What does it MEAN to be a Republican?
Seriously. (And don’t bother pulling out your copy of the GOP platform. I can read as well as you can.)
The conventional wisdom is that the GOP is the *conservative* party — devoted passionately to things like cutting taxes, cutting spending, and restoring more freedom to the people. Many GOP candidates campaign on stuff like that. But then they get elected and spend the next two (or four or six) years servicing their donors and their donors’ lobbyists.
In North Carolina, there is a crime called “obtaining property by false pretenses.” You get elected to office promising things and then never deliver on them. You’ve obtained an asset of value – a job — by lying. In the real world, that could be a crime. During campaign time, thaaaaaaat is just *politics.*
At one time, there was little difference between the two major parties. The Democrats were seen as the party of the working man trying to pay his bills and put food on the table. The Republicans were rich white people and / or Yankees. Both parties didn’t mind spending or a larger government. It was the degree of each of those things that made the difference. During a lot of this phase, Republicans were shut out of power — Raleigh and DC — in the legislative and executive branches.
Then, something changed. Barry Goldwater rose to prominence in 1964 preaching the gospel of small government and lower taxes. That piqued the interest of the Democrat * working men* who were struggling with paying taxes and government overreach. Backing some of that off would certainly help them. He got crushed in a wave of sympathy for JFK. But the seed was planted.
We got Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon in 1968 picking up where Goldwater left off. Again, the Democrat *working man* was interested. Nixon got two terms in office, as did Reagan.
At the state level, Jesse Helms – a long-time on-air voice for WRAL — came along and won a Senate seat in 1972. His on-air editorials and campaign rhetoric followed in the footsteps of Reagan, Nixon and Goldwater. People liked what they heard and gave the man six terms (30 years) in office.
Honest political scholars attribute Helms with convincing conservative voters in eastern North Carolina it was OK to leave your grandpa’s Democrat Party and vote Republican. Helms arguably got the ball rolling on making North Carolina a credible, honest-to-God two-party state.
I spent about two years in DC working for Helms. I ran into numerous folks visiting from back home who told me some variation of this:
“I don’t agree with the senator on everything. But he is so incredibly responsive, and he actually does what he tells you he’s going to do. You don’t have to speculate on where he’s going to come down on an issue. And that’s refreshing.”
Listening to and responding to folks from back home. Actually doing what you said you were going to do. Why are these attributes so rare among our elected class? It’s kind of sad, isn’t it?
Republicans took over Raleigh in 2010 – promising a radical change from the shenanigans of Marc Basnight, Jim Black and Tony Rand. They made voters believe they were going to get the stuff Reagan, Nixon, Goldwater and Helms talked about.
After years of things like Greater Carolina and the antics of the Phil Berger machine, it can be argued that *our side* is just as bad as what they replaced. Apparently, even Republicans like to tweak the gears of government for donors and enrich themselves and their friends with confiscated and appropriated taxpayer funds.
There has been no serious effort – in DC or Raleigh – to dramatically cut spending and ease the burden on taxpayers. DOGE was exactly what conservatives have been dreaming about. But a bipartisan effort choked the life out of any DOGE-like efforts to make meaningful cuts in spending or regulation. Apparently, it’s *good* to be on the inside playing with other people’s money.
Does anyone seriously think electing Roy Cooper over Mike Whatley is going to unleash a wave of communist repression?
Both of those guys agree on January 6 and on government-subsidized green energy. Both of these guys have lived their entire adult lives dependent on government cash. Whatley would be a lot like Tillis, and not far off from Cooper.
From what I hear, Republicans can hold the Senate in DC even if Whatley loses.
Whatley has been – and is – a lobbyist. He’s not going to rock the boat. The campaign has been conducted at a nanny-nanny-boo-boo level with nary a word about ideas to right our national economic ship. Neither one of them wants to talk about it because both plan to be good soldiers to their party leadership in the Senate. That means aiding and abetting more spending and more jacking up of the debt.
We keep hearing this stuff about loyalty to Trump. Trump is in DC for two more years. The Senate term is six years. I’d much more prefer loyalty to the ideal of limited government. Politicians come and go. Ideas are forever.
We are all familiar with Lucy and Charlie Brown in the Peanuts cartoons trying to kick the football. Charlie would come running at the ball, and Lucy would pull it away from him every time. Eventually, Charlie Brown learned and stopped. When will we?
How much longer will we keep falling for the same old crap?
It’s not unreasonable to expect your *representative* to respect you and your opinions over those of the party leaders or majority leader or the speaker.
People keep responding to the limited government message because they believe the GOP is going to do it — and not pull the football away again.
Limited government is worth fighting for. If the scoundrels we keep electing keep resisting – fire them and find some new ones who will listen and comply.
It seems that when Republicans overturn long-standing Democrat rule, as happened in Congress in 1994 and in Raleigh in 2010, we got good stuff for a term or two, but then the corruption and sloth that accompany power set in. Soon we are left with the choice at the polls of, “Well, they’re pretty lousy at solving the real problems, but the Democrats are even worse — they create them.” What a dismal, demoralizing state of affairs we have reached! But we have to vote for Whatley, even if we get a quarter of a loaf. Maybe just a mere slice. At least we will not get sewage poured down our throats by Cooper and the woke Democrats.
I appreciate your post and words.
However, don’t we tire of the, ‘we must vote and get a quarter of a loaf’???
Name names. Report on their personal wealth and its sources. Report on their personal lives, that is often fraught with poor character. It’s not that hard to determine. Start with solar farms and gambling including the state lottery. Look into airport and school construction, rife with cronyism. Look into medical insurance and hospital spending. Then government supported day care. Let the chips then fall. Expose them all.
What you said reminds me of Frank Sossamon trying to get his NC-32 seat back after real conservatives threw his worthless self out of office in 2024, reasoning that we couldn’t do any worse with the radical socialist who replaced him. Solar industry? Check. Gambling legalization? Check. Medicaid expansion? Check. He voted for/supports all that garbage and particularly in the case of Medicaid expansion, I’m told he had the nerve to tell the folks back home that the leadership in Raleigh told him it was the right thing to vote for. Now he’s campaigning again and telling everyone he’s got an affordability plan. Pfft. Does that plan include ditching expensive solar and eliminating Certificate of Need laws?
Yes, I believe Roy Cooper’s election would likely unleash a wave of radical socialism, if not something even worse. Why? Cooper is a Democrat yes-man and will vote down the line with an increasingly radicalized Chuck Schumer. Schumer is afraid of a primary challenge from the hard left from AOC, so he will be toing the far left line. If Democrats get a senate majority, that becomes a massive problem for America.
The old conservative Democrats have been an extinct critter for decades, and the moderate Democrats are now also in the process of becoming extinct. The only one left in the senate is Fetterman and he is not going to seek reelection.. Democrats who tell you they are “moderate” are liars. Look at Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger, who campaigned last year as a “moderate” but has gone fully hard left since the day she was sworn in.
Sadly, we have some serious rot in the Republican Party, too. John Thune is a disaster as senate leader, and Whatley would probably vote to give him another term. Thune is milquetoast Mitch McConnell 2.0, and not fit to lead. The GOP needs a real leader in the senate, not the timid likes of McConnell and Thune.
No, I do NOT want an elected official in bed with the leftwing Green New Deal wind / solar scam that makes electricity more expensive and less reliable while damaging the environment. Because the Democrat hierarchy is in bed with this special interest in a huge way, however, I see that threat as more seriously coming from Democrats, including Roy Cooper. Cooper pushed the NC Green New Deal, and got turncoat Phil Berger to do Cooper’s dirty work in the legislature to push it through.
Phil Berger was/is a rat, but there are/were lots and lots of rats aboard the ship their actions sunk.
Those rats are the ones which derailed the conservative movement and squadered the opportunity We The People gave them to reform goverment.
Those rats betrayed us for personal gain.
We The People should not rest until each and everyone of the Berger supporters/enablers is out of power.
PS: In their selfish quest for personal wealth and power, the same Uniparty Establishment “Republicans” also managed to destroy the NC Republican Party and their respective county parties.
We The Poeple should never forget or forgive that.
In Dante’s Inferno, crooked politicans were submerged in boiling tar in the deepest part of Hell for all eternity. Even that doesn’t sound like adequate punishment for their betrayal of The People.
I was one of those conservative eastern Carolina voters that joined Helms in moving away from my grandparent’s Democrat Party. I was an active Republican when we took over Raleigh in 2010 after being a long-time one-party state. For me and others of my generation, the stuff Reagan, Nixon, Goldwater and Helms talked about was a lot more than some kind of phony baloney political game plan antic. It seems the joke has been on us.
Our main function in the party now-days is to point out that it is we the much-maligned conservative grassroots members that are actually working to live up to the Republican Party platform. For that we are labeled extremists and much worse.
At this point the main reason for any of us to stay Republican is ballot access. I think ballot access barriers must be torn down if we are to salvage our constitutional republic. Reforming one of the major parties seems to be the least likely option of all our poor options facing us. I hope I’m wrong about that. Sincere candidates oftentimes have a hard road in the present-day landscape.
Having someone to vote for should not be an impossibility. We the People do not have to accept this scenario as something we have to participate in. We do not have to comply, and we shouldn’t be subjected to that expectation.
People like me that are technically serving on Republican executive committees officially urge voters to vote Republican. At the same time, as a human-being I would never demand anyone to be a political zombie. Also, let’s be real – there’s plenty of my fellow Republicans that are all in on opposing me as a party official and as an elected office holder. Many are much more determined in that regard than any supposed opposition to Democrats they may have. That’s the political minefield we navigate today. Being an advocate of the Republican Party Platform and the Republican Party Plans of Organization do not necessarily protect any one of us from modern day Republican Party wrath.
It seems harder and harder to find “clean” candidates Republican or Democrat. So many today are running FOR the money/corruption. Cooper has no record to be proud of, as he edges himself up the ladder for larger stakes.
He is pure Biden/Obama. The disloyal Thom Tillis has implaled the NC Republican Party over petty issues. No real leader is Tillis.
If NC turns BLUE, watch the exodus of sound, solid citizens and a resistence for new industry to settle here. Some small communities with inexperienced leadership have pushed massive entry level and low income multifamily housing, to as they say…”fix the national housing crisis” and placing a label on their community. Small towns are consistently electing leaders with little or no experience with the operation of a town small or otherwise….and nor are they equipped to raise the quality of life for the residents.
If Republicans are to influence a better North Carolina, they must arrive at a vision aimed at a brighter future for sound growth and stable management.