hradzka: Cassidy, from Garth Ennis's PREACHER. (cass groovy, cassidy)hradzka ([personal profile] hradzka) wrote,
@ 2012-02-08 07:41 am UTC
Entry tags:politics
Crossposts:http://hradzka.livejournal.com/435215.html
I figure I'll do a few political posts from time to time this election year, just so all my lefty buddies in these parts know what the righties are thinking.

At the moment, there's considerable unhappiness with the candidates left. Mitt Romney has an accomplished resume and knows how to sort out problems, but he will literally say *anything* to get elected and conservatives don't trust him. Santorum has a consistent ideology, with which I strongly disagree; even people more socially conservative than I am dislike the fact that he has no compunctions about using gov power to compel his ends, rather than leave folks alone. Ron Paul, who's rumored to be suborning Romney delegates to vote for him on their *second* ballot, has ridiculous foreign policy ideas and has no compunctions against sidling up to lunacy if the lunatics'll give him money. And Gingrich, while The Smartest Guy in the Race, is unfortunately a narcissist.

Lots of folks are grumbling about a brokered convention. But who would step forward? Discontented righties have discussed it, and we think we've got a winner. Here, folks, is my chosen candidate for 2012.



Call me crazy, but I think this guy has a real crossover appeal.



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nicki: (uncover)


[personal profile] nicki
2012-02-08 05:54 am UTC (link)
My condolences? Where's Teddy Roosevelt when you need him? :P

IMO the Republican party is a victim of ideologues. Reality won't survive the level of ideology required by the current Republican party so you are either going to get stuck with lying realists or really really extreme big-government conservatives and neither of those is going to be particularly comfortable to anyone who isn't a really really extreme conservative or a liar.

(I had a whole thing on why the current Republican party is also having increasing trouble with women voters, but it's your journal so I'm not going to subject you to my rant on that topic)

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hradzka: Cassidy, from Garth Ennis's PREACHER. (cass groovy, cassidy)


[personal profile] hradzka
2012-02-09 08:51 am UTC (link)
This is a pretty common lefty perspective, but it gets the Republican party completely wrong. There are a bunch of different stripes of ideologues in the Republican party, and they are in a similar boat to the ones in the Democratic camp: they feel like they're not being sufficiently listened to. The social cons and evangelicals like Rick Santorum, but the libertarian Republicans *hate* him beyond all belief.

Curiously, I'd thought the most electable Republican in the race was Perry. This is mostly because I agreed with the folks who wanted to run Perry's jobs record in campaign commercials, over and over and over. And what happened? Perry ran a famously ideological commercial (oh noes, gays in our military and no prayer in our schools), and he *flamed out.* Nobody voted for him.

(Of course, it didn't help that he had major back surgery and decided to go on with the campaign rather than wait to recover. Oxycontin's a hell of a drug; I figure a lot of Perry's flops and flubs, including that famous YouTube video of him slurring incoherently, can be chalked up the fact that he was *high as balls.*)

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nicki: (uncover)


[personal profile] nicki
2012-02-09 05:02 pm UTC (link)
I have to admit that I don't generally consider the liberterian side of things because there hasn't been a legitimately serious libertarian candidate in a very long time (several decades? nearly a century? Ever (depending on your viewpoint?) and the Republican party I've spend the most time around is the Rick Santorum end (all those Colorado votes for Santorum? A significant number of them belonged to my semi-immediate family members.)

I would have guessed that Perry would have done well, but, yeah, his public appearances were not impressive. I do like the number of debates this year though. I think it gives a more much reality-based view of the candidates than usual commercials and gladhanding.

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hradzka: Cassidy, from Garth Ennis's PREACHER. (cass groovy, cassidy)


[personal profile] hradzka
2012-02-11 03:51 pm UTC (link)
I think this is a little like not considering the hard-left side of things because Dennis Kucinich never gets anywhere. Most of the Repubs I know are more on the libertarian side, and that strain has some surprising strengths in mainstream conservative thought. This is roughly where I'd put myself, but I find myself surprised to be considering more socially conservative angles as I get older.

I really wish the Gingrich-v-Cain debate model between just two candidates had caught on. Also, I wish Republicans would hold a debate with moderators who would ask about things that conservatives want to actually know about, rather than wasting time on gotcha questions, but there's a reason we're called the Stupid Party.

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