Battle For GOP Continues

I'm sure you have all been watching the battle brewing between conservatives like Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney on one side and Colin Powell and Tom Ridge on the other.

Each side is claiming to represent the real GOP.

I'm no longer sure what the real GOP is. I am, however, pretty sure that Colin Powell does not represent a set of policy prerogatives of a party I'd want to be a member of. I hear that Powell and his supporters think the GOP should simply take a pass on the Sotomayor nomination. Their thinking goes "she's going to be confirmed, so opposition will just alienate women and Hispanics from the GOP".

David Broder wrote that "most intelligent Republican strategists" were alarmed by the loss of Hispanic support over the GOP's tough stance against immigration reform. He suggested that the GOP cannot afford to further alienate this group.

Well, I'm not a Republican strategist and I'm probably not that intelligent either, but, I cannot understand why supporting a law (immigration reform) which would increase the numbers of Hispanic voters, is considered intelligent. G.W. Bush did the best any Republican ever did with that group and he only got 40% of their vote.

More importantly, what kind of government leader casts votes solely on the basis of political impact?

Why could a majority of Democrats vote against Justices Roberts and Alito, solely on the grounds that their political views were too conservative, without any criticism, but a vote against Judge Sotomayor because she is too liberal is deemed partisan and wrong? President Obama voted against both Roberts and Alito despite acknowledging that both were first rate and well qualified. His no votes were based purely on political philosophy.

This brings me back to my main point. If the GOP is going to remain a serious, viable party, it has to have a discernible body of ideas and principles. The members of the party ought not be expected to subscribe to every single ideological position, but, they ought to agree to most of, if not all, of the core principles.

Colin Powell has indicated that we need a more "moderate" GOP. What does that mean? I want to know what principles and policies he thinks the GOP should advocate. Everything I've heard him say indicates that he agrees down the line with President Obama. If so, how can he deem himself a Republican. Obama's agenda is the most liberal we have ever seen.

From 1932 through 1994 the GOP rarely held a majority in either House or Senate. Everyone was cordial and they all got along. Bob Michel was a fine gentleman, Everett Dirksen a great guy. But, in the end, they were almost always in the minority. They got invited to dinner parties and played golf with the Democrats, but it was the Democrats that ran the country.

If the GOP is simply going to be a faint shadow of the Democrat party, its really not needed. I'll have to find a new party to call home. But there is a place in American politics for an active opposition party. I surely hope that the GOP does not become the Obama lapdog party that Gen. Powell seems to be advocating for.