{"id":957,"date":"2008-11-06T15:01:36","date_gmt":"2008-11-06T19:01:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/?p=957"},"modified":"2008-11-06T17:51:11","modified_gmt":"2008-11-06T21:51:11","slug":"the-blame-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/11\/06\/the-blame-game\/","title":{"rendered":"The Blame Game"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the last couple of days a lot has been said and written about why Republicans lost… Conservatives want to blame John McCain. Moderates and some McCain staffers<\/a> are trying to pin the blame on Sarah Palin.<\/p>\n

Enough!<\/p>\n

All this finger pointing ignores one simple truth: Republicans had ZERO<\/em> chance of winning this election. They have spent much of the past decade destroying their “brand”, they abandoned solid conservative principles in favor of quasi conservative\/centrist\/populist ideas that lead to out of control spending and bad policy ideas like campaign finance reform and amnesty for illegal aliens that alienated their conservative base.<\/p>\n

That plus the Bush Administration’s mismanagement of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, coupled with their ham-fisted response to hurricane Katrina and failure to engage their opponents in a meaningful policy debate not only deepened the divide with the party’s conservative base it helped alienate independent voters.<\/p>\n

The basic problem for Republicans is that they’ve forgotten Conservatism is not policy idea it is a fundamental unwavering belief that, in the words of the Declaration of Independence, “… all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”<\/p>\n

If Republicans expect to have any chance of winning in the 2010 mid-term elections, much less the 2012 Presidential election, they have to rediscover those fundamental principles and return to being the party that embodies them through policies that promote fiscal responsibility and a smaller less intrusive government.<\/p>\n

These truths should be self-evident; unfortunately they aren’t, they have to be articulated constantly, lest people forget what they are.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the last couple of days a lot has been said and written about why Republicans lost… Conservatives want to blame John McCain. Moderates and some McCain staffers are trying to pin the blame on Sarah Palin. Enough! All this finger pointing ignores one simple truth: Republicans had ZERO chance of winning this election. They […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[47,290,40,44,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-957","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-politics","7":"tag-2008-elections","8":"tag-conservatism","9":"tag-john-mccain","10":"tag-republicans","11":"tag-sarah-palin","12":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pfpI7-fr","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":952,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/11\/05\/election-postmortem\/","url_meta":{"origin":957,"position":0},"title":"Election Postmortem","author":"Jeff","date":"November 5, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Let the finger pointing begin... Beltway Republicans will undoubtedly blame John McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate as the reason for his loss. Palin may not have been the most qualified candidate available and her disastrous interview with Katie Couric certainly didn't help her or John McCain.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1118,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/12\/16\/mccain-dodges-the-palin-question\/","url_meta":{"origin":957,"position":1},"title":"McCain Dodges the Palin Question","author":"Jeff","date":"December 16, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Josh Painter over at RedState points out this exchange between George Stephanopoulos and Sen. John McCain on last Sunday's This Week: Today on ABC\u2019s This Week, when asked by host George Stephanopoulos whether he would support Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin if she runs for president, Sen. John McCain punted: \u201cOh\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1001,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/11\/16\/5-myths-about-the-2008-elections\/","url_meta":{"origin":957,"position":2},"title":"5 Myths About the 2008 Elections","author":"Jeff","date":"November 16, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Washington Post writer Chris Cillizza examines and attempts to debunk 5 myths about the 2008 elections... The entire article is worth reading but the two points that stand out in my opinion are these: 4. A Republican candidate could have won the presidency this year. I doubt it. In the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":225,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/08\/29\/mccain-vp-watch-whos-it-going-to-be\/","url_meta":{"origin":957,"position":3},"title":"McCain VP Watch… Who’s It Going To Be?","author":"Jeff","date":"August 29, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"My top picks in no particular order: Fred Thompson Michael Steele Sarah Palin Carly Fiorina Michelle Malkin has more... Update: Foxnews says it's Palin. Whew... I'm not sure what to say. Personally, I would have preferred Michael Steele or Fred Thompson... That said Palin's a great choice, grass roots conservatives\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":234,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/08\/29\/its-palin-hot-damn\/","url_meta":{"origin":957,"position":4},"title":"It\u2019s Palin… Hot Damn!","author":"Jeff","date":"August 29, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"I've have to admit I'm stoked! Yes I still have reservations about John McCain, I don't like him, I don't trust him but Sarah Palin is the real deal. She's a solid conservative; she's intelligent, articulate and charismatic. She has a proven record as a reformer; she's battled corruption and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":265,"url":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/02\/was-she-or-wasnt-she\/","url_meta":{"origin":957,"position":5},"title":"Was She or Wasn’t She???","author":"Jeff","date":"September 2, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"All morning long I've been hearing and reading media reports quoting an \"unnamed republican source\" as saying that \"the team assigned to vet ... [Sarah] Palin in Alaska\" didn't get there until the day before John McCain \"stunned the political world with his vice-presidential choice.\" I'd like to know exactly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Politics"","block_context":{"text":"Politics","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/957\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}