Thankfully I don’t drink much at all and I don’t want to, nor have plans to do so the day I take her up there for check-in.

But I do have a new bottle of Famous Grouse Gold Reserve that looks mighty good right now….. just had the same talk with Mom for the 20th time about the why, what and maybe when…. that;’s what hurts the most.

I’ve been with them for going on 2 years now. Can’t take care of ‘em anymore – physically on their end or otherwise.

Got my one and only DUI that night.

As soon as I get my parents situated I’m in full bore (this is not fun ; both of Mom & Dad going to a nursing home – he’s there already).

I plan on getting heavily involved with my local/state CONSERVATIVE organizations (GOP – y’all lost me a long time ago) and the strongest 2nd Amendment folks – I’m already a member of NRA, GOA and JPFO.

Cheers !

I rather like what Nancy Pelosi is doing in shutting out the Republicans, not so much because they won’t get anything done but because she’s showing the nation that the only compromise her Congress is interested in is capitulation. Add in the intolerance of the extreme left and the moderates on both sides are really going to get tired.

2010 is not that far away, really. Republicans have no cohesive message, no conservative principles it can uphold with examples, and it’s in a whole peck of trouble. If we keep rushing headlong into this, nothing is going to help and I’m really in the frame of mind of nation first and what conservative principles can do for it.

You’re right that there are so many differences in the “no compromise” areas so all I have to say about that is: If people keep trying to force those issues, we’re going to be in a neverending battle that even if we win, we lose. We would become the fascists that the left is always saying we are and more like them than our founding fathers would ever have intended. The extreme right can be as fascist as the extreme left. The only difference between the two extremes is what they focus their fascist ways upon.

There are things that government has to do to insure our security. The rest should be up to us, as individuals, within our communities, cities, and states. The religious right can’t save souls by forcing certain behaviors no more than the environmentalist left can save the planet with their screwed up policies that often cause more damage than good. Such behavioral controls do nothing, regardless of the motives. They might make people feel good… in the short term… but long term?

If we don’t recognize that government has limitations and should have limitations, all we’re going to do is make one big mess. Oh, wait, we’ve already done that, haven’t we?

Perhaps the answer isn’t so much compromise as finding a way to show that conservatism is really the only answer to this country’s ills. It just isn’t attractive anymore because people have forgotten what it was like when, once upon a time, conservatives were pretty much in the same position as they are today.

Perhaps, we need to show how conservatism empowers people. I can’t conceive of being anything but conservative, even to the point that I’ve been considering calling myself an Independent conservative because there is no party where I “fit”, if that makes sense, so I can understand why you have that reaction to McCain’s loss. I kind of have the same feeling ut, you’re right, it’d be a hard case to make.

I will no longer send money to the RNC as long as they court me in the primary and forget me after they’re elected or ignore my beliefs altogether as they did in the primary this past cycle.

Congratulations moderates, you’ve finally motivated me enough to get off my fat backside and get in the game.

But back to the question of “how far do we go?” – I think Erick Erickson answered a similar question quite well here. I smart-assed a comment on another thread and referred to the Rolling Stones “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” as representing the situation – sometimes we just don’t have the ideal option at our disposal, so we have to settle for the next best thing. John McCain is the perfect example of this. In retrospect, many of us are somewhat relieved (in a warped sort of way) that McCain didn’t get elected, as he was soooo far from the ideal option that one could make the case that we’d be worse off than with Obama (it’s a hard case to make, but the discussion is interesting)

I like your question. A number of the RS contributors have tossed around ideas about where we could/should compromise, and I think we all came to the conclusion that it’s a heck of a lot harder question than it appears on the surface. We all tend to have our “no compromise” issues, and when you stir them all together, you’re left with a heck of a dilemma. I don’t think I have an answer to it.

I believe the article would be a better representation of what you’re asking if you would more clearly define what you mean by compromise. Some of the comments speak to that confusion when questions such as “giving up principles for the sake of compromise… are part of the responses.

Maybe I’m out of line since I haven’t put up a diary in ages and don’t really spend a lot of time commenting but I’m thinking that instead of rushing forward blindly as we’ve been doing since Clinton defeated Bush1 we need to step back and reevaluate what we are and what we stand for… as individuals, as a conservative, and a nation.

I see us as conservatives and Republicans still rushing forward without a real goal in sight. We say we have goals but what we’re rushing toward isn’t those goals. I see a lot of people parroting Reagan conservative ideology but how many really know what it is all about? And do they know how to live it?

You briefly mentioned Fred Thompson and while it’s probably meaningless at this point, there was something there that you missed that could have been included in this article. Fred ran because people said they wanted real conservatism but when Fred told and showed them what real conservatism is about, they found they didn’t want it after all.

Being conservative in a liberal world is a tough task. It’s so easy to fall for the promises which, when they are fulfilled do make life easier in the short term but over the long haul the resultant misery makes conservative living look like a cake walk… until people get tired or lazy again. It’s a seemingly neverending cycle.

So, where do we draw the line on compromise?

Oh and I agree….;^)

Don’t compromise or hide your beliefs. Just be aware that change happens in baby steps.

As far as my question above, the reason why I wrote it was in response to many other posts that said things like “become the guy they can’t live without”, in the context that it was said it troubled me. Personally when I get involved here in VT I am not going to hide my beliefs, just to gain the trust of those who would sell me out once they discover who I am. I would rather go in knowing who is with me and who I need to keep a watchful eye on. If they ask me to tone it down on some matter of principal in order for me to gain access to the club, I will promptly tell them to pound sand.

Now this isn’t to say I would withdraw from participating, rather I would simply make it my mission to show them how a principled activist can be successful. the eventual hope being that the rightness of my beliefs would win over more minds then it would lose.

In some cases, you can only advance them incrementally. In other cases, you can take great strides. The compromise comes in the decisions made to advance your principles, not in actually compromising your principles.

A number of readers have read our listing of Duncan as 2nd choice as some sort of compromise on principles. It is no such thing. See e.g. my Mitch McConnell punches. We happen to believe Duncan was unable to do his job because of several factors and if he could do his job, which he is now in a position to, we’ll be able to advance our conservative principles effectively.

We’re not about compromising principles around here. Hell, if we did, we’d be a much bigger site. But we don’t want pro-aborts as contributors and we don’t want profanity all over the place, etc.

Frankly, if you’re not identifiable as one of the above, you’re a name on a list. If your name isn’t recognizable to a Party official or an officeholder, if you contact them about some issue or concern, the VERY FIRST thing they do is look up your party registration and who, if anyone, you gave money to. There’s a lot of difference in the way the email, letter, or phone call gets treated if it is referred to as “he’s a constituent” as opposed to “he’s a supporter.” Usually, if you gave money to the other party or the other guy, you go to the bottom of the stack if not the ignore file, If you’re a constituent but are an NP or registered with the other party, you go in the “when I get around to it” stack. If you’re registered with their party and gave money, you’ll get in the “he’s a supporter” file and somebody will listen to you. They might not do what you want, but they’ll at least address you and your concern.

And finally, there’s stateing your position or concern, there’s complaining, and there’s being a pain in the a**. It is a whole lot easier to be the purist and the harda** if it isn’t your name on the door or your vote to cast. I’m not saying that to excuse the linguine spined and the compulsive compromisers, but the World does look a lot different when you’re the one responsible for some action and all you can do is try to move in the direction of your objectives. You can’t always get there in one step or even in one hundred steps but you try to do things that get you there step by step and not do things that cause you to step backwards, especially that last bit. Sometimes, “it was the best I could get” is not a good response to a constituent, supporter, or ally, but sometimes “the best I could get” is simply all you can get. There is, after all, that guy on the other side of the ditch.

My other objective here was to remind people that the Redstate Directors endorsed Ken Blackwell. Somehow that seems to have been lost in the flamefest about Mike Duncan. Fine, people don’t like Duncan. You (the “royal you”) don’t have to support him. But make damn sure you convey that to the RNC. Just remember that a) the first choice of the Directors was Blackwell, and b) the choices made were based on NOT just ideology but also the belief that those two men are able to get the right GOP candidates elected…. which, of course is the #1 job of the Chairman. The #1 job is not to be God’s gift to conservatism, but we’d love for that to be true as well.

What is the best way to find a contact so I can sign up with my local party office?

The change we all desire isn’t going to happen overnight. We have to do it one precinct and one county at a time. It’s going to be a lot of work. But if each RedState regular takes 1 precinct or 1 county, this process will be much shorter.

And will continue to do the work necessary (as Moe suggested above). And will continue to fight the degradation of our party from within.

But let me ask you, if I “save my ire” for Democrats, how am I to get fired up to do what’s necessary in the party. I don’t merely have ire for democrats. I have a problem with every member of the party I’ve called home for the last 10 years who seeks to weaken its principles and bring in those ideals that we’ve supposedly been fighting.

I suppose the main problem I have, bs, is with the constant meme of “go along to get along” that we’ve been hearing lately. It’s this idea that once decisions are made within the party hierarchy (or even during an incredibly stupid primary process) — even if they are the wrong ones — that we need to just shut up and be good little soldiers.

I’ll be clear: I will work with every other Conservative Republican willing to change things from within, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to just toe the line when they make the wrong decision. And I’m not going to be told — or listen to others being told — that they aren’t holding up their end if they decide they don’t want their hard-earned money going to whatever idiocy the Party Leadership has on the table.