Do the RIGHT Thing, Principles Matter, Votes Have Consequences
Posted by Andy on February 27th, 2008
There’s plenty of internal party discussion on what to do about the 6 (R)s who raised taxes $7 Billion. Overnight a group of us in CD6 had the MDE post on the Seifert presser yesterday sent to us with a request for comments.
Here are mine:
There needs to be further action taken. Abler is already trying to say the Guv made him do it. Tinglestad doesn’t give a rip. These 6 need to go as do the 2 in the Senate who voted to override for no reason other than their strong desire for a $7 billion tax increase on the citizens. Those are not Republican values or principles. Democrats didn’t run on raising taxes in 06, neither did Republicans, so why in the world did 8 Republicans do so?
I’m part of a conservative network group that had the State Chamber of Commerce as a participant. We had been meeting monthly at party HQ, but on Caucus day they moved to the Chamber offices. The group is headed by the TaxPayer’s League, but organized by another person. When this month’s invite came and I saw it was at the Chamber again, I respectfully declined and told him I’d no longer participate if the Chamber was involved.
Numerous other people did the same and the next meeting has been canceled. Oh and our business is canceling our membership to the state chamber.
Our local Chamber opposed the State org’s plan. Local chapters are the real small business home. The state chamber is driven by huge corporations that that are seeking to lower costs by having state taxpayers pick up their operating costs. I encourage all of you to check with your local Chamber’s and see if they supported the State Chamber. Adjust your memberships accordingly.
Now let’s find some real conservatives and run them against Tinglestad and Abler. We can’t have these 2 on the ballot for the (R)s. It is going to hurt Bachmann. If we follow our principles we can’t support Abler or Tinglestad at the CD level. Bachmann can’t afford to write off 2 HDs.
AAA
For all my fellow conservatives who don’t want to let Abler and Tinglestad get away with it. Here’s what you/we need to do. We need to find people to run against and challenge them. If there is no alternative, these BPOUs will have no choice.
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February 27th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Do you think it would be appropriate for voters to write respectful letters to the state Chamber telling them that we will no longer do business with their membership?
LL
February 27th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
I have a hard time believing that people who believe in fiscal conservatism are not going to vote for Rep Bachmann.
February 27th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
LL
Great idea! Post the list of their members.
Sue Jeffers
February 27th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
Brent - if conservatives are PO’d enough to just stay home it is the same thing as not voting for Michele. We had that problem down here in 2006. We had an 8000 vote drop off due to people in our SD being PO’d at the Governor and the President.
LL
February 27th, 2008 at 8:18 pm
if conservatives are PO’d enough to just stay home it is the same thing as not voting for Michele.
exactly! Last week’s vote was a direct result of the choices made in 2006. Now people are outraged and want to do something about it. Now, right now. But it doesn’t work that way. They can’t do anything this year about what happened since 2006. The choices they make this fall will change what happens in 2009 and 2010.
In 2006 people choose by either voting or not voting. They choose to elect the DFL in huge numbers and the tax increases and huge spending increases that came with that. What will they chose this November? Will they choose more tax increases and higher spending?
Some people seem astonished that we can elect near veto-proof levels of DFLers and then get tax increases. I’m more amazed that they didn’t really seem to expect that to happen.
February 27th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Brent you are leaving out a few key items.
The 800 pound donkeys of the 06 elections: Ed MN, MoveON, and other 527 esque liberal electioneering groups. They lied to voters and unfortunately they bought it. The GOP was offering nothing substantive in response, due to the problem of a certain upper ticket person who was courting Ed MN.
If as you claim conservative voters are to blame for the DFL’s sweeping victory, it means good news, yes, good news. We had 59% turnout in MN, down from near or round 80%. Your claims would lead to the conclusion that the 20% of Minnesota voters that didn’t show are conservatives. (ha, I may like your hypothesis) So if we can get that 20% to show up, bingo, slam dunk for the GOP in 08….. if we give them a reason to.
The 2006 Election was painted as the reelect Tim pawlenty at all costs election by the MNGOP. The MN House and Senate were written off early and it shows. The party frizzled away piles of money on polling in stead of utilizing that for message delivery. Republican voters, conservative and moderate, didn’t know what the party stood FOR. They saw the GOP legislators undermine law with the Twins stadium. They saw spending go up, and just got turned off by all the negativity that flowed out of 525 Park St.
My explanation for why things went so bad in the 06 election is simple, the party had lost its way and didn’t have people blindly following it around anymore. Sure there is a big chunk that will just vote (R) no matter what, but not a majority. There needs to be motivation to get people to make the investment to work.
You see elections are not won at the ballot box. Now bare with me. What happens on election day is the end result of months and months of hard work and effort put forth by elected officials, their campaigns, the party, and activists. The first 3 there will do something every time. the last won’t if the first 3 aren’t doing what the last wants.
That was the problem in 06. Sure, voters put Dems in the victory column in 06, but don’t forget that the trend started in 04. On the eve of the elections in 04, Republicans were large and in charge. We had 4 of the 5 Constitutional offices, a BIG majority in the House, a split on Congressional and US Senate seats, and we were in striking distance in the MN Senate with hopes of evening things out.
What a difference a few elections make. now you can sit there and cast blame and wave your finger at conservative voters, but you should look behind you. Conservative voters need to be inspired to work and vote. When the message they are fed is simply the Dems suck. The Dems are worse. The Dems can’t have power, a principled conservative will instinctive ask why when they see that their own party is, on too many issues, negligibly better than the Dems.
Now, here’s your last flaw. Democrats didn’t run on massive tax and spending increases. I believe restore may have been as far as they went on that issue. Oh sure, some of the uber liberals in the urban utopia were running on unbridled socialism, but not out here in the suburbs, or rural MN. Nope in way too many of those races, our natural advantage was blown by our own party. In many cases Democrats were able to outflank the (R)s on issues.
They ran on property tax relief and better education. Ending the war in Iraq may have cost a few seats here and there, but again that was mismanagement by the party on the issues the state legislature deals with. Voters weren’t given a clear and obvious choice. They were given we’re not as bad as them.
I’m guessing here, but I would bet the reason more (R)s lost in 06 was not because conservatives didn’t show up, but rather that turnout across the board was down. The problem was, and here comes the part you are really going to hate, is because moderates went to the Dems this time. The GOP was giving them Dem light for 2 straight cycles, but they remembered when they voted for (R)s in droves in 2002. Oh yeah, remember that year? Yeah that was the year conservatives won overwhelmingly.
That’s what a lot of those swing voters remembered when they cast what may have been their first (R) ever. Then all of a sudden, well over a Legislative session or two, they saw those conservatives they voted for turn into spineless moderates and proposing the ideas they voted against.
Long rant short: If even the Republicans won’t stand up for the conservative principles of the party, why in the world would volunteer conservatives bother going out of their way, and worse, voters pick us over them?
February 27th, 2008 at 10:12 pm
The 800 pound donkeys of the 06 elections: Ed MN, MoveON, and other 527 esque liberal electioneering groups. They lied to voters and unfortunately they bought it. The GOP was offering nothing substantive in response, due to the problem of a certain upper ticket person who was courting Ed MN.
Get ready because they are going to be lying to voters again this year.
Then all of a sudden, well over a Legislative session or two, they saw those conservatives they voted for turn into spineless moderates and proposing the ideas they voted against.
That doesn’t even make sense. If Republicans became like DFLers and proposed ideas the moderates voted against, why in the world would moderates then for the candidates that actually enthusiastically supported the ideas that moderates are supposedly against?
If even the Republicans won’t stand up for the conservative principles of the party, why in the world would volunteer conservatives bother going out of their way, and worse, voters pick us over them?
Well, the DFL has a long, long, long list of taxes and spending to go. The voters can choose to accept it or vote for someone else. I suspect that this November much like 2 years ago people are going to vote for more taxes and more spending. But that is a choice that they have the right to make.
February 27th, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Republicans have also gotten smarter. They don’t trust RINO’s and we can now call the Dem’s flat out liars. Dem’s stand for special interests, higher taxes, bigger government and they do NOT look out for the little guy. That applies to party leadership too.
B..you are exactly right what we sow now is what we reap in 2009 and 2010. Never underestimate a conservative who is motivated.
February 28th, 2008 at 10:26 am
Sue,
What Brent just can’t possibly comprehend in his moderate mind is that how (R)s sowing liberal ideas in 04 & 05 could possibly reap lack of motivation for the conservative base or for swing voters to swing to the right in 06.
We suck less is not a motivating factor. = Translation, (R)s didn’t give reasons why to vote FOR us.