Tuesday, January 29, 2008

That's a Lot of RINOs

From the Florida primary election tonight, all of the "conservative" theologians must be hiding under their beds for fear of total Republican In Name Only (RINO) infestation. Between the McCain, Giuliani and Huckabee, they picked up 64% of all Republican votes. 64% of the Republican party are not true Republicans.

Does that make sense to anyone else?

You can't hide. We're everywhere.


Update: I have a follow-up post here.

12 comments:

Rose said...

That's FUNNY!

Atticus Queeg said...

Im a RINO too, lets have a horn fight!

K T Cat said...

You filthy RINO! Randy, you'd sicken me if I wasn't a RINO, too.

Dean said...

After 8 yrs. of having the biggest RINO of them all in the Oval Office, I am so looking forward to more "bipartisanship" and of course, more restrictions on free speech, more debt and an open border. I'm sold! Sign me up for the McCain straightalk express.

Anonymous said...

Sign me up for the guy that looks like either a used car salesman or TV preacher. You know, the insincere guy that panders to his audience, be it his wife's financial support of abortion activitists or the detroit auto industry. There is no facade but Romney and Hugh Hewitt is his profit.

Anonymous said...

For purposes of the general election, the figure you cite is inapposite.

Sixty-four percent of Florida Republicans voted for someone other than McCain. The relevant question is: Of those voters, how many are so opposed to McCain that they won't vote for him in the general election?

Presidential elections in this country are close affairs. If even 10 percent of core Republicans bolt, McCain can't win in November.

Not since 1992 when George H.W. Bush ran for re-election have we seen as much antipathy for a Republican candidate as we see for John McCain.

McCain may win the nomination, but he cannot win the general election, because he cannot sustain the defections he would surely suffer.

geoffrobinson said...

You need to seriously convince people like me, people who respect the 1st amendment's protection of free speech, not to sit this one out.

K T Cat said...

You need to be convinced to not sit out the election? How about this.

We didn't.

We "RINOs" in this case, people like me who thought that tax cuts in the middle of deficits were the equivalent of payday loans didn't sit out the election when Bush was elected. What did we get? Massive deficits. We knew that was going to happen, but we voted for the guy anyway. You're welcome.

So now you want to point to one individual policy or another on the part of McCain and throw a temper tantrum? Thanks, pal. So much for winning the war on terror, replacing ACLU members on the Supreme Court and controlling government spending. That's not enough for you, you have to have more.

Well, at least some of us were mature enough to know how to take half a loaf instead of nothing at all. If you need to sit out the election, why not do it in a corner with a dunce's cap on.

geoffrobinson said...

I'm not buying that the previous tax cuts caused a revenue decrease. The problem was too much spending. And I fully agree that that was a problem. But to equate giving ground on one of our basic rights, free political speech, to those spending concerns is, frankly, upsetting. Now, Bush was bad enough to sign McCain's legislation. He at least had the excuse he thought the Supreme Court would strike down such horrible legislation.

I would hold my nose and vote for McCain if I thought he would appoint good judges who would strike down his own legislation. But after the Gang of 14 stuff and his general instinct to seek the approval of the liberal media, I'm inclined to take my chances at getting judges 4 years from now. If McCain is elected, we won't get a crack until 8 years from now. Re-election, probably 12 years. In the meantime, since he removed the ability to get around fillibusters, we are probably going to get Souters.

The best reason I would have is I don't want Iraq to descend into genocide. I don't trust his instincts on wire-tapping, Geneva Convention stuff, giving lawyers to al Qaeda, etc.

Foxfier said...

Come on, KT!

You KNOW that's just being silly.

1) Florida is not the nation--it's not even close to being a rep. sample, even if folks DO keep retiring down there.
2) A LOT of folks are doing exactly what you keep saying we should, and trying to find the least nasty of the bunch.

Frankly, our Prez is NOT a very good Republican. He's a good guy, maybe too nice, very dedicated and solid as a rock with many conservative points. (Cutting spending did NOT turn out to be one--the tax cuts didn't manage to make enough extra money to counter the added spending--and relatively little of that extra was for the GWOT.) Only Pol I can think of that I wouldn't mind leaving my (hypothetical) kids alone with for half an hour.

We've got the options of the war hero who trashed the first and second amendments, the preacher who is basically an old-style Democrat (from before the nuts got to be normal), the standard-issue politician and the quasi-liberal hawk who half of the US has seen in a pink dress and wig.

Right now, I'm trying to pick the ones least likely to cause massive damage. I liked Fred, and the G man, but they're out-- I can't stand Huck with his desire to ban cigs nation-wide(and other nanny actions), and I am disgusted that a military man would vote to classify weapons as "assault weapons" because they LOOKED scary, and ban political speech because it's not nice.

So, barring some amazing stroke of luck and a lot of new information, I'm kind of stuck with the Standard Issue Pol Mitt.

Seriously, is there something in the water right now? Half of the folks I read are throwing utter fits; it's like there's a bunch of protestors under their window, waving pitchforks and yelling "RINO!!!!" if they dare, DARE to try to pick someone that is going to do the least damage...and then they turn around to chop at folks who are pointing out ACTUAL FLAWS in the folks we're supposed to be selecting from.

We really *do* have a pathetic selection this year-- if you're trying to view them as, you know, Republicans. The whole small-gov't(that means taxing AND SPENDING), take-care-of-yourself, respect-the-written-Constitution, Yay-Military and Traditional-Manners group?

It really is pathetic that there are a (relative) lot of folks saying they're ready to set the election out-- although I'd like to point out that one of the most conservative folks I know is considering going to Obama if they put McCain in, on the theory that Obama will do less damage. (I disagree, but at least it's a rational response--as opposed to "I'll just set this one out.")

geoffrobinson said...

This last comment is making a lot of good points. The selection this year wasn't a good one.

But let me say that kt's previous comment that more moderate Republicans misses the mark. W wasn't a full-fledged conservative. So there is fatigue with McCain. Do you want to fight your own president for another four years on important issues?

Foxfier said...

*curtsies*

I started typing and it kind of exploded....

Part of me has this petulant desire to scream that it's not FAIR-- the Dems have three guys that fit their EXTREMISTS views, and we've got three mildly-conservative guys who can't even fit in with the majority of the group.

Then reality slaps me with the fact that life isn't fair, so we have to fight it like a battle-- keep the land, and fight to keep from losing it. Figure out what's most important.
(Example: Ron Paul is pretty dang good on all flavors of social issues, and a lot of the legal ones...but that doesn't do much good if he gets us killed via foreign policy.)