We Can Do Better… a Whole Lot Better

The Republicans wasted a golden opportunity when Todd Akin made his now infamous quip about “legitimate rape.” Instead of locking arms to condemn the man, they could have mentioned that the Republican Party (unlike another party whose name starts with “D-” and ends with “-emocrat”) does not value solidarity more than it loves freedom, liberty, and the wholesomeness of dissent. After all, dissent is the engine of federalism. It is the reason our country has enjoyed up until now the longest-lived written Constitution. We didn’t used to believe everyone had to agree on every little thing. Leftists like to parade around their love of diversity, but we all know that the only diversity they appreciate is one where no one disagrees. Why else would they have lambasted Todd Akin and Dan Cathy? Isn’t this a free country? Aren’t we allowed to hold opinions that differ from our neighbors’? Apparently not.

And the Republican National Convention was just another sign that the Republican Party will not abide by dissent either, not even among its friends.

I know Obama is bad. He’s almost definitely the worst president we’ve ever had. But the biggest problem with Obama and all his compatriots is their abiding confidence that the “federal” government knows better than average citizens and local governments. Centralization and totalitarianism have been the earmarks of our national government for quite some time now, and, though the Republican Party may have a different perspective on what the policies of our national government should be, it is becoming very clear that it has no intention of reducing the scope of those policies.

Did anyone notice a conspicuous omission in the tallying of delegates at the RNC? At first, I thought they were only mentioning the votes for the candidate that had won a majority in a particular state. But when Iowa’s delegate gave a very clear majority to Ron Paul, the moderator did not even mention Ron Paul’s name from the stage. In fact, no official representative mentioned Ron Paul’s name even though he won an overwhelming majority of delegates in six states, a handful of delegates in other states, and probably would have won more delegates if the GOP in those states didn’t have “winner-take-all” policies. You may hate Ron Paul’s views on foreign policy, drugs, homosexuality, or whatever. But you must at least feel some concern when a very significant dissenting voice in the Republican Party is treated like he does not exist. I thought we were better than this.

You think I’m reading too much into things? How about this: When there was a vote on adopting new rules for the Republican Party, it was not clear whether the affirmatives outweighed the negatives. The crowd was just about equally loud on both sides. Yet the Chairman of the RNC went right along as if no dissenting voices existed, not bothering to do a hand count to make sure the opinion of the delegates was being accurately represented. It was as if they already knew what they were going to do. It made the whole thing feel like a sham.

We all knew Romney was going to get the bid, so why not allow the voice of the dissenting states and the dissenting delegates to have their full weight? Why even bother to appoint delegates? To have primaries? If the GOP establishment is going to do whatever it pleases in the end no matter what, why even pretend “We the People” even matter at all? I’ll tell you why: Because we’ll submit more easily if we believe in the illusion that we can effect a change. I faintly remember Reagan calling the Soviet Union an Evil Empire for things like this.

I find it ironic that the live stream of the RNC on YouTube had a quote above the comment area for most of the convention that read:

Compared with Democrats, many Republicans believe in a more robust version of federalism with greater limitations placed upon federal power and a larger role reserved for the States.

Nice try. Diversity of opinion is necessary for true federalism, and it’s obvious that, in the Republican Party, the “States” have no larger role in anything. They aren’t even allowed to have a voice if their opinion differs from the “National” perspective, whatever that is. And if this is the way Republicans deal with their own party, what should we expect from a Romney presidency? I am so very disappointed right now. Not that Ron Paul lost. I already knew that was going to happen. I am disappointed that the Republican Party has lost, no matter who wins in November. If we value solidarity and unanimity over freedom, transparency, and truth, how are we fundamentally different from the totalitarians we criticize?

0 responses

  1. All throughout the delegate process, Ron Paul supporters were routinely barred from becoming delegates even though they played by the rules. The Romney supporters (still haven’t met one) sometimes didn’t even bother to show up to the local conventions, but the leadership made sure that even though the Ron Paulers had a majority, they would be stripped of their credentials and replaced with unelected Romney voters.

    What is the point at all of having a delegate process if the outcome is already predetermined by the RNC? The republican party at every step of the way broke its own rules to make sure Paul didn’t win delegates.

    • I believe the whole point of this convention was to take the effort and the power of the people and stick it into someone elses pocket. Damn the people all elitists ahead!

    • They have turned into BULLIES and emulating Obama as dictators.
      I was going to vote for Romney…he can forget it. I am NOT voting till we have a TEA PARTY set up to compete against the other two totally corrupt parties.
      I am also making myself heard to all my friends.

  2. If Romney still loses after all this—and if it becomes bloody apparent that most of the “unity” he was trying to flaunt before the world was completely fabricated and achieved only through outlawing dissent, forcibly removing differences of opinion, swindling rule changes at the last second, and using legal and political favors to arrest grassroots forces, I don’t see how he and his whole crew could avoid losing all credibility. But then again, we thought eight years of Bush would do that too—but it didn’t. Either way, recovery will require some faith in men, in politics, and in this party, which we’re all running short of right now. This was no convention today. It was just a public demonstration of the party’s next step toward dictatorship.

    P.S. — Read about the bus that Virginia delegates Morton Blackwell and Mike Rothfeld—two longtime, influential Virginia patriots—were on and what happened to it. (They were on the Rules committee—and they never made it to the meeting.)

  3. my feeling is that you may have a point but the biggest point is removing the person now in office who we know has so many more tricks up his sleeve.

  4. IMHO, another aspect of Romney & Co shown by this sort of activity also is an indication of the way he will govern. He portrays himself as a moral, honest, and honorable man – but, by behaving in this fashion, he shows himself to be amoral, dishonest and dishonorable. Sounds like some other major political figure we all know and love. Anyway, I was considering voting for Romney and Ryan, but no more. I will vote for either Gary Johnson (Libertarian Party) or Virgil Goode (Constitution Party) – but not for either of the so-called “Major” parties. No more of the so-called “lesser of two evils” – this must stop! They are but two sides of the same coin. But, to be honest, I am not surprised any more – both parties are equally corrupt, and will stoop to any means to grab power. A viable, independent thrd party is desperately needed to combat the Hegelian dialectic that has been set up for us, with the illusion of “choice”. Good luck to us all, and God save the Republic!

      • Oh, really? It’s funny because during the campaign, people would say that they liked Ron Paul, but they couldn’t vote for him because their one vote wouldn’t do anything. And now, all of a sudden my one vote for Ron Paul or anyone else besides Romney will make the world of difference?

    • blindersoff, if you vote for anyone other than romney, you voted for obama. are you that unpatriotic that you want obama for four more years? if you vote for gary johnson and obama wins, we will be thanking you and others like you who have the same misguided ideas.

      • So tell me, what is the difference between Obama and this Romney you espouse? Not a damn thing. They are both for stimulus, both for tax and spend, both are pro abortion, both are for bailouts, both are for increasing deficits, both are for gun control. Where is this difference that makes Romney a better choice? It seems to me that I am getting screwed either way. If he is this underhanded at the convention towards the Paul delegates, what lies are he telling you? iI he is this way at the convention(2 faced) what trick is he pulling on you? What scam has he got up his sleeve for America? It seems to me there is no difference between the candidates andf the parties, I hope Mitt wins so the ignorant in this country can see how they have been played for fools. But Mitt wont win, he is a shill to ensure Obama wins, he is lackluster at best, just like Bob Dole and John McCain, he is here to throw the election. He just proved this when he shut the door on 25-30 % of the delegates, these people represent 20 -30% of the voting conservatives, how is he going to win when he has destroyed a quarter of the party? The Paulites will not forget, neither will they forgive this final slight.

      • Who are you, to call blindersoff unpatriotic !? I consider him a patriotic American, just like myself. The International Corporate Mafia has orchestrated this choice of candidates for the American people, and I for one, am not buying it. Regardless which of these two candidates win, the revolution is on. They are both corporate controlled, evil twins. There is no lesser of two evils, no matter how much people want to believe it. Prepare yourself for the end life as you know it, because that’s exactly what’s going to happen.

  5. As far as I am concerned Romney has just lost the election. But then again maybe thats what he was hired to do just like Bob Dole and John McCain.

  6. We need to re establish the “Wide Awake” Party which was the pre cursor of the Republican Party when the Whig party died. The Republican Party is dying now, lets get ready to replace it. Liberty and Union!

  7. Romney should’ve co-opted Ron Paul in exchange for his delegates. Let Ron Paul audit the Federal Reserve!

  8. If voting could really change anything congress would have outlawed it years ago – unknown
    . (When I was a kid in the 70s i had a book that attributed this to mark twain, an Internet search now shows many sites attributing it to emma goldman or even noam chomsky. )

  9. Sorry but I just don’t share your feelings about Ron Paul. We have a country to save. Democrats remember will do anything to win. We are at a juncture in America where we have to put aside. You MUST remember that THESE Democrats are NOT patriots who merely disagree with us. This is not Jack Kennedy’s type of Democrat The are in my opinion un-Americans. Led by the “organizer-in-chief” they will do anything, invent law, disregard law, subvert law, attack. We don’t need another Ross Perot debacle.

    • Agreed. The issue is not really Ron Paul as such. It’s the fact that the RNC proved the Republican Party wasn’t much different from the Democrats in that they are not afraid to… how’d you put it? “Invent law, disregard law, subvert law, and attack.” Just look at what they did with the rules change committee. Blatantly totalitarian. I would have been happy to go along with Republicans if they had proved themselves to be fundamentally different from Democrats. But I’m afraid they just are not. Feel free to vote in Romney, but don’t be surprised when he turns out to be another version of the same big government throat-ramming.

      • I hope that Romney is like Obama in one sense. That is that he issues a lot of Executive Orders. But these are to undo the ones that Obama had written. One other thing that I am sure he will do is to replace the heads of all the “alphabet” agencies like EPA, FCC, DEA, etc., except he won’t have to replace the heads of those which are eliminated.

  10. Let’s be totally real, honest, and deep thinking here. Evil is content to work in slow, piecemeal changes with great patience to bring its dark agenda to pass. Evil uses tricks of great guile, subtlety and craft to infiltrate and work its malice. One of those tricks is that when good people rally together against a greater evil, evil will work subtly to trick them into compromising on principle to secure the seeming defeat of the greater evil. They become afraid that the greater evil will not be defeated unless they sweep aside the challenge in their faces, and so they unknowingly choose a camouflaged evil by compromising on the challenge in their faces to preserve what they think is their advantage in defeating the greater evil. What they have just done is plant a seed of evil within to stand against the evil without. Evil has just won, for it has gained a foothold within.

    That’s right. Think clearly now and take it in slowly. It happens all the time. A group of people who endeavor to stand up for good with high morals and values unites against a prevalent evil. They agree this evil must be defeated. In the course of being so focused and bent on defeating that evil, some internal challenges arise. What’s at stake now is their integrity. Will they deal with the challenges properly, honestly and according to their high morals and values, or will they cave in to pressure and act in a way that compromises their integrity by choosing to cast aside principle and what is right to brush the challenge under the rug and ignore it–because after all, the most important thing is to defeat the evil.

    Well, ladies and gentleman, compromise is the introduction of a hidden evil that gets implanted and will grow to wreak its future havoc all in the name of defeating evil now. That’s how evil breaks down life and systems and integrity and good.

    It is a shame and dishonor to the GOP that they did not deal fairly and honestly with Ron Paul and his delegates. Whether you like Ron Paul or not, the precedent for simply sweeping aside a dissenting group of grassroots activists was set and even established by party rules (the evil seed now planted) to inflate the illusion of party unity without undertaking the true, necessary, honest, noble and moral work to actually forge party unity.

    Out of many, one. That’s the genuine principle.

    Our founding fathers forged unity out of diversity, they did not sweep aside opposing views. This Republican compromise will now grow and added to the other compromises of the party will set the GOP on a path that will insure it will be as thoroughly hijacked as the Democratic party has become. The GOP has compromised principle and acted in a way that would be expected of the evil they are trying to defeat and therefore have unwittingly welcomed evil into the camp.

    Only when men and women choose principle over all else, will their actions prevail in truly and fully defeating evil and rooting it out. When principle is compromised, the evil is not rooted out, it is replanted elsewhere and allowed to fester and come back harder and more vicious another day.

  11. ROMNEY is dead. They have turned into BULLIES and emulating Obama as dictators.
    I was going to vote for Romney…he can forget it. I am NOT voting till we have a TEA PARTY set up to compete against the other two totally corrupt parties.
    I am also making myself heard to all my friends.

    • paul ryan has the full backing of the tea party. if romney loses then you eliminated any chance for a tea party supporter like ryan to ever be elected. if you vote for anyone other than romney, you voted for obama. i don’t agree with everything romney has said or done. but this election is to important. if obama gets reelected, he will destroy america. and if anyone votes for anyone other than romney, they will be just the same as an obama supporter.

  12. this is a totally bias article and disingenuous. gingrich and santorum won delegates too. where’s the outrage about their names not being mentioned during the delegate count? the fact is, gingrich, santorum and paul lost. period. gingrich and santorum are patriotic enough to get behind romney so obama will be defeated.
    i used to respect paul although his foreign policy ideas are about as goofy as you can get. now i’m totally disgusted with paul and supporters. paul acts like an egotistical sore loser. paul got his message across. if he was a true patriot and believes in america, he will support romney. if paul’s supporters vote for anyone other than romney just out of spite, they basically will be voting for obama. doing this would not only be disingenuous, it would be treasonist.

    • He does believe in America, evidently he believes in a better America than you do and is willing to stand his ground rather than “politics as usual”. There is no discernible difference between Romney and Obama. Two sides of the same coin. Paul gave us hope for a return to traditional American ideals. The real problem is far too many Americans are absolutely ignorant of what those ideals were. I guess the Federal takeover of public education has finally paid off.

      • don’t even suggest that paul or anyone else in this country believes in america more than i do. there is a discernible difference between romney and obama. romney’s not backed by communists, socialists, radical homosexuals or radical muslims. i’ve listened closely to paul who has good and bad ideas. but if you vote for anyone other than romney, you voted for obama. i wouldn’t want that on my conscience.

    • My main issue was that Ron Paul actually won state majorities, and his name was still not mentioned. The point is, the will of the national party, not the local or state constituencies, was being alone represented. My biggest problem though was the railroading of the rules change. It really was completely out of order. There is no spite going on here. With me at least. I vote on principle and I try to live on principle. If we are willing to break the rules with the idea that the end (voting out Obama) justifies the means (compromising the most basic principles of liberty and justice), we have already lost. Consider this interchange from “A Man For All Seasons”:

      William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!
      Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
      William Roper: Yes, I’d cut down every law in England to do that!
      Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil the benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!

      • an intellectual comment and i agree with you about principles. i don’t think paul should have been slighted either. but the main goal for every american should be to get obama out of here. i appreciate your intellectual and courteous comment. you make a good point .

  13. Watch 2016 to find out what zero has in store for his “next four years” in office.
    It makes sense and fits his historical track.

  14. There is a huge frustration with the Paulites who are still pitching a fit because their guy didn’t win. They have lost sight of the big picture: we need to remove the most inept and evil President from office who doesn’t support the constitution and breaks laws. Paulites are like two year olds throwing a tantrum on the floor in a grocery store because they didn’t get what they want. They are willing to throw an entire election and let the Infidel stay in office. I have several online Paulite friends and after months of declaring that the Ron Paul still had a chance to get elected, I’m just fed up listening to it because it never was going to stop unless they got their way! Ron Paul wasn’t the right person for the job; some good ideas, just too odd and would never have a chance getting elected. He really is a RINO who belongs in another party (Liberatarian or Independant). The Paulites didn’t win. Move on. BUT THEY WOULDN’T UNLESS THEY GOT THEIR WAY. EVERYONE, let’s focus on the important issue: removing BO of Hussein from office. After Romney is election, THEN let’s work on cleaning up the problems within the party and where it is headed: conservative or moderate. If it won’t budge, then perhaps the conservatives need to start a third party…after the election?

    • The big picture is this, there is no difference between the two parties or the established candidates. Paul was a hope for a return to traditional American ideals.We are not throwing a fit, we are determined to make things better. Go ahead and vote for Obomney and see what you get, a continuation of the same failed policies of Obama which are a continuation of the same failed policies of Bush which are a continuation of the same failed policies as Clinton, which are a continuation of…… and so on.

    • I agree… Paul in this case should have stepped down before the convention when it was obvious he had not won the bid to be candidate. this looks like whining to me … so he (Paul) did not get his hour in the sun…did it occur to anyone that the delegate count was skipped because of the weather…they had to squeeze 4 days activities into 3 days so obviously something had to be cut… It was already a foregone concusion that Mitt Romney was the candidate… he had more than enough votes… Paul and his followers should have stepped asides and pledged their support and shown a united Republican front… not run off like a bunch of democrats who didn’t agree with th program… Now is not the time for division… that is what O is hoping for… Let us unite with one purpose… NOBAMA IN 2012..Why must everything be a big conspiracy… let’s get over it, get out and vote and put ROMNEY AND RYAN IN THE WHITE HOUSE…..

  15. There is a huge frustration with the Paulites who are still pitching a fit because their guy didn’t win. They have lost sight of the big picture: we need to remove the most inept and evil President from office who doesn’t support the constitution and breaks laws. Paulites are like two year olds throwing a tantrum on the floor in a grocery store because they didn’t get what they want. They are willing to throw an entire election and let the Infidel stay in office. I have several online Paulite friends and after months of declaring that the Ron Paul still had a chance to get elected, I’m just fed up listening to it because it never was going to stop unless they got their way! Ron Paul wasn’t the right person for the job; some good ideas, just too odd and would never have a chance getting elected. He really is a RINO who belongs in another party (Liberatarian or Independant). The Paulites didn’t win. Move on. BUT THEY WOULDN’T UNLESS THEY GOT THEIR WAY. EVERYONE, let’s focus on the important issue: removing BO of Hussein from office. After Romney is election, THEN let’s work on cleaning up the problems within the party and where it is headed: conservative or moderate. If it won’t budge, then perhaps the conservatives need to start a third party…after the election?

  16. I agree with you. While dissent may look imperfect on the surface, it actually makes any candidate stronger. Unanimity is not all its cracked up to be. Anyone who believes that has drunk some Kool-aide. Dick Armey is correct, the delegates should not be silenced. Let the process play out. Romney’s nomination is safe. And Ron Paul supporters et al…will be voting for Romney in November. Tic them off and who knows?

  17. Catnip wrote: “paul ryan has the full backing of the tea party. if romney loses then
    you eliminated any chance for a tea party supporter like ryan to ever be
    elected. if you vote for anyone other than romney, you voted for obama.
    i don’t agree with everything romney has said or done. but this
    election is to important. if obama gets reelected, he will destroy
    america. and if anyone votes for anyone other than romney, they will be
    just the same as an obama supporter.”

    I agree with you Catnip. There are lots of dirty tricks within parliamentary procedure, campaigns etc…we don’t like it, nor do we approve. But we can’t change it if we bail out and let Obama win. RINOS can be gotten rid of. We are in process. Don’t jump ship now. A third party won’t fix the two party system.

  18. Romney is a more handsome version of the ayatollah barack hussein obama. Great is the pity that States cannot have total autonomy and that the governor’s can do everything possible to get their own States in the black and out of the red.. Also their should only be 2 people per state going to Senate and 2 to congress – thats is the way to cut that top heavy government down to size. end of Story

  19. We CAN do better because we are a Christian nation and we are children of God. Our blessings are no accident. Christians are not perfect but they know how to correct their problems because of the bible, which stands for Basic Instruction Before Leaving Earth. The Christian-Judeo culture made America great. It is the principles and values that we got from our bible that helped create the greatest country in the history of civilization. This is fact! There is a Divine Power that guides us if only we invite Him to do so. People like to call Christians “evil” but they can only offer the Crusades as an example. When you see people doing wrong, that is when they are NOT following Christian principles!. It is the Christians and the Jews that have made most of the inventions and done most of the discoveries. This is no accident, either. We must preserve our foundations and hold on to the things that keep us free. The highest form of government is self government but we cannot do it without God in our lives.

  20. Somebody compared what the GOP did to Paul and his delegates to what Obama did to Hillary in the last election. It is funny I could not argue with them. If this is how Romney and company deal with differing voices then if he wins in November we are in for a rough four years.

  21. We all need to kick the bumb out that created all these problem in the pass three years. If we have an american leader this would not have happen. We need to get rid of the traders……………….*Watch it now before it gets pulled from the internet!*
    http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=tCAffMSWSzY#t=28 Why Obama is failing as an american leader;*
    http://www.youtube.com/v/Z6QOscKvUjU?version=3&feature=player_detailpage Over 2,500 Department of Homeland Security Employees Have Been Convicted of Crimes…………http://teapartyeconomist.com/2012/08/28/over-2500-department-of-homeland-security-employees-have-been-convicted-of-crimes/

  22. I wish someone would just come out and say they are in favor of getting back to the Articles of Confederation. What exactly is the difference in the Republican position right now?

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