[quote]countingbeans wrote:
[quote]BPCorso wrote:
I’m an obnoxious conservative turned [/quote]
I’m a reformed Contemporary American Liberal… Nice ot meet you.
This thread is like AA. [/quote]
LOL!
Mufasa
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
…Are there more listeners for a “we need a government the size of the one we had in 1820 and let’s abolish a bunch of other stuff”? No.
[/quote]
Every single one of us is sitting here waiting for you to produce the statement by or the video clip of Cruz saying anything resembling this.
Even though I’ll be here the rest of the day please don’t dally.
Sometimes, TB, your hyperbole puts YOU on the “fringe.”[/quote]
C’mon, Push - it’s ok that your preferred candidates undergoes criticism, that’s just part of grown up politics.
Cruz repeatedly says he wants to “return to the Constitution” - ok, well, where does he want to return to? He says it - it must mean something. So, when? Burden is on him (or his followers) to explain what this means.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
[quote] pushharder wrote:
Losers.[/quote]
The first Bush won, before lost. Reagan - tax-raising, amnesty-loving Reagan - won twice. The second Bush - pretty right-wing, but in a conventional sense, he never called for a return to the 18th century - won twice.
The closest comparison in the modern era to Cruz, Barry Goldwater, did not.
Different kinds of right-wing-ish types have won, but their moderation was a reason they did, and the reasons the others lost was not on account of their moderation.[/quote]
Speaking of historical revisionism you practice it with flourish. Let me help you with how things really went down.
Ford, a moderate backed by the GOP establishment, LOST.
Reagan, a true conservative (with some errors – amnesty, machine gun ban of 1986) and not backed by the GOP establishment the first two go-rounds (1976, 1980) and tax-cutting sumbitch until forced into a corner by a Demo controlled Congress DID raise some taxes. He WON twice.
The elder Bush, a moderate backed by the GOP establishment, won his first term DIRECTLY on the coat tails of Reagan and because of one of the weakest Dem candidates in 100+ years (Dukakis). The second time he ran, and with only his own coat tails, i.e., his moderate record, he LOST.
Dole, a moderate backed by the GOP establishment, LOST.
Bush II, more conservative than moderate (until he ran off the rails grossly increasing the size of the federal gov’t) and not necessarily backed initially by the GOP establishment[/u] WON twice.
McCain, a moderate backed by the GOP establishment, LOST.
Romney, a moderate backed by the GOP establishment, LOST.
[/quote]
This isn’t inconsistent with what I said - what I also said was that the candidates who won were helped by their moderation, and the ones who didn’t win weren’t hurt by it.
And Reagan was pretty conservative, but he was an apostate on three critical issues - gun control, immigration, and taxes. He’d be attacked as a RINO today because of thosr betrayals. And curiously, you forgive him for one of them because liberals pushed him into a corner to agree - precisely the kind of capitulation that would end his run in a primary (“he wouldn’t stand up for conservative principles when it counted!!!”).
Look, there is no massive base of sleeping hard-right voters that a Ted Cruz can ignite to a victory. If they existed, surely they would have turned out in legions in 2008 to turn out the antichrist Obama who is days away from destroying the country. They didn’t, and the idea that this sleeping majority will turn out in 2016 - when Obama will be gone and even the Democrat will spend some time running against the Obama years - is foolish. It is a terrible electoral strategy.
The idea that the GOP simply hasn’t been running candidates far enough to the right to win general elections makes little sense. It’s a fantasy for hard right wing types who want to believe more people agree with them than actually do.
NO thread hijack, honestly.
Would like feedback on this: Had the Dems not gotten into a damned fine pissing match back in '08, and Hillary had been the Vp (the horror, the horror)( a blazing saddles flashback as well, the mayor is a *…). Do you think it would have given Hillary a better chance for 2016 than she has now.
Also, who else is going to come out of the woodwork for the Repubs, and who will end up being who’s wingman.
Remember that if the Pres gets nocked off, then the Vp takes the Top Dawg spot.
this is an honest question, thank you.
killerDIRK
[quote]Mufasa wrote:
[quote]
LOL, you may be right. If so, you’re brilliant!
Ah, you’re brilliant anyway.[/quote]
You guys can make me so mad sometimes that I can’t post for a week (and maybe I frustrate you sometimes too!)
But more times than not, you all have greater insights than many “experts”.
Mufasa[/quote]
Mufasa, you are a PWI institution and I always read your posts in the threads I participate in. You always bring not only intelligence, but good common sense. We’re better for having you around.
[quote]killerDIRK wrote:
Do you think it would have given Hillary a better chance for 2016 than she has now.
[/quote]
No. I think the only thing hurting Hillary right now is the following:
-
Over exposure. We’ve been hearing how she is going to win in 2016 since 2012, from every lefty that couldn’t help by gloat because Obama beat a squish that expected all the good parts about him to market themselves somehow.
-
Her age.
-
Being married to Bill.
On topic one, everyone on the left expects 2016 to get the same turnout that Obama got, and everyone on the right expects those typically low turnout voters to be way down. The right is more likely than not correct as Hill just doesn’t have the same Pizzaz that Obama did, and “first female POTUS” isn’t as big of a draw because it’s a Clinton. That said it won’t be down enough for the right to just run out some toolbox that alienates blocks of entire demographics.
Some are predicting there are some swing states trying to get weed on the ballot in 2016 to get youth vote out. If that is the case… Hillary wins no matter the R candidate.
What he says:
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
What he says:
I think I’m right… I think the republicans finally, for the love of Christ found a chess move rather than play checkers with this.
It’s really just, beautiful if you sit back and think about it. All this teeth grinding…
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Look, there is no massive base of sleeping hard-right voters that a Ted Cruz can ignite to a victory. [/quote]
You talking about Birch’s silent majority?
If so, I think they exist, but only on a per issue basis, and include D letter voters too. As in, if only one or two issues was at stake, yes you would see ground swell for the right person.
However, being POTUS is about dozens of issues, which tampers this, and means no one candidate will get it all right and wake a sleeping giant.
[quote]countingbeans wrote:
You talking about Birch’s silent majority?
If so, I think they exist, but only on a per issue basis, and include D letter voters too. As in, if only one or two issues was at stake, yes you would see ground swell for the right person.
However, being POTUS is about dozens of issues, which tampers this, and means no one candidate will get it all right and wake a sleeping giant. [/quote]
I feel this is like that “the answer depends on how you frame the poll question” type of deal.
[quote]magick wrote:
[quote]countingbeans wrote:
You talking about Birch’s silent majority?
If so, I think they exist, but only on a per issue basis, and include D letter voters too. As in, if only one or two issues was at stake, yes you would see ground swell for the right person.
However, being POTUS is about dozens of issues, which tampers this, and means no one candidate will get it all right and wake a sleeping giant. [/quote]
I feel this is like that “the answer depends on how you frame the poll question” type of deal.[/quote]
Not exactly a glowing review here, but you’ll get the idea.
I’m trying to find the article I read on their theory of the silent majority, I keep coming up Nixon, lol. So I may be mixing up topics here as it’s been a long time since I looked into the “Birchers”.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]BPCorso wrote:
When is the last time someone who was loathed by their own party representing that party for the presidency?
[/quote]
Your youth is quite evident with this post.
[/quote]
I like Ted Cruz. Although I don’t agree with everything he has done; he has done a great job representing Texas and we need someone that is willing to ‘muddy the water’ occasionally. Speaking as someone that was around in 1980…Cruz in no Reagan. Despite the rhetoric, Reagan was a pragmatist not an ideolog. He was a master at selecting his battles and negotiating. I don’t recognize either characteristic in the current version of Cruz. He may be fit to be an adviser to ‘The Man’, but he’s not ready to be ‘The Man’.
Just a few bullet points on Reagan and his ability to balance priorities…
*Ronald Reagan looked to revenue increases, broadening the tax base, closing loopholes and raising taxes. Yes, he raised taxes in 1982, 1984, 1985, 1986 and 1987."
*During his administration, the top income tax rate decreased from 70 percent in 1981 to 28 percent in 1986. But to combat a rising deficit and debt burden, Reagan also approved increased taxes.
*In 1982, The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act raised taxes by $37.5 billion per year, and the Highway Revenue Act raised the gasoline tax by $3.3 billion.
*In 1983, Reagan signed off on legislation to raise payroll taxes and tax Social Security benefits for some higher earners.
*In 1984, the Deficit Reduction Act included increases in taxes on estates and distilled spirits and ended some business tax breaks, to the tune of $18 billion per year.
*In 1985, Reagan signed legislation making permanent a 16-cent federal excise tax on a pack of cigarettes, then worth about $2.4 billion a year.
*In 1986, the Tax Reform Act lowered the top income tax bracket from 50 percent to 28 percent. To pay for the reductions, however, the legislation closed a number of tax loopholes.
*In 1987, Reagan signed the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act that extended the telephone excise tax and eliminated a real estate tax deduction loophole.
However…
*When Reagan took office in 1981, federal taxes were 19.6 percent of GDP, the highest level since World War II. That figure dropped to 17.3 percent during his first term and rose to 18.2 percent at the end of his second term.
And and more critical review from a left leaning web-site…
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/02/05/142288/reagan-centennial/
Although it might appear I’m critical of Reagan nothing could be further from the truth. IMO…we have no better leader since; precisely because he was able to separate the ‘wheat from the chaff’ and make decisions despite the background noise. Cruz may be a good Senator, but he’s not Presidential material at the present time.
[quote]Alrightmiami19c wrote:
I like Ted Cruz. I’m interested to see if all the lefties will attack his being born in Canada if he runs for president. The same people who were calling “birthers” nut jobs for questioning Obama’s birthplace will be all over Cruz.
[/quote]
Nope. Only right winger retards do this.