Reflections from the 4th of July

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that 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. – Declaration of Independence

It was two hundred and thirty-five years ago yesterday that those words were officially ratified, unanimously, by the Continental Congress and our nation was born. It took the Constitution of the United States nearly ninety years after the nation’s birth to live up to that creed. It took over one hundred and eighty years for the Civil Rights Act and Brown v. Board of Education to ensure true equality in law. It took over two hundred years for the hearts and minds of Americans to truly believe these words.

Yet, in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of Americans, we have arrived at the place where we do indeed see all as created equal and judge people by their actions, not their skin tone. There are some who will claim racism as an excuse for why Conservatives dislike President Obama (ignoring the fact that one of the Tea Party’s favorite candidates is Herman Cain) or sexism as an excuse when Conservatives dislike various female politicians on the left like Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton (ignoring the fact that two of the Tea Party’s favorite candidates/potential candidates are Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin), the truth is America only sees people through their race or gender thanks to the Left reminding us of those differences.
Truth be told, the only real failures in America are due to failing our creed and our founding. We failed in the first ninety years by continuing slavery, but we righted that wrong through the blood of hundreds of thousands of Americans in the Civil War. We failed our creed by the continuance of segregation into the 1950s and 60s, but we righted that failure with Brown v. Board and the Civil Rights Act.

Today we’re in the middle of a correction, one that I believe we are winning as well, by correcting our failures to let freedom reign by allowing confiscatory taxes, regulations that stifle growth, and laws that tell people what foods they can eat or continuing to lecture people about legal habits that they, as adults, have chosen to continue with full knowledge of the dangers.

On this, the two hundred thirty-fifth anniversary of the United States, I want to encourage you who believe in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution with these words that a hero of mine wrote in 1993 after the election of Bill Clinton to the Presidency. I believe it holds true today as well:

We can win, my friends. But we can also choose not to win. It is up to us. Liberalism is failing, as I chronicle each day, and can’t beat us. Only we can make ourselves lose ground. We Conservatives must remain united, confident, on the offensive, and avoid the temptation to circle the wagons.

Liberalism is one of the most gutless choices one can make. It is easy to be a liberal. You just say yes to everything. Some guy wants to throw a rock through a window and blow up the building, you just say he has a right to do it because of some oppression he feels. You run around saying you care all day and do a few symbolic things, like conduct a bake sale and raise $150 to reduce the $4 Trillion national debt (2). Or you take your daughter to work with you one day of her life and claim she now is prepared to do battle with unfairly advantaged little boys.

Being conservative takes guts, though, because the dominant media will make fun of you, liberals will try to shut you up, leftist activists will try to intimidate you. As a conservative, you remind people that they are responsible for their fate, which is construed to be heartless, cruel and mean-spirited. As a conservative, you demand accountability while many want to go through life blameless and they’ll react angrily when you confront them with the truth. In short, you are a target when you are a conservative. We are winning, my good friends, but this skirmish will never be over, which is why you must remain confident, undaunted, and dedicated to your principles and ethics. We all must. – Rush Limbaugh, “The Way Things Ought to Be” (3)

Rush wrote that eighteen years ago. Since then, we’ve seen it play out. We chose to lose in 2006 and 2008 because the Republican Party chose to, as Rush said, “Circle the wagons.” As I’ve put it before, we chose to be the New Coke of political parties to the Democrat Pepsi (might as well just drink a Pepsi). That’s why we lost. We failed to be Conservative. In 2010, the GOP won a huge victory because we went back to being Conservative. We lived up to our country’s founding for the first time in years.

I want to encourage you on this two hundred thirty-fifth anniversary of our nation (the day after, actually) that we are winning and that we can continue to win, provided we continue to stand up for the things that Conservatism stands for: freedom, personal responsibility, and the Constitution of the United States. If we do, Barrack Obama will be a one-term President. If we do, I believe we will grow our majority in the House of Representatives and win the Senate. Only if we fail to be Conservative will we lose.

Republicans must remember who they are: We are the party who freed the slaves. We are the party who passed the Civil Rights Act. (Democrats try their best to claim that the “the Republicans of today are the Democrats of history and the Democrats of today are the Republicans of history.” It is, of course, an attempt to ignore their own poor history and lay claim to the GOP’s far more desirable history.)

We in the Tea Party must require that Conservatism out of the Republican Party in 2012. We must flock to the primaries and vote for Conservatives. We must not believe that a “moderate” is our best chance to win. It’s not. We’ve lost in national elections when we run moderates (see Gerald Ford, George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole and John McCain). We’ve won with Conservatism in national elections (see: Reagan, Bush 41 in ’88, Bush 43 in ’00 and ’04). We lost with moderates in ’76, ’92, ’06 and ’08. We’ve won with Conservatism in ‘80, ‘84, ‘88, ‘94, ‘98, ‘00, ‘02, ’04 and ’10.

If we force the GOP to live up to Conservatism, to the Constitution, we will win. History has proven that. Americans are by far more Conservative, with Liberalism in the small minority. Those numbers have changed in our favor over the last several years. My friends, we are winning. We must only choose to win.

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(1) The Declaration of Independence

(2) Nearly twenty years later it’s our debt is $14 Trillion thanks to two Liberal Democrat Presidents and their spending and a Republican President who spent like a Liberal.

(3) “The Way Things Ought to Be” by Rush Limbaugh, Copyright 1992, 1993 by Rush Limbaugh. Published by Pocket Books, a division of Simon and Schuster Inc., 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020