As I’m sure I’ve said before, I’m in Illinois.

The local Repubs had their own version of this civil war several years ago that resulted in a squish (Topinka) losing the Governors’ mansion to Rod “crook” Blagojevich of some recent notoriety.

One of the other results was Alan Keyes squaring off against Barak Obama. Why Keyes? Because the Topinka squishy wing would rather *lose elections* than admit their base contains conservatives. So, pitting Keyes against Obama, then giving Keyes almost no support was an obvious bone, but also a steel glove across the face of Illinois conservatives.

The end result is pretty obvious – at this point the Illinois republicans are unlikely to retake the Governors’ mansion even after Blagojevich, and Kirk is a longshot against the corrupt Giannoulias for the Senate seat Obama left behind.

I’m not saying to knuckle under. I am saying that we need to understand the opponents, both in the Lib/Dem party and in the GOP leadership. A more organized conservative organization could have propped up Keyes enough to make his race close or, better, fought to get a candidate who could appeal statewide.

Just sayin, if there’s no other way than splitting the GOP, then we’d better start building a parallel structure Right Now….

Mew

I especially liked the Ben Franklin quote. The more I think about it, I think the establishment pundits incorrectly talk about a Republican civil war. They do not realize this is actually a Republican revolution. The words loyalist and patriot can return to the meaning they had in 1776.

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Activists Taking Action: Unified Patriots

that to many of us, we have nothing left to lose. They have taken everything and given us nothing in return. We say “stop this nonsense” they just wring their hands. We have watched our country being slowly, but inexorably taken down this road, and really, we have everything to gain by fighting, nothing to lose.

I’ll just put it here.

Three things are important about Lincoln’s replacing generals in the Civil War and Roosevelt’s replacement of generals after Kasserine Pass: First, Lincoln and Roosevelt were in a position to replace general officers; second, they had other potential general officers to choose from, and, third, the general officers that were replaced had all been promoted to their high positions during peacetime.

Few of us are in a postion to replace privates in the Republican Party not to speak of generals and electoral threats do not necessarily threaten the Party’s organization establishment; if it did, they’d have all been gone in 2007. We have very few operatives to choose from, not interconnectedness between those operatives, and no agreed upon plan to fix either situation. And finally, we are paying the price for the Republican Party having run on money and outside organization focussed only on GOTV for so long; the Party apparatus is in dissarray. At the precinct, district, and in some cases state levels it is at best a social club or band of cronies rather than a true party apparatus. Consequently, everybody in power got there in the salad days of Congressional majorities, plenty of pork and opportunity to reward friends and punish enemies, and no reall challenges so long as the money and power flowed. Well the best they get is Democrat scraps not and they have to scrape and bow to get that; they simply do not know what to do with a hungry ruthless enemy anymore than a series of perfumed princes knew what to do with Lee, Jackson, and Longstreet’s “wolf-like men” or, later, the peacetime generals that faced Rommel’s myrmidons.

We need to get our hands on power within the Party and re-establish functioning Party organization and then we need to find the men and women who were the NCOs and LTs and CPTs in places where we did have to contest races, who help elect the Republican surge from Reagan to the ’94 Revolution. Then we can replace the generals.

your diary are the exact words that would come out of my mouth. WE need fighters in the Congress. WE need those would call the Democrats the RACISTS they are. WE need those who would call the Democrats the MURDER’s they are. WE need those who would call the Democrats the LEFTIST’s they are and NOT worry about the fallout but revel in the knowledge that the WORD IS OUT!

We conservatives will not get the attention of the liberal/moderate/RINO “leaderss” in our Party until we demonstrate that we can do more than blog all day.

We have to demonstrate that we have sufficient numbers of conservatives who are willing to actually get involved in the “dirty work” of politics — I don’t think it’s dirty work, by the way — and spend the our time, energy and talents in the Party itself. If we don’t do that, we have no chance of changing the status quo. And the “Establishment” knows it.

Maybe we don’t have the numbers. I think we do. I think we just don’t have enough conservatives who are willing to “show up.”

The problem is that not enough conservatives are willing, apparently, to actually join the Party at the grass roots level as precinct committeemen.

Again, the numbers in Maricopa County, AZ are instructive.

On Election Day, 2008, 694,000 people in Maricopa County were registered as Republicans.

About 6,320 precinct committeemen slots existed for representing those registered voters WITHIN the Party.

But, fewer than 1,900 of those slots were filled.

So, either, among the approximately 692,000 registered Republicans who were not precinct committeemen:

(a) there are not about 4,400 conservatives or

(b) there are 4,400 conservatives, but they are too busy blogging, complaining, or otherwise engaged in very important activities that really make a difference politically to bother becoming precinct committeemen.

I surmise there are far more than 4,400 conservatives among those registered Republicans. Because I have met many, many, many at Tea Parties and protests against socialized medicine outside my Debtocrat congresscritter’s office.

I try to recruit them to become precinct committeemen. Many had never even heard the words “precinct” and “committeemen” used together in a sentence.

Now, they are one.

Now, they DO have a Party. And they’re in it. And they have a chance to really make a difference in the leadership of the Party and as to which candidates succeed in all-important primary elections.

Thank you.

ColdWarrior

The Republican leadership, in Congress as well as the RNC, RNSC, RNCC…are no more dialed into the desires of its soldiers than are the Dems. The soldiers are the ones who will fight to take and fight to keep a mound of Moral Ground, while our leadership will give it up so they can be construed as “inclusive”.
This is not about being invited to the proper party, social or otherwise, it is about the Success of America. There are no true Statesman left, only Politicians. Politicians who see the Grassroots Soldiers as something to be moved around on a card table and a money source. We have proven over and over again that we not only are willing to fight for our cause but want to fight for our cause, it is our Leaders who do not have the stomach for a fight. I guess they are more concerned about “Re-Election” than doing what the Soldiers need them to do, FIGHT with us. Do not pull us off the battlefield only to give us a pep talk about it is better to pull back, regroup for a fight 18 months from now. In 18 months the plantation will have been pillaged and burned to the ground and who will be called on to rebuild it, only to give it back again and again, Grassroots Soldiers.
Grassroots Soldiers do not need spineless leaders, but these spineless leaders certainly need the Soldiers. If these Roll-over and expose our underbelly Republican Leaders think the Soldiers will Not become Mercenaries, for a third party, to fight for a Cause worth fighting for, they will be shocked when there are not enough Soldiers left to pick up their shinny Lobbiest purchased boots!
The Soldiers are and have been awake for years, it is these Soft Shelled Leaders that need to wake up and fight with us and not against us. If they use the same strategy as the Dems (where else will they go but to us) thinking, they will continue to lose not only skirmishes but the war to preserve American Soverginity. That is what this is about Soverginty of this Great Nation, not who can be next Speaker or Majority Leader, much less President!

The Reco button is missing above, but, if I could I would recommend this diary twice at least. Your voice, as well as all of ours, and many others are just making the “call to arms” louder each day. I love your full battle cry for the Republic. Very well written and inspiring.

The Reco button is missing above, but, if I could I would recommend this diary twice at least. Your voice, as well as all of ours, and many others are just making the “call to arms” louder each day. I love your full battle cry for the Republic. Very well written and inspiring.

“There is something the Republican establishment has failed to take into account before declaring their Civil War. In addition to being the true base of the Party, we are the ones who fight. We don’t scuffle like a couple of angry schoolchildren, we fight. ”

And yet some just decide to sit at home on election day if their nominee is less than perfect. The time to fight is NOW. And during the Primaries.

Sitting on your hands in November is not an option for adults.

Reco, BTW.

Excellent diary, nessa and so right-on. And Amen to Penguin, Art, Jaded and ColdWarrior.
This is a war with many fronts and each of us must choose where we can best fight the Zombie March. We have the problems with the GOP party leadership that is deaf to our protestations. They won’t fight for us, so we have to dilute our Zombie fighting efforts by trying to get them in line! We call, we write, we meet ‘em in town halls and through their votes they tell us to pack sand. So, littlel is right in that we – the Soldiers, the Grassroots are the ones that must get the attention of the leadership. Nessa’s right that the time has passed for comity and the good ole boy approach to Congress. So one front is within our own party. If that’s the front on which you want to fight, then follow ColdWarrior’s advice and become a precinct chairman. At a minimum, attend your local GOP meetings; you’ll be involved before you know it.
Find candidates, regardless of where, that will represent Conservative interests in Congress, then FIGHT for them. Promote them to your friends.
There are other fronts as well. Education has been part of the Zombie March for decades. We need smart Conservatives that actually know a thing or two about history to fight on that front. Get involved in your local school board, attend their meetings, run for a position. I assure you, every one of these local governing entities get really nervous when the public takes an active interest in what they are up to.
The big-time media is marching lockstep with the Zombies. How can you fight on that front? Blog, read, communicate with your friends and neighbors. Put up signs and billboards in your community. If you got 20 people together with $50 each, you could rent a billboard in your community for month. Think about it.
By far, these are not the only fronts, but we each must fight. As Penguin and StephC point out – there is nothing much left to lose. It takes time and it takes energy and like Art says, it takes showing up.
What can you do today to punch a Zombie?

we don’t have a way to deal with the bloodshed. We need to deal with the more important point of idiocy of our electorate. When we do that, then maybe we can do a civil war.

The first step in beating these fools is to take away their ability to wage war on us….

The problem we have is…they fear the Dems more than they do the base…we have to disabuse them of that notion. This is a good shot across their bow…but is needs to be repeated loudly and often by as many people as we can bring on board!

The “Big Tent” analogy isn’t the correct one…the correct one is a MAGNET…we need to be a MAGNET that draws these independents in who are sick and tired of what’s going on in Washington—Fred Thompson

I should probably just say ditto and leave it at that.

Whichever war the party establishment wants, I’m down for. We are where we are (an exceedingly bad place where the future of the republic rests in the hope that McConnell is somehow going to win this HCR battle, the one he keeps giving unanimous consent on) because of those unprincipled jerks.

I just hope that the Republican’s in the Congress and Senate begin to take us seriously when we say that we want them to stand up for their conservative principles.

… that back in 1995, after the Newt Gingrich revolution that took control of Congress, the current “Establishment” in the form of the Republican Main Street Partnership declared war on conservatives in the party. In short, they started it!

However, we did not put up a fight, we actually believed in the Ronald Reagan 11th Commandment. We worked with them [establishment moderates] while they worked to marginalize and undermine the conservatives.

After the disasters of 2006 and 2008 that they [establishment moderates who fought the conservatives] led us into, we [conservatives] finally woke up and have decided to fight back. It is about time. I have had it with “Republicans” who are more comfortable being bi-partisan with the liberal Democrats than they are with conservatives in their own party. Enough I say!

Only one side walks away.

PS: Moderates who do not dislike conservatives, are on our side in this. Those are the people we can and should work with in our party.

You stated :

“We gathered across the country and pleaded with the Republican establishment to fight the rise of tyranny, we marched on Washington to show the Republican establishment that we were there with them to fight the loss of liberty in America, and they voted to bring the Healthcare bill to the floor of the senate and debate it. ”

But they didn’t. Only Democrats and Independents voted in favor of cloture.

‘We ask for conservative candidates who will work against the progressive statist agenda being thrust upon us. Instead we get nominal Republicans who vote for the Porkulus”

Only 3 out of 219 – and one of them is now a Democrat. Less than 1% of current elected Republicans voted for the Porkulus. Over 99% of them opposed it.

Crap and Tax died in committee.

Obamacare looks to be dead soon.

Card Check doesn’t even seem to be being talked about.

Pelosi also seems to have given up her dreams of restoring the Fairness Doctrine.

That’s a lot of disaster avoided and a lot of Obama’s agenda not happening – when he started with a 65% approval rating and the media in the tank and (fairly quickly) the Democrats had a supermajority.

To me it looks like the Republican establishment has done pretty well this year.

I agree with you about restoring liberty and a Constitutionally limited government but I’m not sure why you (and apparently so many others) are so unhappy with the “Republican Establishment” ( I put it in quotes because I’m not entirely sure what you mean by the term, it seems like it could refer to Mitch McConnell, the RNC, the RNCC or some combination)

With no disrespect to females, who, it seems display more Alpah-male attributes than males these days…

The answer to all this angst might be found in simply looking for alpha vs beta behavior. Imagine Lee Iacocca (who I don’t even like) being marched before Congress to genuflect. Or Jack Welch.

How about Little Timmy Geithner?

They’re all a part of the same cabal. Kill off the alpha-male in a pack of dogs and they all spend weeks baring their bellies to each other…out of habit…before one finally gets it…or an alpha interloper marches in and restores order.

Karl Marx was a beta who railed against the success of alphas he considered beneath him intellectually, and it touched off a firestorm (In Europe, not the US) amongst kindred academicians of like beta-ness.

I’ve been on this case since the 70′s. Alpha’s build and run small business…in the corporate world they can’t get past entry-level. The pack-dog mentality.

I’m just saying…
Cheers
Vassar

In the past, when we controlled everything, we did a lot of what is being done now, the major corruption, etc. so now that, for example, folks like Boehner are opposing the very things they supported just a year ago when it was Bush pushing them, he proves himself a political hypocrite, not that most members of Congress aren’t the same way, but we deserve, and should demand, better of our leaders than ‘just another corrupt politician, but ours is better than yours’. No doubt there are some people who have been blinded by wishful thinking, they see Republicans standing up to some of the big government policies of the Obama Administration and they wrongly believe these men to be Conservatives, they are not. They don’t oppose Big Government, they oppose Democrats. If the President was Sarah Palin, but somehow she were a Democrat, Boehner would be opposing her policies every bit as much as he’s opposing Obama’s, just the same way he supported the same socialist giveaways under Bush that he opposed under Obama, because principles dont matter to him, only party does, and thats not what we need in our leadership.

What we did in NY-23 was a huge step in the right direction, standing up to the liberal Republicans and putting a true blue Conservative on the ballot. Hopefully we’ll do the same in the Illinois Senate race if the Scozefava-type Republican wins the primary up there. And should we manage to take back the House next year (which I think we very much can do, and I think we WILL do) I hope we sweep the current so-called Republican ‘leadership’ out of power and put in their place folks who really mean it when they say they’re Conservatives, folks that oppose big government socialism when a Republican President supports it, not just when a Democrat does. Forget simply Hoffman for Congress, Hoffman for SPEAKER!