THE RISE AND FALL OF REPUBLICANS

In 1992, Republicans had an excellent chance of gaining the White House. The war went well, and Bill Clinton had tons of personal baggage. The Republicans did not have a clear message but Ross Perot did and the rest is history. Clinton played his role as a 43% President well and became very popular except among the talk show heads and those disgusted by his antics.

Bush came into office in two close elections. He could not articulate his own positions as well as Rush Limbaugh did, and kept showing poor judgment with his comments on Putin and Vicente Fox, bungling the immigration issue, palling around with Teddy Kennedy, passing the prescription drug bill which spent billions for negative political effect, and not pressing the case with judge appointments. He did not properly explain his tax bill - which frankly WAS flawed. I believe in cuts, but it WAS skewed too much to the very wealthy. He also took millions OFF the tax rolls who now of course WANT tax increases on everyone else to pay for their goodies! But besides hurting himself, Bush allowed the media to destroy him while not using the Bully Pulpit as he needed to. He greatly underestimated the unassailable fact that Democrates gain a minimum of 15 to 20 percentage points of support because of constant, unrelenting, and absurd slanting of the news, with selective reporting and liberal editorializing parading as news being the order of the day. He did not make an aggressive appeal to African Americans, who were ripe for support if he simply told the truth about his opponents and gave them a way to save face and still support him.

Without Evangelical Christians (who used to be majority democrat not all that long ago), no Republican would have been president over the last generation. Yet, most of the current Republican candidates really despise TRUE Christians - McCain, Guiliani, etc. Sort of like a lot of the talk radio hosts - while they are not usually stupid enough to openly offend them, if you listen closely they do not understand what a true relationship with God is all about, and why the moral issues are truly the center of prior support for Republicans. The new candidates think mincing words while supporting issues untenable by the morally straight will get them votes. Sor-ry! I see dark days ahead because of an inability to stick to what worked in terms of conservative moral values and the inability to get the big money support to truly understand what Christians value - not simply opposition to abortion, homosexuality, and legislating from the bench, but also progressive racial and economic policies to heal the great divides in our nation.