Life is really simple when things are broken down to an “either-or” situation. Stop or go. Sit or stand. Hawkeyes or Cyclones. McDonald’s or Hardees.
The joy in life isn’t in the “either-or” scenarios, however. The joy in life is in the critical thinking part of things. It doesn’t take much critical thinking to pick one out of two possibilities.
Right or left? Up or down?
Yet for many Americans, that is exactly what politics is. It is as easy as “Republican or Democrat.” Period. That’s it.
Participation in the primary isn’t near as high as the general election because it is in the general election that things get decided in terms of R or D. But that is such a dumbing down of American politics. And it literally requires zero — ZERO — critical thinking.
Especially when they put an R by the Republican and a D by the Democrat on the ballot. Like it is too much for voters to find out for themselves which candidate belongs to which party.
Careful, could develop a brain cramp if we require people to do such a high level of research prior to picking the people who will literally decide the laws that impact us on a daily basis.
I am here to ask you to consider one question, and it may be a question you haven’t considered before…
Is 20 years of the wrong Republicans really better than two years of the Democrat?
If the Republican who wins is a boring, moderate, talk the talk but don’t walk the walk RINO, is that person in a position of power for 20 years really going to influence others to be Republican?
Are they going to stand up to leadership? Are they going to advance actual conservative causes? Are they going to be more than a reliable vote?
And once a person is elected to office, it is difficult to vote them out of office. There is power in the incumbency. And while in a given election — a snapshot, if you will — a Republican is better than a Democrat in the immediate present, what about the ramifications of that Republican being in office for 10, 20, 30, 40, 60 years?
We need Republicans elected to office who are die-hard conservatives. Those who fight for what they believe in just as hard as the Left fights for what it believes. We need Republicans who will not just slow down the Democrat route to fundamentally transforming America, but Republicans who will actually turn the vehicle around and head back towards sanity.
Here is the deal, Republicans need to hold elected Republicans to the same standard — if not higher standard — that we hold Democrats. Remember, Democrats are not elected to advance conservative principles. Republicans are.
The Lakers coach isn’t taken aback when the Celtics score a basket against him. But when LeBron James or another Laker scores against their own team, that would cause some concern.
Democrats aren’t elected to be Republicans. So as insane as their ideas and policies may be, it’s important we recognize they aren’t going to do what we want them to. That isn’t how politics work.
Thankfully we live in a state where Republicans have been in full control for five years. Five years. F-I-V-E years. This means anything you have wanted to see happen in Iowa politics for the last five years that didn’t happen is due to Republican inaction. Democrats couldn’t do a darn thing to stop it.
Yet there are a number of Republicans who refuse to call out Republicans. Who want to be liked. Who want to go along and get along.
That doesn’t get us anywhere.
Politicians, like children (there are a lot of similarities, by the way), should be criticized when deserving of criticism and praised when deserving of praise. It shouldn’t be some weird lovefest as if they can do no wrong.
If you are a Republican who criticizes Democrats for their inaction on election integrity but stayed silent on the fact every Republican in Congress from Iowa voted to certify the presidential election, you are not helping anything. At all. In fact, you’re making it worse.
We have to remember politicians work for us. We are their boss. They need us more than we need them. At least that is how it is supposed to be.
And we cannot just write off criticism because it is critical of a Republican and we’re a Republican.
We must return to a time where we value principles and not personalities. We have to be married to conservative ideals, not individual politicians.
Iron sharpens iron. As long as our “criticisms” are true, they are beneficial. The reality is when Republicans criticize Republicans, it should serve as a wake-up call for the elected leaders. It should pull them back to the right.
But some, maybe even many, in high positions don’t really hate MSNBC or CNN or The Des Moines Register due to their bias, they hate them because they have a liberal bias. And if those stations or publications actually held a Republican bias, the same people would have no issue with it at all.
Again, life is really simple when it is Republican good, Democrat bad 24/7, 365. But that sort of thinking can really make life irrelevant.
The Iowa Standard will reliably support principles and positions reflected by the Republican Party platform. We will not serve as cheerleaders to Team GOP. We will actually hold Republicans to a higher standard than Democrats because Democrats aren’t elected to do what we want — Republicans are.
Forget fixing the Democrats. That isn’t going to happen short of some sort of political revival or awakening.
Focus on our own first. There are plenty of Republicans who need to start acting like Republicans. Let’s straighten them out first.
What does it mean to be a Republican? Follow the link, most will be surprised…
https://www.iowagop.org/about/platform/?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_source=bookmark
I’m finished with the RINO’s.