According To Jon Huntsman the Republican Party is 'Devoid of a Soul'... He Might Be Right

by: Les Carpenter
Rational Nation USA
Liberty
-vs- Tyranny



While Governor Huntsman was not my favorite to land the rEpublican nomination in 2012 (Ron Paul was) looking back he would have made a formidable candidate in the effort to unseat President Obama. Instead the party nominated Mittens the Flip Flopper Romney and we all know the results of that brilliant move to pacify the more (false) conservatives in the rEpublican Oligarchical power structure. Unless the party wakes up and gets some sense it will pay a lasting price as America, including America's real conservatives and libertarians move on to a new era. Jon Huntsman should figure predominately in a new future for the rEpublican party.

The Telegraph - The Republican Party is leaderless and "devoid of a soul" but can rebuild in the wake of its election defeat if it embraces its history of supporting limited government, Jon Huntsman has said.

In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, the former Utah governor and leading Republican moderate said the party must accept "a strong dose of libertarianism" on social issues and allow state governments to move ahead with gay marriage.

Offering his prescription for the party's renewal, Mr Huntsman said the early stages of the Republican presidential primaries rewarded extreme conservatives rather than "long-term competitive candidates" who could effectively take on the Democrats.

Barack Obama appointed the Mandarin-speaking 52-year-old US Ambassador to China in 2009, a decision the newly-elected President hoped would keep Mr Huntsman out of this year's election.

Obama campaign aides openly acknowledged that they believed the two-term governor would be a difficult general election opponent and possibly the most dangerous Republican in the field.

He returned from Beijing in 2011 to media fanfare but his presidential bid collapsed in the early stages as he failed to connect with the conservatives that make up the Republican primary electorate.

Mr Huntsman said that his work for a Democrat president, his belief in climate change and his relatively liberal attitude on gay rights had obscured his conservative stances on budgets, gun control and abortion.

"You get caught up in a lot of the issues on which you're easily dismissed without people giving you proper consideration," he said.

However, the scale of Mitt Romney's defeat in November has left the party reeling and may create a fresh opening for the socially-moderate but fiscally-conservative ideas Mr Huntsman espoused in the primary.

"The party right now is a holding company that's devoid of a soul and it will be filled up with ideas over time and leaders will take their proper place," he said.

Mr Huntsman urged the party to "reflect a little bit on our winning chapters" and face up to a demographic reality where white conservatives represent a shrinking portion of the electorate.

"We can't be known as a party that's fear-based and doesn't believe in math," he said. "In the end it will come down to a party that believes in opportunity for all our people, economic competitiveness and a strong dose of libertarianism."

He said he "absolutely" supported individual states being allowed to implement gay marriage, saying that Abraham Lincoln, the first Republican president, believed that "equality under the law is an American value".

Mr Huntsman did not rule out a second presidential run in 2016 but said he was not spending his time "looking for some opening that we can fit in". {Continue Reading}

I'm still thinking the Libertarian Party is maybe the best way for America Ultimately. However, given the lock the dEmocrat and rEpublican party has had on American electoral success perhaps it makes a lot more sense to support a candidate in the rEpublican party that can win and then lead America in the direction that makes both social sense and fiscal sense. Jon Huntsman could very well be that individual.

Via: Memeorandum

Comments

  1. I'm a republican. A small "r" republican, mind you. I neither endorse nor support the GOP or beltway Republicans, the big "R" kind. The GOP elite gave us Dole, McCain, and Romney. They have shown their propensity for failure, and their utter cluelessness. (Is that even a word?)

    If Jon Huntsman (or any one) can show me republican ideals and not just give me the GOP talking points, designed to be solely anti-Democrat for the sake of being anti-Democrat, I would be interested.

    However, I believe at this point this is a huge IF.

    I'm not looking for a moral role model or a President interested in pushing social ideals of any kind. I simply want a President who is Contitutionally-savvy and able to represent America properly on the international stage. Oh, and a President who will crack the whip on Congress and get those losers to stop being jackasses more interested in keeping their cushy positions of power.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Believe it or not I'm registered neither as a rEpublican or a dEmocrat, both parties smell of rotten fish. I registered as a Conservative quite some time ago, unfortunately rEpublicans have given conservatism a VERY bad name. So I'm faced with the question of exactly how to register for 2014. I'm thinking independent or maybe looking into starting my own gig. It might be fun.

      Delete
    2. I'm a Registered Independent myself. In CT all this means is I am not allowed to vote in any primaries, and I am not shackled down by either of the Big Two.

      The tricky part is explaining to others that my republican leanings, with some libertarian thrown in, do not mean - by any stretch - that I endorse or support the GOP picks just because the beltway Republican Machine says I should. Those guys and gals can kiss my Independent Conservative arse. I'll even buy them lipstick, first.

      2013 needs to be a focused year of intelligent repositioning. Let the Conservatives abandon the GOP and let the GOP fail on its own. It's not like the GOP likes us anyways. Romney lost not because President Obama had better game, but because Conservatives stayed home on principle. After the GOP was done giving us Dole, McCain, and Mittsy, can anyone blame the Conservatives for staying true to their convictions, and letting Romney lose?

      Anyhoos...I reckon this is all much ado about nothing. The GOP will continue to flounder, the Dems/Socialists will continue to financially rape this Nation, and the media will continue to cover for Our Dear Leader. I would wager that we can wait until the end of 2013, come back and visit this conversation, and NOTHING will have changed.

      Inside, where it counts, I have personally seceded from governmental authority, and I will ever refuse to acquiesce or abdicate my freedoms and free-thinking to anything that cannot resurrect me.

      Delete
  2. Johnson was my first choice because I considered him the most socially tolerant and the best in terms of civil liberties (he, for instance, wouldn't be engaging in rendition), but I also liked Huntsman and would have given him serious consideration in the general. He, I agree with you totally, was light-years better than Mitt Romney.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I've seen polls that indicate that when given multiple choices on issues of importance, a fair majority, somewhere in the high 50's percentage wise, support Libertarian positions. We've become a joke in American politics because we've spent time and effort trying to a convince a polarized America to vote libertarian without first convincing them that they ARE libertarian. We need to take the resources wasted on losing elections and do the PR needed to show the country that we are the center that Ying and Yang no longer provide.

    ReplyDelete
  4. You're absolutely correct about needed sane people to take over the republican party Les. Fiscal and personal responsibilty are of course good ideas. The republican party is controlled by people who don't care about these ideas. Just ranting about gays,welfare queens or whatever to blind rank and file republicans from the real agenda of keeping the government largess rolling in Good post Les.

    ReplyDelete
  5. And the Democrat party is devoid of a brain. So they make a good pair as they drive the nation of the cliff...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hmm. Perhaps a Wizard of Oz analogy is appropriate: Dems no brain, GOP no heart, Electorate no courage, and Conservatives living in a fake world far from their true home, looking at a Wizard who constantly screams to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

      Perhaps.

      Delete
    2. And yes, Pelosi is the wicked witch of the West. Only because Barney Frank couldn't fit into the outfit.

      Delete
    3. For whatever reason I don't get email updates telling me when comments are posted to Les' site. I don't have time to come back multiple times to see what idiocy Silverfiddle says.

      Sorry Les.

      Delete
    4. @ Don - Pelosi the Wicked Witch of the West. Now that's Rich!

      Delete
    5. Joe - Did you use the button top left to subscribe? Always something for everyone here at RN USA.

      Delete
  6. Huntsman is a civilized, personable, well-spoken individual, but he is the absolute ANTITHESIS of Ron Paul.

    Huntsman is in truth a Liberal Democrat in Republican Drag -- another example of that most despised and despicable political breed -- a RINO.

    Like William F. Buckley before me I'd feel safer choosing the requisite number of names to fill both houses of congress -- and the presidency -- at RANDOM from any of the various telephone directories in the nation.

    They could not possible do worse than the corrupt, degenerate crew of foul balls who rule us now.

    It may well be a CRAPPY NEW YEAR, but let us do our best to make it a HAPPY CRAPYP NEW YEAR in spite of it all.

    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well FT I disagree. He is a moderate rEpublican from a rather conservative state If one actually looks at his record, focusing on the issue of fiscal responsibility, he looks more favorable than unfavorable. IMNHO.

      Now if one is of the mind of the socons then yes Huntsman will always be a black spot on the rEpublican party line up I suppose.

      I respect the man, he speaks his mind, he is consistent, he can relate to moderates, fiscal conservatives (the real ones anyway), and reasonable liberaols that haven't gone completely off the rails.

      Given the rEpublican track record of GWB, McCain, and the amazing Human Flipper Romney, all who pandered to the rEpublican power base and the oligarchs I'd say the party should have learned its lesson. But, IMNHO they will continue on the path to ultimate relevancy precisely because they fail to recognize Huntsman, Jindal, Martinez, (include Johnson even though he rightly jumped ship), and others are the types that will give the party the new life it needs so badly after 2001.

      At any rate it takes reasonable intelligent compromise to get anything done in politics and American government. It's one thing to believe in principle and fight hard to win the day. Bit like the wise and compromising founding fathers so readily realized compromise was inevitable. They were thankfully wise enough to make the necessary compromises.

      It might be over 2 and a quarter centuries later, but somehow we seem to have lost the wisdom they were so, well, to use your terminology, blessed with. They realized creating the nation they wanted was by far larger and more important than any one individual's or group of individuals ideological principle.

      We should be looking to their example, all of us, but beginning with the President, and all of our elected leaders. Somehow I think the founders were intelligent and wise enough to know the challenges that would face generations after they were gone would be vastly different than those they faced in 1776.

      Anyway have a very Happy Crappy New Year if you like.

      Delete
  7. Happy New Years to you Les....

    ReplyDelete
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  9. One big problem the GOP has these days is the influence of an idiotic conservative media.

    Many observers, including myself, thought the Republican Revolution in '94 was largely influenced by Rush Limbaugh, a puerile partisan who can never ever speak the truth about anything. What followed was moderate and conciliatory by today's standards, and the GOP ran amok with silly non-issues.

    Today's GOP is heavily influenced by the most popular cable news network on American TV, Fox News. And the level of silliness has gone way over the top.

    It's to the point where 40% of Americans are Biblical literalists, crazy conspiracy theories abound, and thoughtful understanding of the world around us is regarded as snobbish, and it's almost all among Republican, conservative voters.

    The party of William F. Buckley is now the party of Bill O'Reilly.

    The GOP had better start believing in evolution and evolve or they will be a permanent minority in the near future.

    JMJ

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JMJ - In your view every conservative, libertarian, or anyone else who doesn't see it all your way is either 1) a puerile partisan, 2) a pathological liar, and of course your fav 3) stupid.

      I'll just leave it at that JMJ, but ya might want to peer into the mirror now and again.

      Ya see, one of the interesting factors is this... Pissing all over your opponent while giving no credit where credit is do doesn't work. It alienates them and you've last before you've started. Progressives (or at least some of them) are expert at this. As are SOME CONSERVATIVES as well, just to be fair and balanced. But I guess I'm talking to you cause it is obvious I can't convince some of my fellow fiscal conservatives (the real fiscal conservatives/libertarians) to listen to me either.

      Now, you have a Happy New Year ya hear?

      Delete
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  12. "it makes a lot more sense to support a candidate in the rEpublican party that can win and then lead America in the direction that makes both social sense and fiscal sense"

    Sounds like another republican who cannot give up his old loyalties and cannot concede that his party has done so much damage to America. If only we could find a sane politician to lead our party? But you just keep telling everyone, you have no dog in the Rep/Dem political race. Right! You haven't convinced anyone of your neutrality, including, it seems, even yourself.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Moving ahead there are increasing signs Huntsman may indeed have hit the nail on the head.

    In fact, the principles of limited responsible governance have died in both major parties. Indeed as Nixon said 40 or so years ago, 'we're all Keynesians now.'

    It' s going to be a long and rough road for my grandchildren's generation.

    ReplyDelete

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