This past weekend I drove down the coast to spend the weekend with about 20 other College Republicans. As most political junkies would, we were watching Senator Obama's victory speech in
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After Obama’s speech ended, two discussions began amongst us. The first dealt with the obvious trouble Republicans will be in if Obama becomes the Democratic nominee. For someone as young and inexperienced as Senator Obama to have catapulted into superstar status in such a short amount of time is not unheard of in the political world. However, Obama is a scary thought to Republicans, as one might imagine. Hopefully, it will scare Republicans into uniting behind whichever candidate wins our own party’s nomination.
That brings us to the second conversation.
Obama, via his speech, made quite an impression on about a quarter of the people in the room who began insisting that they would choose Obama over whichever Republican candidate they absolutely despise. There are clearly deep divides within the Republican Party over whom to nominate, and there were clearly deep divides within this small group of College Republicans, who are friendly and from the same state and who have worked together many times in the past. This fact says something about where the Republican Party is going.
The lesson I pulled away from this weekend’s retreat is this: if Republicans want a real chance at victory this year, we are going to have to pull together behind whoever wins our party’s nomination and only then can we philosophically re-define what it means to be a Republican.
3 comments:
I concur. It really rubs me the wrong way when people say they will not unite behind our nominee. Especially when these people at the retreat are supposed to be the hardcore republicans.
Thanks for the post.
Unity has always been a strength of Republicans--its the Dems who have a history of self-inflicted wounds by dividing among themselves. It cuts deep to their different political philosophies--pluralism is much more comfortable for Dems. Look for the GOP to unite this year, especially if presumption remains that the Democratic nominee will start out ahead in the race.
I don't vote strictly along party lines and nor should anyone else. I do think the Republican party is more divided at the moment with their candidates than Dems.
That same assessment can be made about the Dems. Some Dems are willing to cross party lines if Billary is chosen. I don't think it's such a bad thing when people vote for the other party.
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