The Republican Long Game

With the republican constituency fading away, where are the republicans going to get there votes by the end of the next decade or two?

America will be predominantly made up of what are now minorities. Republicans are doing very poorly with the minority vote.

What kind of changes do ya’ll think will happen in the republican party?

None. Just keep trying to win minorities over.

[quote]Sloth wrote:
None. Just keep trying to win minorities over.[/quote]

In the most basic terms, this.

Here is a rough outline of what has been in my head lately, and this is just a rough draft.

  1. The center, what is a moderate today, has shifted so far left, we may be lost forever down the spiral. But, that being said, someone like Ron Paul or Gary Johnson has no shot what-so-ever in today’s world. Conservatives have to understand this, and start slowly pulling the center back to where it belongs.

  2. Conservatives have got to fight back against the narrative. Have to. At this point, if any reporter actually reports anything positive about a republican, they are cast off the reservation. There needs to be an infiltration into Hollywood, music, social media, everything. No need to be aggressive, but it needs to be socially acceptable to be a conservative again.

  3. How the Hispanic vote doesn’t love conservatives baffles me. Isn’t Hispanic culture big on hard work, pride, family, Jesus, and being the best you can be within your ability? I mean, really… Am I wrong here?

  4. The likes of anyone who’s hands touched the Patriot act, need to be sacrificed for the good of the country. This is a massive problem the republicans need to be the ones to fix. And it is quite simple, they were doing all the spying and illegal wire tapping before the law, so WTF, just go back to the way it was before, and stop the people with bombs strapped to their chest.

  5. Branding works.

One more thing, the Tea Party and libertarians need to be even more critical of Republican presidents and officials than Democrats. The Tea Party in particular can do wonders for its national reputation by holding their own to a higher standard and demanding more from the republicans.

This will play well.

No need to cannibalize themselves, just be self aware and critical.

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
3) How the Hispanic vote doesn’t love conservatives baffles me. Isn’t Hispanic culture big on hard work, pride, family, Jesus, and being the best you can be within your ability? I mean, really… Am I wrong here?
[/quote]
3.1) Some people believe in all that but also believe in an extensive centralized welfare state, high taxes, heavy government regulation of business, minimal civilian access to guns, etc.
3.2) Some people are social conservatives but economic leftists who vote based on the items in #3.1 above.
3.3) More of them might eventually come around, and change their minds about some of the items in #3.1 above. More of anybody might eventually come around.

I don’t know but I would say the long game of the RNC would be to try and convince everyone they are some how Moderate Conservative :slight_smile: HA HA eye roll

[quote]pittbulll wrote:
I don’t know but I would say the long game of the RNC would be to try and convince everyone they are some how Moderate Conservative [/quote]

All that does is allow the center to get pulled further left.

The long game needs to include the opposite of what you are implying. We need (both parties) to bring the center back to the actual center. Right now “center” is a solid democrat a couple decades ago.

“Moderate conservatives” have brought us such wonders as the Patriot Act. They need to go away with the progressives.

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]pittbulll wrote:
I don’t know but I would say the long game of the RNC would be to try and convince everyone they are some how Moderate Conservative [/quote]

All that does is allow the center to get pulled further left.

The long game needs to include the opposite of what you are implying. We need (both parties) to bring the center back to the actual center. Right now “center” is a solid democrat a couple decades ago.

“Moderate conservatives” have brought us such wonders as the Patriot Act. They need to go away with the progressives. [/quote]

You aren’t being facetious in saying that you think the center in America is left? We are a right of center nation as a whole in comparison to the world. Or are you simply saying that America’s center is moving to the left(I don’t agree with that necessarily either, but it at least would be somewhat arguable)?

The Republican long game likely needs to move it away from being stridently religious. American Demographics are moving away from that. Positions that are only tangentially about things other than religion like gay marriage will weaken the party if they make them litmus tests. There is a huge generational shift in belief systems and those are difficult if not impossible to change. The party needs to adopt to some of them or it will diminish.

[quote]groo wrote:

You aren’t being facetious in saying that you think the center in America is left? [/quote]

No, and the only people that think we are “center right” are people that are okay with progressives taking over the Dem party.

Whole lot of the rest of the world are progressives, so thank the good lord we are right of them.

Not going to happen, and doesn’t need to happen. Social issues are moot.

Abortion isn’t going anywhere, even if they somehow broke the firewall and allowed states to vote on it. Cali and Mass will forever allow you to remove your baby from your womb.

Gay Marriage: the sooner someone passes a law for it or agaisnt it, the sooner the SCOTUS will rule on it and allow gay marriage. I just don’t see how, legally, they can rule any other way.

[quote] American Demographics are moving away from that. Positions that are only tangentially about things other than religion like gay marriage will weaken the party if they make them litmus tests. There is a huge generational shift in belief systems and those are difficult if not impossible to change. The party needs to adopt to some of them or it will diminish.
[/quote]

This proves my point about the shift to the left, and I don’t think the “movement” away from religion is nearly as drastic as I’m reading your post to imply.

4000+ years of people being religious isn’t suddenly going to change because of middle class white college students who can’t see that atheism is a religion.

I think both parties will struggle to hold their coalitions in any kind of semi-permanent alliance. The intra-party tensions don’t allow for the kind of party uniformity that the pary mandarins want and require nowadays.

Parties used to be broader - there were liberals in the GOP, and conservatives in the Democratic Party, because “liberalism” and “conservatism” were not as rigidly defined as a matter of ideology.

Old Southern conservatives were, in fact, conservative as hell, and were often Democrats, and they often were quite critical of unabashed market economics and the notion of tax-cuts-as-panacea (but they weren’t socialists or anything like that). Old Northeastern Republicans were very much “pro-business” but were also less socially conservative and more internationalist.

The modern parties don’t tolerate that kind of philosophical diversity any more - and the problem that causes is an inability to keep together coalitions needed for a winner-take-all system like ours.

I predict in the coming years, we will see more and more people run as independents, and maybe even moreso, people run as independents on a party ticket and they glady advertise as such, as in “I am an independent running on the Republican ticket”.

The Republican party won’t need a long term game plan if Romney wins and then doesn’t live up to his word…

The parties will evolve as they always have.

[quote]groo wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

[quote]pittbulll wrote:
I don’t know but I would say the long game of the RNC would be to try and convince everyone they are some how Moderate Conservative [/quote]

All that does is allow the center to get pulled further left.

The long game needs to include the opposite of what you are implying. We need (both parties) to bring the center back to the actual center. Right now “center” is a solid democrat a couple decades ago.

“Moderate conservatives” have brought us such wonders as the Patriot Act. They need to go away with the progressives. [/quote]

You aren’t being facetious in saying that you think the center in America is left? We are a right of center nation as a whole in comparison to the world. Or are you simply saying that America’s center is moving to the left(I don’t agree with that necessarily either, but it at least would be somewhat arguable)?

The Republican long game likely needs to move it away from being stridently religious. American Demographics are moving away from that. Positions that are only tangentially about things other than religion like gay marriage will weaken the party if they make them litmus tests. There is a huge generational shift in belief systems and those are difficult if not impossible to change. The party needs to adopt to some of them or it will diminish.
[/quote]

That would be the dumbest thing the republican party could do. The religious constituency is huge and the democrats have rejected the religious by and large already. Republicans need to welcome them with open arms.
All your saying here is make them like democrats.

[quote]undoredo wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:
3) How the Hispanic vote doesn’t love conservatives baffles me. Isn’t Hispanic culture big on hard work, pride, family, Jesus, and being the best you can be within your ability? I mean, really… Am I wrong here?
[/quote]
3.1) Some people believe in all that but also believe in an extensive centralized welfare state, high taxes, heavy government regulation of business, minimal civilian access to guns, etc.
3.2) Some people are social conservatives but economic leftists who vote based on the items in #3.1 above.
3.3) More of them might eventually come around, and change their minds about some of the items in #3.1 above. More of anybody might eventually come around.
[/quote]

It depends on who came here to make a living and who came here with their hand out. The cuban population is largely republican. They hate anything that reminds them of communism.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
I think both parties will struggle to hold their coalitions in any kind of semi-permanent alliance. The intra-party tensions don’t allow for the kind of party uniformity that the pary mandarins want and require nowadays.

Parties used to be broader - there were liberals in the GOP, and conservatives in the Democratic Party, because “liberalism” and “conservatism” were not as rigidly defined as a matter of ideology.

Old Southern conservatives were, in fact, conservative as hell, and were often Democrats, and they often were quite critical of unabashed market economics and the notion of tax-cuts-as-panacea (but they weren’t socialists or anything like that). Old Northeastern Republicans were very much “pro-business” but were also less socially conservative and more internationalist.

The modern parties don’t tolerate that kind of philosophical diversity any more - and the problem that causes is an inability to keep together coalitions needed for a winner-take-all system like ours.

I predict in the coming years, we will see more and more people run as independents, and maybe even moreso, people run as independents on a party ticket and they glady advertise as such, as in “I am an independent running on the Republican ticket”.[/quote]

That’s exactly what I’ve heard from other people who lived through those times and you put it really well.

I’d like to see political parties go back to something like that.

[quote]smh23 wrote:
The parties will evolve as they always have.[/quote]
Or die

as they always have

[quote]Fletch1986 wrote:

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
I think both parties will struggle to hold their coalitions in any kind of semi-permanent alliance. The intra-party tensions don’t allow for the kind of party uniformity that the pary mandarins want and require nowadays.

Parties used to be broader - there were liberals in the GOP, and conservatives in the Democratic Party, because “liberalism” and “conservatism” were not as rigidly defined as a matter of ideology.

Old Southern conservatives were, in fact, conservative as hell, and were often Democrats, and they often were quite critical of unabashed market economics and the notion of tax-cuts-as-panacea (but they weren’t socialists or anything like that). Old Northeastern Republicans were very much “pro-business” but were also less socially conservative and more internationalist.

The modern parties don’t tolerate that kind of philosophical diversity any more - and the problem that causes is an inability to keep together coalitions needed for a winner-take-all system like ours.

I predict in the coming years, we will see more and more people run as independents, and maybe even moreso, people run as independents on a party ticket and they glady advertise as such, as in “I am an independent running on the Republican ticket”.[/quote]

That’s exactly what I’ve heard from other people who lived through those times and you put it really well.

I’d like to see political parties go back to something like that.[/quote]

There would have to be some serious un-brainwashing of the electorate though.

We could start by burning Hollywood to the ground and fencing off all the exits.

What the republicans don’t get, which team Obama does: social media, the internet, the power Celebrity has over today’s youth, that expecting people to read and grow and understand intellectually on their own is going to keep the party minority, and how damn lazy youth is today.

Or, they could solve SS & Medicare issues, resolve immigration and repeal the Patriot Act, and coast to some easy wins for a couple decades.

^

I’ve heard from Obama in an interview that he’s made some big modifications to Patriot Act… but I have no idea what that means.

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

  1. How the Hispanic vote doesn’t love conservatives baffles me. Isn’t Hispanic culture big on hard work, pride, family, Jesus, and being the best you can be within your ability? I mean, really… Am I wrong here?

[/quote]

Frankly, Republicans are going to have to become not an open borders party, but a pretty wide open borders party at least. As for culture…I can only point to what can be known here in the US. Look up the out-of-wedlock birth rate. Good luck selling entitlement reform.

[quote]Sloth wrote:
Good luck selling entitlement reform.[/quote]

It is going to work like the tax code. The more money you make the more you pay. And the more you have in retirement the less you receive.

Involuntary means testing every 36 months and voluntary (optional) means testing every June, without permanent loss in benefits if you test above the limit should solve some of the problem.

The next step is removing SS from the General Fund. Then do a 5k increase to the wage limit upward for 5 years, and then back down by 4k for 5 years. You should have a slight excess at this point, and if enough of the babyboomers have dies a good excess. The excess should be invested like any pension fund is. Their needs to be growth of these funds. You don’t expose more than 10-20% to market risk however. But modest gains on 20% of the SS take, is big money compounded over a decade or two.

Third is to put all new and current member’s of congress on SS, and convert their pension to a 401k type plan.

Fourth, and this is where it gets tricky, executive and legislative branches can’t control the money. Can’t borrow from it, nada, nothing. I don’t want another bureaucrat, but I don’t want them appointed either.