The Senate Conservatives Fund: Soliciting Money From the Mentally Inactive

I just looked at the Senate Conservatives Fund website. This is fascinating stuff!

Remember, this site is the Republicans’ site for people who do not want to give money to the party because it has strayed from conservative principles. I was quite curious to see how they would do this.

It is certainly not intended to appeal to my disaffected friends. It’s that same extremist radio talk show format where you rant about a few easily identifiable matters that on the surface would not garner anyone’s support. There is a daily “pork report” identifying instances of government waste. This little entry focuses on relatively small items of waste in the federal government, but the site does not address any of the issues.

Because it is run by Republicans it cannot very well advocate for a balanced budget or balanced trade or any of those big picture things. Spending in the Mideast is of course out, as that would put the party in an awkward position. So they identify what they claim are instances of government waste. The “pork report” could be put on the website of almost any political party.

With respect to the pending mortgage crisis bill, it does not criticize anyone voting for it, as most Republicans are doing that. Instead it identifies the nine congressmen who voted against it.

There is a little list on the right margin that identifies “what conservatives are for.” The list though is little more than a string of meaningless buzz words, like “national security.” No explanation of the meaning of these terms is offered. Obviously, they are intended to mean whatever the viewer believes they mean.

This is for sure not a site for a thoughtful person who has issues with the Republican Party. It just omits reference to the party and contains little more than empty slogans.

The site identifies twenty close races for Senate seats and asks the reader to identify the true conservatives who are running. I could find no meaningful assurances about precisely how the donations that it solicits will be used.

Rift Between Republicans and Conservatives: The Senate Conservatives Fund

Many people who have always called themselves Republicans will no longer vote for that party. Five people have told me this and I was interested to see that this attitude has caused the Republican Party to restrategize fund raising for senate races.

The people I’m talking about do not call themselves social conservatives, just conservatives. They tend not to be social conservatives as that term is commonly used. They tend to support women’s rights and civil rights in general. Abortion and school prayer are not their foremost interests. They are not followers of extremist right wing radio shows. They do not feel that Democrats are evil. They are well educated and keep up on politics, usually from a variety of sources.

Like Alan Greenspan in his recent autobiography, they feel that the party led by Bush has abandoned its fundamental principles and in the process deserted them. Some are rather bitter.

The concerns expressed to me are Bush’s disregard of the need for a balanced budget, a concept that was treated as hallowed by Republicans during Clinton’s administration, then abandoned as soon as Bush got into office. Related to this is the Republican’s disregard of the mounting national debt, a sore point among my friends. The gaping trade deficit, something Republican used to be concerned about, still concerns many people.

The corruption and mismanagement of money associated with government contractors deeply shocks some conservatives, as did the political scandals that have characterized the administration. These people also do not support the jingoistic militarism that the Republican Party seems to stand for.

Finally Bush’s apparent dishonesty about the war, with regard to the Plame leak and now blaming gas prices on the Democrats while urging acceptance of off shore drilling as a solution, knowing full well that that it does not offer a solution (well, maybe one or two percent in fifteen or twenty years) and that oil companies have tens of millions of acres of undrilled land that they choose not to use at this time. They are shocked at the administration’s suppression of science and diminishment of the E.P.A.

They ask: What traditional convservative value has been respected by the Bush administration other than lip service to family values? The business of government has not been on conservative tracks. Clinton’s administration was far truer to conservative principles than the current administration.

Anyway I was surprised to see that this attitude is shared by so many Republicans that the Republican Party is having a hard time with fund raising. People are refusing to give money to the Republican Party PAC that raises money for senatorial campaigns. To do an end run around this obstacle, the Republican Party is creating a PAC that does not collect money for the party but for conservative candidates.

It seems that to some degree the Republican Party may have lost its base in the course of catering to Bush’s base.