[Frank Stephens]
Dear Congressional Republicans:
Learn how to govern – PLEASE!!! Yes, I am a small government Republican, but we will not get there this year or next. It will take several years to undo the damage socialist Democrats have done to our nation. In the meanwhile we need to move some very important legislation.
I was dismayed as I read Daniel Larison of The American Conservative, who correctly identified the self-defeating strategy conservative Republcans are following. He wrote: "It would be bad enough if small-government Republicans were merely being short-sighted and committed to a losing strategy," he writes, "but what makes these tactics more harmful to the cause of small-government conservatism is that they reflect no sense of prudence or consideration of unintended consequences."
For six years under the Obama Administration you yelled and screamed and promised “just wait until we have the majority again.” Well, you have not just a majority, you have control of ALL three branches. Since you took back control of government you have added to a pile of legislation that moldered outside the Obama White House. Your thwarted agenda included unspooling financial regulations, slashing of business taxes, Planned Parenthood stripped of federal funds, the ¬Affordable Care Act was to be teed up for repeal and replacing — plus dozens of more agenda items.
Well, how about staring with a unified Republican government so some of these extremely important agenda items get accomplished? 2018 is just around the corner and Republicans, who evidently lack the ability to govern, are setting themselves up for defeat.
Enough of the purists who are damning us to another round of socialist Democrat control of government. Didn’t eight years of Obama teach you guys anything???
What we are witnessing is another conservative example of purism and principle damaging another major opportunity to do good.
During the election, and immediately afterward, the purist conservative Never-Trumpers, who believed it was better for Hillary Clinton to be elected president and for the Left to have four more years of presidential power than for Donald Trump to win, nearly accomplished their senselessness goal.
Yes, there were valid reasons to wonder whether Donald Trump was a conservative, and valid reasons to oppose him in the primaries. There were no valid reasons to oppose him in the general election or after he was elected.
In terms of policy, Donald Trump is a conservative dream. From appointing a conservative to the Supreme Court, to approving the Keystone XL pipeline, to weakening the fanatical, hysterical, and tyrannical EPA, to appointing an ambassador to the United Nations who has moral contempt for that immoral institution, to backing Israel, to seeking to reduce economy-choking regulations on business – indeed essentially everything conservatives would wish for in a president – Donald Trump is almost too good to be true.
Have you forgotten the last time you controlled government? The GOP amassed such a poor record while governing that voters ousted you. Finding yourselves in a much weakened position, you tried to substitute intransigence for the long, hard work of clawing your way back into power. Democrats are now employing that same self-destructive strategy. After 2018, you may find yourselves there again as you continue in your small splinter groups rather than unifying to govern.
Many of us hold to one larger principle than even the conservative ones we share with the purists – defeating the left because that is the No. 1 priority of those who cherish Western Civilization and regard America as the last best hope for humanity.
Make no mistake about what you hold in your hands – this may well be the last time in your lifetimes that Republicans control both Houses of Congress and have a conservative president. AND understand that time is not on our side; there are congressional elections next year and it is up to you if you win those elections or revert to minority status.
by Frank Stephens
