GOP Candidates And Office Holders Beware
By Thomas D. Segel
February 15, 2008
If the GOP candidates and office holders don't wake up and face reality soon, the party will be able to hold next year's convention in a telephone booth. For the past six years those wearing the party brand name in Congress have ignored those principles that helped them win office. They have pandered to the special interests, lobbyists and congressional elitists to the point where grass roots Republicans have turned away in disgust.
Those who failed to listen to calls from a return to solid conservative principles now see the handwriting on the wall. They will not win reelection in November. Instead of admitting the error of their ways and promising to return to the winning ways of past GOP election victors, we now have a mass exodus of those who abandoned traditional party values. We are fast approaching three dozen members of Congress who are no longer willing to face voters and defend their dismal record of non-achievement.
There is one hard fact that is impossible for those seeking office to ignore. When those claiming to be Republicans operated as conservatives they won time and time again. When they accepted the guidelines established during the Reagan Revolution, they won time and time again. When they signed the pledge to support the Contract with America they won in a landslide. Then, once in office long enough to be tainted by the elitism that contaminates most of Congress, they fell from grace...and the party has been losing, losing, losing.
Last week the GOPUSA Eagle published what it calls the 'Contract with Conservatives'. It lists those principles of governance that have won for the GOP in the past, and will again in the future, if candidates can honor the words of that document. The GOPUSA Eagle also placed a petition online to have conservatives sign. The number of signatures is growing daily. In brief, it says that those conservatives will support the presidential nominee and other candidates for high office, only if they uphold the Contract for Conservatives.
That contract calls for Immigration Reform that will secure America's borders, enforce employment laws, and not grant amnesty to those who are in the United States illegally.
It calls for tax reform including making the Bush tax cuts permanent, reducing taxes for business and individuals, and simplifying the tax code by moving toward a fair tax or flat tax.
The size and scope of the federal government is addressed. The contract calls for reducing the size of the federal government, reforming entitlement programs, respecting states rights and limiting the reach of the federal government as stated in the Constitution.
It charges candidates to cut spending, support a balanced budget amendment, eliminate ear-marks and support stand-alone spending bills.
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