Welcome to today’s edition of Watercooler: Last Week, RedState.   This WC is all about Posts, Reader’s Diaries, and comments at RedState

Hot Topics Last Week:

The AHCA was a big topic this week with a few contributors weighing in, if you missed it: Andrea Ruth on the windup to the vote , and Thursday’s upcoming vote

If that didn’t catch your attention there was Susan’s piece on Trump’s unhelpful comments on how our healthcare system compares to… Australia?  Trump on the greatness of Australia’s HC system Then, as if to prove that Trump knows from where he speaks there was Jay’s piece about Trump’s profound knowledge about the Civil War Explaining Trump on the Civil War? No. What He Said Was… in the article we found out new facts about Andrew Jackson and his newly discovered powers of foresight.

Sometime during the week Paul Ryan found common grounds with the Democrats on the budget and left a significant portion of the Republican caucus to sulk.  He gave the Democrats everything their little hearts desired including continued spending for PP, no money for the wall, etc., etc…. Susan felt the sweet burn with Rand Paul in this piece, Susan on Rand Paul

Tail Wags Dog:

One of the most hotly debated topics over the last week or so was this piece by Kira Davis entitled 18 Environmental Doomsday Predictions from 1970 That Turned Out to Be Hilariously Wrong Climate change is obviously a hot topic here at RedState as 119 comments were registered.  My bet is that it’s not only because good science a concern of conservative minded people but because, first and foremost, the left is using it as another method to put their elites in control of the rubes in this country.

Recurring Topics at RS:

In the comments sections I’ve noticed that there are a fair number of topics that could benefit from a more thorough and unified set of arguments both pro and con a topic.  These topics come up repeatedly and usually the RedState community find themselves on multiple sides of these topics.  Topics like: global warming, health care and purchasing HC products across state lines, restoring the Constitutional principles, etc.

Today I’d like to look at The future of conservatives in the GOP.   I’ve noticed that the RedState community members are sounding, well, a bit pessimistic!  We elect and reelect people to Congress and nothing seems to change.  During the primaries and the general election one conservative champion after another fell in battle.  It’s happened so much and for so long maybe it’s time to rethink how we’re doing this.  Here are a few of what I think are good questions that should be but have not been asked about our approach.

1. Given that the 13 sovereign States created the federal government and there are now 50 of them, where are the States in these battles?
   • Aren’t they supposed to be the ones holding the federal government accountable?
   • Sure, they send an AG to do battle with some egregious diktat sent down from DC but, really, is that keeping a tight rein on their creation?
   • Churchill noted that in the lead-up to WWII that Germany picked off one nation after another because none of them really banded together to resist Germany as a group so…
   • Why are the States following a similar path to subjugation?
   • Why aren’t the like-minded States getting together AS STATES even before an Article V Convention to build common cause amongst the states and pledging to not accept and resist the expansion of federal monies into areas where States are supreme?
2. For that matter, why are the citizens of the States electing and sending our conservative champions off to fight our equivalent of a holy war in DC without the States standing behind them?

We continue to lose our best and brightest stars as those champions are chewed up and defeated one-by-one by the unbelievers in the DC system. Reagan was partially successful but one of the classic lines in response to Reagan’s intent to give the country back to the States and people was “Fat Chance!”

During The Holy Wars the middle ages delayed the Enlightenment by a good number of years. We should learn from their mistakes.

Any opinions?

RS Gatekeeper:

Our own WC contributor, Joliphant, had a nice piece in User Diaries, if you haven’t seen it, pop-by and take a look at it here, Ninth circuit and how to recover the courts from the left’s capture of the court system

Memorable RS One-Liners:

Best Video or Picture Usage:

See below

RedState Tips:  If the old saying that “One Picture is Worth Ten Thousand Words” is true than today’s YouTube and other video sources are what, priceless?  Finding and embedding a video today can present challenges on finding just the right place to start and end to make you point.

Today’s RS tip is about copying a URL so that the video starts at the desired time.

1. First, preview the video until right before the desired starting point you want.
2. Right-clicking on the video, select “Copy video URL at current time”.  You’ll notice other choices but I’ll leave it to others to mention these.
3. Paste it into your post or comment.

For example, this video URL was started 29 seconds into the clip, it’s one of my favorites, enjoy!

Drink up, that’s it for the Watercooler today. Remember, this thread is all about RedState contributors from: the front page, Reader’s Diaries, or in the comments section.

Use the topics above or choose your own but, stop by, hang out, and drink up.