Who are the real RINO’s?

If you spend enough time on the internet reading political blogs, comments, threads, and the like you are bound to read someone using the term ‘RINO’. For those who do not know, ‘RINO’ means ‘Republican in Name Only’. It is a term used to attack other Republicans who they do not deem adequately conservative. Jim Jeffords, Lincoln Chaffee, Olympia Snowe, and Scott Brown are a few names that come to mind.

But since when did the Republican Party start demanding that for you to be a true Republican you must be a die-hard Conservative? This has never been the case in the GOP until the 1980s with the rise of the Reagan wing of the party. For nearly 130 years prior the party functioned and flourished with a wide range of political beliefs and candidates such as Progressive Theodore Roosevelt and Robert LaFollette, Sr., Moderate Nelson Rockefeller and Dwight Eisenhower, Conservative Calvin Coolidge and Robert Taft, and even radical reformers like John Fremont and Abraham Lincoln.

By today’s standards the founding father of the GOP would be booed out of the party convention and told he is not a real Republican… do you see the irony in this? Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Republican and stated that what his civil rights movement would do is open the South up for the Republicans. Even Karl Marx endorsed the re-election of Abraham Lincoln and his Republican Party in a letter he wrote congratulating.

Letter

Link

Robert LaFollette, Sr. fought hard for these programs as governor of Wisconsin.

Primary elections, allowing the rank-and-file members of a political party to choose its nominees rather than caucuses usually dominated by political bosses.
Workers' compensation, allowing workers injured on the job to receive a fixed payment in compensation for their injuries and related expenses rather than forcing them to go to court against their employers, which at the time was extremely difficult and had little realistic chance of success.
State regulation of railroads in addition to the federal regulation imposed by the Interstate Commerce Commission.
Direct election of United States Senators as opposed to the original method of their selection by the state legislatures, eventually ratified as the Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Progressive taxation, where the wealthier pay a higher rate of tax than the less-affluent, made possible on the federal level in part by the adoption of the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Theodore Roosevelt was a proponent of the Square Deal.

Robert Taft was known as ‘Mr. Republican’ for his staunch opposition to the New Deal, except public housing and Social Security, his opposition to intervention in World War II, and his condemnation of the Nuremburg Trials as a ‘victors justice’.

On May 26, 1953, Taft delivered his final speech, in which he presciently warned of the dangers of America's emerging Cold War foreign policy, and specifically U.S. military involvement in Southeast Asia:

“I have never felt that we should send American soldiers to the Continent of Asia, which, of course, included China proper and Indo-China, simply because we are so outnumbered in fighting a land war on the Continent of Asia that it would bring about complete exhaustion even if we were able to win. ... So today, as since 1947 in Europe and 1950 in Asia, we are really trying to arm the world against Communist Russia, or at least furnish all the assistance which can be of use to them in opposing Communism.

Is this policy of uniting the free world against Communism in time of peace going to be a practical long-term policy? I have always been a skeptic on the subject of the military practicability of NATO. ... I have always felt that we should not attempt to fight Russia on the ground on the Continent of Europe any more than we should attempt to fight China on the Continent of Asia.”

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Calvin Coolidge is the most well-known proponent of laissez-faire economics in the 20th century but I doubt you knew that he was a believer in Federalism before any other political ideology which means that to some people today his voting record would seem mixed but if you understand the GOP of that era they believed in state intervention but not federal intervention (most of the time).

Finally, what is to be made of Blum's statement that Coolidge believed "government should not interfere with the businesses they ran, though it should help promote them at home and abroad." As Governor of Massachusetts, Coolidge supported wages and hours legislation, opposed child labor, imposed economic controls during World War I, favored safety measures in factories, and even worker representation on corporate boards.

Did he support these measures while president? No, because in the 1920s, such matters were considered the responsibilities of state and local governments. As for promoting business interests at home and abroad, or course Coolidge did.

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We cannot forget Dwight Eisenhower and his warning to us of the Military Congressional Industrial Complex.



Perhaps today’s conservatives forget that the Republican Party was actually founded in the Northeast and Great Lakes region as a rather radical party but then became moderate. Even with the changes over a period of one hundred years of existence the party’s base was always located from Maine to Nebraska. Now it is usually the Republicans from that region which are being chased out for not being Republican enough. Who makes these decisions? Could it be the recent converts to the party from the South who were always Democrats?

It seems to me that what the GOP did was welcome the whore into the church then foolishly let her lead the congregation.

Today’s conservatives conveniently forget that their champion of their version of Republicans, which they now claim as the sole legitimate kind, was actually a Democrat for much of his life and even gave speeches for Democrat Harry Truman.



Ask yourself, who are the real ‘RINO’s? If Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and Dwight Eisenhower were to come back today and run for election without people knowing who they were easily these men would see a primary challenge against them for not being true Republicans.

I am sorry my fellow Republicans and Conservatives here but you really need to get over this whole ‘RINO’ label you enjoy sticking to others. When you realize the Republican Party is actually a moderate party which welcomes Conservatives, reformers, and Progressives alike not just Culture warriors, hard-line conservatives, and reactionaries then perhaps the party can regain what it once had. Your ideas are no more Republican than a Moderate’s and to think otherwise just shows what kind of absolutely ignorant buffoon you really are.

I predict that it will not take more than a dozen pages before anyone and everyone with an R behind their name is listed as being a RINO in this thread. I just want to put that out there early on. If I am wrong, I will be happy.

My take on the whole thing has always been, that there is no republican nor democrat, no matter who wins, they all are controlled and/or have the same ultimate goal. Left and right = middle.

Deebo

Just another false term.

Single party system. They all push one agenda. Oligarch control and subservient mass.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

reply to post by Deebo


I am so sick and tired of hearing this same line being peddled. All this does is legitimize your lack of action in changing our nation's politics. By declaring 'tptb' run it all that removes the responsibility of constructive action off your shoulders.

Beside that point what you are saying has absolutely nothing to do with the OP. You regurgitated that same old line into my thread without even truly thinking about what I wrote. Nice going. Now leave please.

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


Refer to my post above. Thank you.

Reply to post by Misoir

What's my lack of action? Knocking on doors for third parties? Voting election after election for candidates who never win?

What are you doing? Parading around the "big tent"' mantra trying to suck up anyone who might be feeling a little down about their single party scam.

"No, don't look over there behind the curtain. Come with us we welcome everyone."


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Good research Misoir, you are getting very good indeed...
I find that I cannot identify with any party or modern ideology
Anymore. There are a lot of people who do not have a home,
Maybe that will inspire change? Or maybe the opening
Of endless private funds is the end, maybe freedom is just
An operation of money, I believe that is the new mantra which
Will eclipse notions of days gone by. Liberty distilled, is your financial
Ability to do as you please. It is a new era, I keep trying to talk in
The old aesthetic, RINO might be a similar function of growth
(malignant growth) but the future.


Every man is an island, man cannot
Harm mother Earth, processes we do not see- do not matter or exist because
No one sends a bill! The new mantra is as deep as TV logic

I must agree with the reply by Deebo, Republican vs. Democrat is a Control mechanism used to distract the general population from seeing that this Nation is controlled outside of the process of established representational government.

The two party system is a basic brainwashing tactic. Given credence through a constant barrage of talking heads on the MSM telling the populace what to believe and think, i.e. your so-called “RINO” concept.

When the populace allows themselves to be side tracked with meaningless , made up divisions we ensure the victory of the tactic Divide and Conquer.

We must throw off these bonds, open our eyes to the reality of our serfdom and take back what is, has ever been, the best idea of Governance in the history of Mankind.

Just imagine if our system worked the way it was designed. This Nation would be as close to Utopia as humans could achieve.

A Government BY the People and FOR the People. What a great hope for Mankind.

Just think if our Government did everything with the primary thought being “IS IT GOOD FOR THE PEOPLE”. Utopia ! I say.

Spark and rekindle the flames of True Liberty. Throw off your bonds take up your torch and storm the halls of liberty and declare with one voice that we will not go quietly into the night, we will not give up without a fight.

This is OUR Independence Day !

Excellent post.

Years ago, despite being a left-leaning independent, I found numerous Republicans I felt good about voting for. As the years have gone by it seems as though most of the Republican candidates have become ditto-heads to a very specific ideology and have a group-think mentality in how they govern.

What I'd like to know is who/what is setting these parameters? What is the end goal? What would the ultimate fruition of their ideas look like and what would be the effect on everyday people?