strongest positions. This is my problem with Kerry. He's two-faced. He'll say whatever the polls tell him to and then turn around and do something different.

2) No vote is wasted? Tell that to Nader's supporters in Florida during the last election cycle. Or the conservatives that voted for Perot in '92.

Ugh listen go argue about extraneous topics in another thread. Talking about 2 faced? I consider a president who says he supports AIDS funding and doesn't deliver, a president who says we have 60 stem cell lines to research with when we have 10, a president who passes temporary tax cuts to be just as 2-faced.

And again, no vote is wasted since it's not about who gets elected. There are 40 year cycles where certain parties maintain power and concentrate on certain issues.

-Rudey

At least he's consistant and predictable. Always goes the way that Jesus tells him to:rolleyes:

I don't find it nearly so bad if someone's motivated by religious convictions (which he has to know has cost him support in many areas) as one who is seemingly says anything in order to gain power.

The temporary tax cuts were supposed to be a stimulus for the economy. It's debatable that they were one of the contributing factors to the recovery, but here we are in a recovering economy.

You can talk yourself blue in the face about 'no vote is wasted'. It's not going to change the fact that voting for an extreme right or left 3rd party candidate will only be contributing to the center-opposite candidate's campaign by removing a potential vote from whoever your 2nd choice would have probably been.

The only real place we can make a difference is in the primary election. Unfortunately, American voters are too quick to jump on the bandwagon of the annointed one.