Thursday, November 24, 2005

Thanks for Nuthin’, Boys

 
What the poll numbers for President Bush don’t tell you is how much of the decline in his approval ratings comes from people to his right. Those of us who thought that Mr. Bush might really change the political culture of Washington D.C., who thought he might rein in spending, who thought he might limit the intrusiveness of government in ordinary peoples’ lives — well, we had another think coming.

Contemplating the craven and profligate behavior of Republicans in Congress, the ordinary grassroots conservative is disgusted. With the exception of the President’s conduct of the war against the Great Islamic Jihad — and even that has had its wobbly moments — there isn’t a dime’s worth of difference between the two parties.

I have argued previously that the only way to effect change in the national GOP is to hit them where it hurts: create a hemorrhage in their beloved supply of cash. Fortunately, we at Gates of Vienna were provided another opportunity yesterday to put our (withheld) money where our mouth is. The following message arrived in our mailbox, with my name on the envelope, but, strangely, someone else’s name and address on the letter inside:

REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE
310 FIRST STREET, SOUTHEAST       WASHINGTON, D.C. 20003       www.GOP.com

SUSAN GAZDO
MEMBERSHIP DIRECTOR


Mr Buddy Dudley
[Redacted address]

Dear Mr Dudley,

I don't want to believe you've abandoned the Republican Party, but I have to ask ... Have you given up?


What on earth might have given you that idea? Could you have possibly acquired a Clue Bag?

Our records show we have not yet received your 2005 Republican National Committee membership contribution.

Your records are correct: don’t hold your breath. You might look in the Clue Bag for the following message:
     The world is tilting, and you useless, ineffectual, dithering moneysuckers seem increasingly to be empty suits, given shape and movement not by ideas and a willingness to serve the electorate, but by wispy tufts of ambitious smoke. You seem directed toward nothing more than keeping your almighty Senate or House seat in your name. You give away your power, you give away your advantages in committee, you leave in place utterly feckless people like Arlen Specter and then, when you finally seem like you are on the cusp of doing something productive and right, like investigating the CIA or okaying drilling in a bare, muddily, uninhabitable tundra, you fall into a faint and go slinking back to your states and districts to gladhand and pump for money and then gladhand some more.
Mr Dudley, President Bush is counting on Republican leaders like you to help him with the tough challenges that lie ahead in his second term.

Mr. Bush can’t even count on his Capitol Hill colleagues or his own cabinet; why should he count on me?. His only true allies seem to be his Vice President and his Secretary of Defense, not to mention the soldiers in Iraq laying their lives on the line for his belief in the spread of liberty.

While we strengthened our majorities in Congress, the margin is still narrow -- and that means liberal Democrats will continue their delay and filibuster tactics.

A fat lot of good our “strengthened majorities” did. With RINOs like Arlen Specter on our side, we might as well be campaigning for Joe Biden. As for “delay and filibuster”, would you like to talk about the Gang of Fourteen? With so many turncoats in the current Congress, it’s hard to tell the elephants from the donkeys.

But as we learned during the President's first term, the Clinton/Kennedy/Kerry Democrats will obstruct and delay our agenda at every turn.

Pray tell, what has changed here? Obstruction and delay is not just a Democrat preoccupation.

So if you have delayed in renewing your membership because you feel the RNC has let you down or no longer needs you, please let me know. I need to hear from you.

That’s what this is. I’m putting you on notice. This shameless bunch of invertebrate poll-readers are embarrassing the rank-and-file conservatives. We’re looking for alternatives, and we do not expect to find then at the RNC. We’ve long since quit looking under that rock.

If isn’t already, the Republican establishment should be lying awake at night in a cold sweat thinking about the 2006 primary season. Check out the plans at the Club for Growth.


Just include your comments and suggestions with the enclosed Membership Confirmation and return them with your 2005 membership renewal check.

In summary, Ms. Gazdo,

  • Get a Clue Bag.
  • Look in it early and often. Conservatives, compassionate and otherwise, are already sending you angry, desperate messages. So far, they’re going unread.
  • Arlen Specter et al. are worse enemies than any Democrat. The political expediency that “required” the President to endorse this specter has come back to haunt him. Sometimes integrity is essential.
  • See “delay and obstruction.”
  • Watch the Republican primaries in 2006.
  • And consider joining a Twelve-Step group to overcome your Pork Addiction.

Please don't quit now! Renew your RNC membership today. Thank you.

Sincerely,
Signature

Susan Gazdo
Membership Director

P.S. Our nation is closely divided politically. We need the support of every Republican to provide the resources President Bush and the GOP Congress needs to defeat the liberal Democrats and fully enact our agenda.


“Agenda”??? What agenda? Oh, you mean ladling out the big slimy gobs of pork into every outstretched hand? And then cowering under the bed every time the New York Times or CNN says a disapproving word?

While you’re at it, why don’t you proclaim our renewed friendship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, our faithful ally in the War on Terror? What? Oh. You already did…


Please don't give up now. Please renew your RNC membership today. Thank you.

Oh, I won’t give up now. I gave up long ago.

Happy Thanksgiving, RNC. Gobble, gobble! Oink, oink!

12 comments:

Pastorius said...

I think you need to figure out what is most important to you right now.

Papa Ray said...

I'm tempted to just copy and paste the last fifty or so emails I have sent to my congress idiots.

But in the interest of neatness and anti-egomania, I wont.

But I can boil them all down to just this.

You guys are not doing your jobs, you are being paid to take care of the Nation's business and the Business of Texas citizens.

This is your notice if you don't do all you can to help this state and nation to prosper and grow, you are going to lose your high paying job and all its perks.

You are also failing in your duty to make sure this nation will not only survive against the Islamic threat but to win and win decisively, wiping out any and all threats to our nation and the American People.

I have sent so many that they most likely just delete them when they see my name.

But I am not giving up.

Papa Ray
West Texas
USA

MrSpkr said...

Amen, GoV. Repulicans long ago traded in their gonads for business as usual.

It is depressing.

Anonymous said...

So what's a conservative to do? Shall we start a grassroots Dudley for President movement? To combat the ever so thrilling Sheehan for Prez campaign by the "I am completely insane" branch of the DP.

Just let us know what your platform is --as long as it doesn't involve women *of a certain age* going topless with placards that read "Breasts Not Bombs."

Seriously, it's a very sad state of affairs when you reach the point of despair in your own party. We need better choices, but what are they?

antifraud said...

Baron, you nailed this one. Thanks for posting this. Can we get an honest to goodness 3rd party going next time up? I don't think the two parties of choice can give us any choices that would be any different that what's going on presently.

Pastorius said...

A third party will be the death of conservatism.

I think you guys need to figure out what is most important to you right now.

antifraud said...

Pastorius said...
A third party will be the death of conservatism.


And tell me how conservatism is alive in the party today.

Pastorius said...
I think you guys need to figure out what is most important to you right now.


You've said that already. So tell me more about this conservative party. I must have missed that press release, as I haven't seen anything resembling "conservatism" in this administration.

El Jefe Maximo said...

In general I agree with this post, but given that it's true, what can we do at present ? We have between 20-30 or so percent of the electorate that is actively dangerous, or supports dangerous candidates and policies (one part intractable poor, one part very bright and rich movers and shakers); then 30-40 percent that is reasonably conservative; and everybody else wishy-washy in the middle.

This last is the most difficult group. How anybody sentient could NOT know where they stand on the issues confronting us is beyond me, but this group does not, because (save for its leavening of born contrarians and ticket-splitters) it is the portion of voters which is least interested in politics, and which has no time for history, current events or even reading the papers. But this group runs the country, and keeping a majority has to be based on catering to them.

This being the case, what can we do ? Yeah, I'm disgruntled at the Republicans on many levels right now, but I don't see any alternative to them other than handing the country over to Cindy Sheehan and company. We will then lose the war.

I'd sooner trust Jeffrey Daumer than the Democrats right now. They cannot be trusted with our security. But all this conservative upsetment is going to produce nothing but Democratic majorities in Congress and a Democratic president in 2008. If the Democrats even get control of one house of Congress in 2006, we will see hearings and investigations on a staggering scale. The President will have difficult avoiding impeachment.

I receive the same mailings you do. I think the thing I dislike about them most is that they are often so patronising. The mailings are too transparently propaganda. I'd respond much more favorably, more often, to a more intellectual or personal appeal, or even a simple statement along the lines of "we're short of money now, we need your help and that of millions of others, or the Michael Moores are gonna beat us."

As I say, I share your concerns. But I see nothing we can do about them, at present, that won't make matters worse, other than to keep yelling at the solons when they get it wrong. We must hang together now or hang separately next year.

Pastorius said...

Antifraud,
It ought to obvious what I mean. This site is called Gates of Vienna for a good reason.

You know, I'm not even going to dignify this argument with a longwinded explanation.

We are in the middle of a war, guys.

I think you need to figure out what is most important to you right now.

Go ahead and be sarcastic with me, if you want.

Amuse yourselves to death.

Pastorius said...

And, one more thing, if you think you are going to turn "The Gates of Vienna" into a metaphor meaning the defense of conservatism itself, then once again, you are amusing yourselves.

We can not afford the luxury of metaphor in time of war.

I am very surprised and disappointed in the people who are commenting here. That I am the only dissenting voice shows what the problem is with Bush's second term.

For God's sake.

Baron Bodissey said...

Pastorius --

Our defense against the Jihad is ill-served by the likes of Bill Frist. Republican leaders need to hear our outrage, and be motivated by it to change their behavior (if they are opporunists, then they surely will). Otherwise we need to throw them out and elect people who will truly defend our country, even if the New York Times does not like it.

But I propose to do this without losing the Republican majority by strategic targeting in the Republican primaries -- see my new post on the topic. A few notable upsets in the primaries will send a message loud and clear to the rest of the pork-loving spineless bunch.

The profligate spending by Congress (without a single veto by the President, mind you) does great damage to our national security by sucking resources away from vital operations. When defense authorization bills come up, they get resisted more than they would otherwise, because the money has already been directed to to the pals of Congress. When the time comes to make a strategic decision -- to mount an operation against a state sponsor of terrorists, say -- the President may think twice about taking action if knows he faces resistance in Congress to funding it.

This is scandalous and it has to stop, and the sooner the better. Ten years from now, when Iran has nukes and Europe has collapsed, it will be too late.

Pastorius said...

My opinion is this war is grinding on too slowly because of the attack Bush is under from the MSM. We should have been in Syria and Iran already. If we do not take care of those two threats, the war will have been for nought. The fact that the Republican Party has been turning against itself has cause Bush's second term to turn into one problem after another, and he is almost incapable of doing anything right now.

Do you think we wouldn't have taken out Iran's nuke facilities by now, if it weren't for the constant barrage of idiocy that Bush has had to endure? Do you remember the momentum that existed just 10 months ago?

Baron, I respect your intelligence and your opinion, but, in my opinion, you are off on this.