Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture

Conservatism is more than this though. It’s a way of thinking, a worldview, a way of life. And it has never been more important to make this distinction than it is today. At a time when there is a national effort underway to “rebuild the Republican Party,” we must recognize that the party is only as good as the principles of the people behind it. These are what need to be reformed and revitalized. Today we have an excellent opportunity to rebuild the GOP into a once again nationally viable party. In heavily Democratic regions like Albany, rebuilding the party locally is even more of a challenge and opportunity. But I am afraid that there is an overwhelming perception out there among many Republicans that this rebuilding is simply about making the party politically competitive once again through purely logistical and organizational means. Finding charismatic new party leaders able to utilize the value of the internet and organize better campaigns should not be the primary aim. This is secondary to discovering what it is that we are marketing. I don’t think Republicans are in the sorry state we are in because people agree with the party’s positions but just haven’t received the message. I think people can see quite clearly what the Republican Party is offering, and they don’t like it. The problem is not that the party is poorly organized and led, and people don’t really understand what the GOP stands for. The problem is it’s become obvious that the GOP has ceased to stand for anything! The Republican Party is supposed to be a means to an end. It has become an end in itself; power for power’s sake. The conservative philosophy that is supposed to be at its core has become unrecognizable. In short, while most Republican (and indeed American) voters are undoubtedly conservative in their perceptions and lifestyles, the GOP has ceased to be a conservative party that can inspire them.

I don’t support Republican candidates simply because they are Republicans. See Arlen Specter. The guy ran with an R next to his name for decades but has always voted like a liberal Democrat and is now making it official by switching parties. So what’s the point of supporting Republicans who could just as easily call themselves Democrats? The Republican candidates I do support I support because I believe they will deliver principled conservatism that will benefit the community, state, or country. Unless your job specifically relies upon one party or the other winning, I see no reason why anyone would support the GOP in and of itself regardless of what it does or stands for. I want to rebuild the party. But I don’t want to rebuild it just for the sake of returning it to power with the same bunch of empty suits that have occupied it in recent years. This is why we must now have a frank discussion on what policies and principles the Republican Party will stand for. Let us not avoid this conversation. Let us recognize that until the snakes that currently represent the party are thrown out we can’t begin talking about rebuilding. Empty slogans about government spending from the same demagogues that stood silent while Bush ran up the national debt aren’t good enough. Their credibility is shot. The politicians, pundits, and personalities of the Bush era, save a few brave souls that stood their ground, haven’t got a conservative leg to stand on. It is misleading to blame Republican defeats on an unpopular conservative message, because I haven’t been hearing this message. To say that the party needs to drift to the center is an utter distortion of reality. The real reason for recent failures is transparent hypocrisy and a lack of any guiding conservative principles. The political waffling and gamesmanship of party leaders is the reason people have lost faith in the GOP, not conservatism. People aren’t rejecting the GOP because it is too conservative. They’ve rejected it because of the double-talking sleazeballs that it has run as candidates. People will actually support a candidate they disagree with on most issues if they believe him to be an honest principled man. Getting them to support a candidate who espouses their own views but whom they don’t like or trust is a more difficult, if not impossible, sell.

So as we go about rebuilding the party, let’s not make the mistake of recycling the same empty suits that have driven it into the ground and continue following the same failed model we’ve followed in the past. Let’s instead find new leaders whom we can trust are in this game for a better reason than to simply return the GOP to power, regardless of what it has to do to get there. Let’s adopt leaders that will say what they mean and mean what they say, not say what they think is popular and still do something else. There’s no better time than now. Let’s make it mean something to call yourself a Republican again.

It was after 9/11, in the supposed interests of national security, that the Congress gleefully surrendered their constitutional powers and responsibilities to the Executive Branch, who then went about expanding the size of the federal government to unprecedented levels. A new bureaucratic monstrosity was created in the Department of Homeland Security that was charged with performing a task that apparently no other federal agency was already responsible for, defending the country from terrorist attacks. At the behest of the President, the National Security Agency gained new authority to monitor terrorist internet and phone communications that included at least one party outside of the United States, despite the questionable legality of the program. And under the inaptly named USA PATRIOT Act, the powers of the FBI and other federal security agencies to monitor the activities of suspected and potential terrorists in the United States were expanded. Scarcely a conservative voice could be heard raising caution about this expansion of power within the Executive Branch, and the overall growth of government that was being undertaken. After all, Bush was a good conservative, it was thought, and he needed all the power and authority available to protect us from terrorism. He could be trusted with these new authorities and the prospect of national security was worth the price. The most obvious problem with all of this that conservatives seemed to have overlooked, however, is that Bush had not been given a lifetime term in the White House. Eventually he would be gone, but the power ceded to the office could probably never really be reigned in. As has been demonstrated time and time again, once the government is granted the authority to violate your liberties and expand their powers, they never let it go.

I actually had the misfortune of working on the McCain campaign in New Hampshire during the 2008 presidential race, and witnessed this lack of foresight firsthand among many Republicans. During one conversation with a fellow campaign staffer who was brought in from Washington, D.C. in the final few weeks leading up to the election, I tried to convey to him some of the problems with the sacrifices made in the name of the War on Terror as he expressed his undying devotion to George Bush. (Yes, in November of 2008 there were still some Bush loyalists who hadn’t yet removed their heads from the sand! Fortunately, by this time most Americans living outside of the Beltway’s Republican circles had woken up to Bush’s empty conservatism.) But after waxing lyrical about how Bush had protected us from terrorists for the last few years he expressed regret that the powers he had acquired for the office and the expanded federal apparatus that had been built would now be at the disposal of Barack Obama. Apparently the obvious reality of presidential succession was not something that had ever crossed his mind during the years he was cheering on George Bush. Although this was the only problem that occurred to him, it is really only a secondary problem with the trend of expanding federal power. The primary issue of course is why you would want any president to be granted the power to expand their influence over individual privacy! As long as our man was in the White House though, it was all fine.

But still most overlooked by conservatives during this time was the use of the word “terrorist” in relation to these expanded powers. It remained dangerously ambiguous. While Bush was president, “terrorist” was typically used as a shorthand term for a militant or radical Muslim, and it was against militant Islamists from around the globe that it was expect these powers would be used to combat. Again, conservatives acquiesced to this vague terminology without objection. But while liberals railed against the ”War on Terror” for its exaggeration of our enemies’ capabilities and the negative connotation they think it had on the Muslim world, they too got it wrong. The real problem with this language that everyone seemed to miss is that it’s simply too vague and unfocused. Terrorism is a tactic and  the literal word “terrorist” could just as easilly be applied to someone completely disconnected from any global Muslim jihad, but still engaging in an act of terror. The powers granted the president to deal with the War on Terror could potentially someday be used against a so-called domestic terrorist. The use of the word became particularly significant for me when the controversy over the torture of terror suspects arose. I would have no objections if Ayman al-Zawahiri were to be captured and tortured in order to extract information. Ditto for any other confirmed radical Muslim withholding information that could prevent future attacks. I continued to hold reservations over the issue though because of who exactly could be defined as a “terrorist,” not only legally but also in the perceptions of the public. This point, so far as I could tell, remained absent from the debate. So long as our man Bush was president there was nothing to worry about. The terrorists were Muslim radicals bent on global jihad.

Well, Bush is not the president anymore and after less than three months of the Obama regime my exact fears over the loose use of this terminology are coming to fruition. Although the Obama regime has apparently suspended use of the terrorism label while referring to the international struggle against radical Islam, they have not retired the term altogether. In a new report issued by the Department of Homeland Security (remember, created to protect us from “terrorists”), the DHS will now be increasingly focused on “righwing extremists” and ”small terrorist cells” of Americans acting out of frustration due to the current political and economic climate. In other words, anyone expressing criticism of the disasterous road this administration is taking us down could be a potential terrorist. Reading some of the language in this report is truly shocking. DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano even goes after returning war veterans, claiming that “the possible passage of new restrictions on firearms and the return of military veterans facing significant challenges reintegrating into their communities could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks.” So the Department of Homeland Security, created by George Bush to protect us from what everyone naively assumed were exclusively radical Muslim jihadists, is certainly doing its best to stay on top of terrorist activity, only these aren’t the terrorists we had in mind. An expression of political dissent has become a red flag that could get you put on a list somewhere. Questioning our new government’s socialist economic policies or liberal social agenda could brand you an enemy of the state.

So when the government is granted undue power to fight “terrorism” we had better be damn well sure we know what “terrorism” means. There never seemed to be any question among the American public under President Bush. A terrorist was an insurgent in Iraq, a Taliban fighter in Afghanistan, or a suicide bomber in London or Madrid. But now, under the Obama regime, those concerned about gun regulation, unadulterated immigration, disgruntled returning veterans, or anyone else opposing the political agenda of the new regime falls under the category of a potential terrorist. The same terminology that has been used to describe the former is now being used to describe the latter. American patriots concerned about our current radical growth in government are being compared to al-Qaeda. So the next time you hear the word “terrorist” or “War on Terror,” ask yourself what that might mean, because it isn’t so obvious anymore.