The RINOs Blew It

Conservatives Are Challenged To Reassert Themselves

by Phyllis Schlafly, November 22, 2006

Big Media are repetitiously posing the post-election question: will President Bush now work with the Democrats? The bigger question the media fail to ask is, will he work with Republicans?

Will he work with the 88 percent of House Republicans and 58 percent of Senate Republicans who voted for Border Security Only without any amnesty or "guest worker" plan? Or will he continue to embrace a phony bipartisanship based on cooperating with Ted Kennedy and John McCain?

The 2006 election results cannot be read as a demand for "cut and run" in Iraq, open borders, same-sex marriage, higher taxes and spending, or bigger government. As Democrat Mark Shields accurately summed it up on the Lehrer NewsHour: "The election was not a victory for Democrats; it was a defeat for Republicans."

The election was a referendum on George W. Bush and his handling of the war, illegal aliens, Katrina, spending, some of his nominations, and his administration's failure to remember who elected him.

Although the American people did not vote for the San Francisco values of Nancy Pelosi, her regime will bring an unprecedented level of radical leftwing leadership. Pelosi has a 96% rating from the leftwing Americans for Democratic Action and a 100% rating from the pro-abortion group called NARAL.

The anticipated Pelosi rule in the House is why some pundits are gloating that the era of conservatism is over, but in Mark Twain's famous words, reports of its death are greatly exaggerated. Conservatives still are the majority in America, and the Democrats who won on November 7 did so by dressing in Republican clothes and pretending to be pro-life or pro-gun or pro-marriage.

Grassroots conservatives have repeatedly shown that they have the energy, the dedication and the numbers to wrest control of the Republican Party from the branch that has variously been known as the Rockefeller Republicans, the Eastern Establishment, the country club Republicans, the moderates, or the RINOs (Republicans In Name Only).

Conservatives took leadership in the Republican Party in 1964 when they nominated Barry Goldwater for President after defeating Nelson Rockefeller. Conservatives took leadership in the Republican Party again in 1980 when they nominated and elected Ronald Reagan after defeating the so-called moderates who were backing Gerald Ford.

Conservatives took leadership in the Republican Party again in 1994 when they elected the first Republican Congress in 40 years. They've done it before so, ergo, they can do it again.

The northeastern wing of the Republican Party took the biggest pounding on November 7. That's the perch where the RINOs roost.

A good example of the old adage that Coming Events Cast Their Shadows Before Them can be seen in the election to Congress of pro-family conservative Tim Walberg in Michigan's District 7. His victory came after he challenged and defeated a RINO Republican incumbent in the primary.

Conservatives had other significant successes on November 7. Seven states passed marriage amendments: Tennessee with 81%, South Carolina with 78%, Idaho with 63%, Virginia with 57%, South Dakota with 52%.

Wisconsin, where opponents thought they had the best chance, easily passed its state marriage amendment by 59%. Colorado voters were presented with two choices: Colorado passed a traditional marriage amendment by 56% and also defeated a referendum to legalize same-sex domestic partnerships by 53%.

We now have 27 states that have passed marriage initiatives with an average majority of about 70 percent.

Arizona overwhelmingly passed three amendments limiting taxpayer benefits to illegal aliens. By 74 percent, Arizona also passed an amendment to make English the official language, with half of Hispanic voters approving it.

Eight states passed eminent domain initiatives to mitigate the damage done by the Supreme Court's 2005 supremacist decision in Kelo v. City of New London. Michigan banned affirmative action despite hysterical opposition from the politically correct universities which had just gotten approval for their race-preference policies from the U.S. Supreme Court.

We lost a few conservative Members of Congress, but they didn't lose because they were conservative -- they lost in the anti-Bush tide. For example, exit polls show that the visit President Bush made to Missouri to help Senator Jim Talent a few days before the election actually cost Talent votes because it reminded people how angry they are at Bush, and Talent lost by only 2 percent.

Conservatives should emphatically reject the advice of the sanctimonious former Missouri Senator John Danforth, who urged Republicans "to disengage themselves from the Christian right." The only Senate victory Republicans had in 2006 was Bob Corker in Tennessee, who was elected because Christian right voters came to the polls to pass the marriage amendment by 81 percent.

Pro-family conservatives should reassert the integrity of their principled movement, rejecting all financial temptations to be the Bush Party or the party of Big Business. Conservatives should re-claim their majority in the Republican Party by outnumbering and outsmarting the false prophets of RINO politics.