We really do need to dial back the overuse of the RINO label . . . save it for those Republicans who truly do not adhere to GOP core principles.  When we find ourselves in an internal disagreement, the question we should be asking is:  Can we disagree on this matter without compromising the core principles of the party?

For example, I don't necessarily agree with Rep. Amash's support of NRAV, but his position, as he himself articulated it, is well reasoned and defensible.  I don't happen to agree with it, but his points are solid.  And I see no good reason to make an otherwise solid republitarian "walk the plank" because of a challengeable position.

The Wizard does have a point in that any true Republican will embrace both fiscal and social conservatism.  Said Republican will also, on the campaign trail and on the record, point out where his opponent does not, and why that difference is important.  At the risk of really irritating Nick, I think that Dick DeVos' big screw-up on 2006 was failing to get squarely behind MCRI (as well as waffling on the debate question that gave him a chance to support right-to-work), and inadequately shredding the Governess based on her record (falsehoods about sexism be damned).

Of course, these are just my thoughts.  What follows are the thoughts of my personal politial hero.

But Dick DeVos was all that and more and lost miserably to an already failed governor.

What's up with that?  He had all the conservative credentials and positions yet lost.

I suspect in this case it was The Messenger - not the message - that lost.

DCuz
www.RightCuz.com

Devos is a great guy and would've done us a lot of good as governor, but he never answered the outsourcing to china attack, he never could get away from the bad feelings a lot of folks have about Amway, and he never quite connected to folks.  

When I saw an article in the Oakland Press that they were considering buying a house in the county because he was campaigning so much down there, I knew the gig was up.

Not that I am bashing on our candidate, but once they Democrat checklist to attack him was printed up, they very easily were able to x all the boxes in people's perceptions.

Rich, out of touch, dirty businessman, doesn't care about the American worker, extremist, and so on.

And there were so many arrows being flung that they couldn't all be knocked down.  And to be perfectly frank, there wasn't an attempt to knock most of them down.

And once that took hold, Granholm was inevitably going to win.

And, although the waters from the "tidal wave" were lapping a wee bit closer to my race, and we ended it packing sandbags and standing on chairs and so on, we outperformed the top of the ticket by 10 points. And you look at most of the races that the GOP won, or even lost (that we shouldn't have) and you'll see that they outperformed the governor's race.

In 04 we either ran even with, or slightly outperformed, W.

This article in the Detroit News is part of a recurring phenomena, in which the party that does poorly in an election is said to be "cracking up" or "going extinct."

Now, when it's the GOP, they get positively giddy, since they can pile on and not worry about the biases that they have.

 Then they find some disgruntled folks to get a couple of juicy quotes from to stoke the fire, and bring up a series of random episodes to point out how our party is out of touch and so on.

We are losing because the Democrats are out hustling us.  That's it.  This isn't about RINOs and the Youth vote and abandoning the pro life cause and not being hip, or a lack of twittering and so on.

They took advantage of crappy economic conditions, anxiety over the war, and general malaise with government... and out hustled us.

Novices talk strategy, experts talk logistics.

In my little election as a township trustee, I narrowly beat the Democrat I ran against.  And mine has been a reliably Republican township for generations.  I'd keep telling myself this is because the Dems hit a high water mark with the election of Obama.  They won't be nearly as successful in future elections.

But I also sense we may be going through a sea change in this country.  After 26 years of conservative rule (from Reagan in 1980 through 2006), has the country decided it's time to give the libs (for 4, 8, 12, or 26 years) control?  There's an entire generation of voters who weren't around in the 60's and 70's to remember first hand what liberal ideology did to this country.  

Is it possible our side will be on the sidelines for longer than just a couple years (i.e. 1992-1994 then we took control of Congress with the '94 elections)?

I have a nagging sense we may be in the wilderness for much longer than any of us dare to think.

DCuz
www.RightCuz.com

What we need is a fiscal equivalent to Right to Life. That is, usually in a GOP primary, someone who loses the Right to Life endorsement gets the kiss of death for his candidacy. But you don't see that if the candidate gets both the right to life and the MEA endorsement. This is unnacceptable, and I would argue that, for example, in a state house GOP primary, if candidate A is endorsed by right to life and the MEA, but candidate B is endorsed by Great Lakes Education Project then candidate A is NOT superior to candidate B.