Tag Archives: moderates

Jun 14 2012

Advantage or Disadvantage

 

 

The primary is days away as I write this.  Many have exhausted themselves in non-stop battle to get their candidate elected to the general election.  There are some truths and traditions to examine when it comes to the politics of Maine.

Most historians agree that in the last fifty years or so a disturbing pattern has developed in our State.  The voting populace has proven to be much more conservative than the politicians that represent them.  How then, in a representative form of government, can this pattern emerge?

While conservatives have the numbers to consistently win the majority, they lack the unity to truly effect change.  One of the defining strengths of many conservatives is their dogged adherence to truth and principle.  But this strength at times, yes it seems at the most crucial times, becomes the Achilles that brings another frustrating setback to the march towards consistent prominence.  So fundamentally attached to a certain nuance of the conservative standards, factions easily develop and splinter into various corners and, during elections, never the twain or twenty shall meet.

Governor LePage was the one strong leader, who seemed to bring them together over the divides of their several beliefs.  Now it seems, perhaps, the divides are yawning open again.  Moderates and liberals may regain their hold on power and conservatives could once again squalor in sectarian apathy.

Liberals have long trumpeted their belief that the end justifies the means and have implemented this to great effect.  Conservatives believe the means is just as important as the end.  One cannot be compromised to facilitate the other.  Unfortunately, within this strict approach to representation there has steadily crept an aversion to compromise.  Holding the ground and defending an issue against the onslaught of liberalism has now evolved into staking your territory and fighting with anyone who comes near.  This has resulted in the near death of unity within the conservative ranks.

The one consistency amongst Maine conservatives is the attack of any front-runner, who dares call himself conservative.  Should a conservative candidate emerge from the pack and push to the fore, it seems every conservative leader in Maine is bound by blind rage to lacerate, eviscerate, castigate and in all ways mitigate the demise of his or her candidacy.  This all in an effort to prove themselves much more the conservative than the sad representation, who had the audacity to give themselves the hallowed title of conservative.  The public preening of one’s own conservative narcissism has had a painful debilitating effect on Maine’s political landscape.

Whatever the outcome of this primary, the numbers showed that the front-runner race between a conservative and a moderate should not have even been close.  But old alliances, petty grievances, and downright dirty politics, have made this, perhaps, another chapter in the saga of missed opportunities.  Our founding fathers showed us the wisdom of true compromise. My fellow conservatives, win, lose or draw, it is imperative that we find and learn that lost art our forefathers perfected of finding our unified voice for the sake of our posterity.  Let’s not miss opportunity!

Sep 16 2011

What Emily hates

What Emily hates

 

The tender shoots of young job growth are beginning to break through the volcanic ash, which is the residue of the 40-year liberal scorching of the business landscape of Maine.  Democrats are now faced with the stark realization that the first steps the LePage administration have made towards making Maine palatable to business again are working.  Despite the work of Emily Cain’s “Party of No” and their obstructionist moderate allies in the Republican Party, the effects of a pro-jobs Governor on Maine’s business climate has been quickly evident as we discussed last week.  This did not sit well with the minority party.  This was no more evident than through the words of the Democrat leader Emily Cain.

After the legislature had passed an admittedly imperfect budget (it was much too large for a conservative), Ms. Cain told the media emphatically that she and her Caucus “just hated these tax cuts, just hated them!” This after moderates had helped to grant the Democrats concessions beyond the Governor’s liking.  This is just a reminder that a Democrat’s 40-year definition of bi-partisan is “do everything our way”.  It seems those tax cuts Emily hates are sending a message, both to entrepreneurs within the state and without, that Maine is truly open for business.

But why does Emily hate them so? Could it be that the advent of job growth, prosperity and the independence it brings signals the end to the strangle hold the Democrat party has held upon the futures of the people of Maine?  With more of their own money left in their pockets to spend and save for their own future, residents will begin to feel that heady sense of accomplishment that comes from providing ones own needs from the fruit of ones own labor.   Instead, Ms. Cain seems to prefer we remain in the Democrat’s pattern of choice that has the people being herded into entitlement systems like so many cattle. Back, she wails, to the dependence on big Democrat government to get us through the endless meager years under the grey drab famine of socialism.

Is this why she hates tax cuts so?  Perhaps, by extension, she hates the inevitable fiscal independence prosperity will bring to Mainers?  The people will begin to realize this truth.  They don’t need government.  Government needs them.  Maybe it is the great sense of satisfaction a young businessperson can feel by growing a business that they can pass on to their young ones that she hates so much?  Or maybe its that sense of calm that comes to a family when they know there is enough work to pay the bills and even get ahead that she takes exception to?  One thing we know for sure, Emily Cain hates tax cuts.   She “just hates them”.

Simply put, tax cuts give the people’s money back to the people.  Tax cuts show businesses we are serious about bringing them back to Maine.  Tax cuts are the tried and proven way to fix an economy.  Now Emily Cain, how could you hate a thing like that?  We the people don’t.