Senator Ted Cruz and Senate conservatives make final stand as 1.6 million Americans sign “don’t fund obamacare” petition. Was House vote last week a Pyrrhic Victory?
The image we show here once again represents Senator Ted Cruz and his allies in the Senate and House who are making a final stand to block Obamacare from becoming law on October 1, a mere six days from now.
The script of the liberal left and their allies and useful idiots in the GOP like Fox’s Bill O’Reilly and Karl Rove is to denigrate and attack Senator Ted Cruz and any Republican Senators and Congressman who stand with them.
The script of the liberal left and their allies is to use every minute of broadcast air time and every headline to to (a) warn of a government shut down, (b) warn about Senator Cruz and the “crazy” conservatives and (c) say little to nothing about Obamacare and the October 1 implementation.
Bill O’Reilly’s “praise” can be damning too. He said tonight, that Senator Ted Cruz is the “most controversial politician in the country.”
Then, he said that “I was wrong” in all of his criticisms of Cruz this past week (often in a duet with his guest Karl Rove) – because, he reports, Cruz is trying to “take over the Republican Party” and this will help him do exactly that, by the stand he is making this week.
And one really “fair and balanced” Fox TV reporter (which Bill O’Reilly, who takes regular potshots at conservatives, is not) on Fox said several days ago that the House victory to send a Continuing Resolution for a budget without Obamacare funding in it, could be a “Pyrrhic Victory” if the Senate rejects it. He urged readers, “look it up.”
“The far right in this country,” continued O’Reilly in his anti-anti-Obamacare nightly rant tonight, “sends me hate mail because they don’t want the moderate Republicans but want to take over the Party themselves” and “you can’t mess with Cruz because,” reports this intrepid reporter, “he is our guy.” The way he spoke tonight of “the far right” I thought for a moment I’d made a mistake and turned to MSNBC and maybe this is a male version of Rachel Maddow.
So Bill O’Reilly now joins with Hillary Clinton in decrying the massive influence of us, the “far right” and the “vast right wing conspiracy.” Thanks Bill. And you’re supposed to be the one speaking “for the folks” on the “fair and balanced” TV network.”
Here is a humble attempt to rebut this silliness at best, or outright attempts at file character assassination at worst.
First, the conservative mainstream in the GOP isn’t trying to “take over” anything. Outlets such as REDSTATE are consistently the voice of that conservative mainstream, and as the online descendent of Human Events – founded some 50 years ago – we conservative have ALWAYS had to battle BOTH the liberal left of the Democrats AS WELL AS the liberals of the GOP.
Over the years, whether they are the Nelson Rockefeller-Jacob Javits Republicans of New York who inspired the birth of Young Americans for Freedom and its version of the 95 Theses – the Sharon Statement, then the 1962 creation of the Conservative Party of New York to directly strike at the heart of the liberal GOP in New York, to the American Conservative Union, to Phylis Schllafy’s “A Choice not an Echo” and Barry Goldwater’s Conscience of a Conservative, the truth is the opposite of what Bill O’Reilly reported today.
It is not the conservative trying to “take over” anything. It is as it has always been, the conservatives trying to launch a revolt against the prevailing orthodoxy of modern day liberalism and the defeatist Republicans who are scared to death to do what General MacArthur said about another conflict: “in war there is no substitute for victory.”
It is the liberals, or the progressives, or the anti-conservatives, or the “I’m conservative but I’m not crazy” wing of the GOP which has ALWAYS said “we are more efficient then the Democrats elect us, and (b) we just want to make government work better, and (c) we need to sit down with the Democrats (or the Communists) and work out an amicable deal so that they can make the most of one defeat after another defeat they have planned out.
The worst thing in the world to one of these anti-conservative Republicans is to start speaking to them of issues and principles and tell them straight out, that we demand the right to stand up and fight the liberals. “But we might lose,” they say or worse, as Bill O’Reilly and Karl Rove have been saying EVERY day for the past week, “we will lose so lets be realistic.”
Pyrrhic victory for House GOP on defunding Obamacare?
Last week I compared the stand of the House Republicans to the heroic stand of one of the heroes of the epic book, Lord of the Rings, Gandalf the wizard, against the evil Balrog (see . House Should Defund Obamacare, Tell Balrog Obama, You Shall Not Pass).
Many young people might not be aware that there was actually a bestselling BOOK since they rarely read, but at least the three part movie was close to the original.
As the outnumbered “Fellowship of the Ring” was fleeing for their lives against a pursuing army of evil orcs, the hideos, frightening, enormous sized “Balrog” monster” made its appearance. In rapid strides, it caught up to the hapless Fellowship at the Bridge, below which was what appeared to be an endless chasm.
It was truly one of the most frightening moments of the nine plus hours of movie.
I was reminded of that scene last week because it is a terrifying moment in American history. A President who has promised (threatened!) to “transform” us from what America has been for two centuries, is on the verge of taking the most enormous step of that plan on October 1.
The main theme of the media as we march down to that October 1 deadline in just 6 days, is that the crazy Republicans led by the crazy Senator from Texas, is going to cause chaos and destruction and anarchy in America by “shutting the government down.”
It is such a frightening scenario painted that the media hardly has time to even refer to the October 1 deadline
Conservatives are assailed on all fronts by stories of how crazy and unrealistic these Senators and Congressman are who won’t just accept and vote for a budget that includes funding for Obamacare. Rarely if ever – and not once on the Bill O’Reilly TV show – has anyone referred to the basic job of elected Senators and Congressman – to vote FOR or AGAINST legislation and do their best to represent their constituents and their own conscience.
Today, for those who can remember that frightening scene of the Balrog catching up the fellowship of the Ring at the Bridge, with thousands of orcs who had also been chasing them scurrying out of the way as the fire breathing, whip snaping Balrog entered the scene, there is that same feeling. It seems impossible to imagine how our heroes can survive the next few moments.
One member of the fellowship turned and faced the evil Balrog at the bridge. Gandolf the Wizard stood and shouted with determination, “you shall not pass.” His stand enabled the Fellowship to escape certain death.
The reporter this week on Fox that called the House stand a “pyrrhic victory” urged his viewers to “look it up.”
I did. There is Gandalf to help you understand. Gandalf appeared to lose that battle, but he bought time to the Fellowship of the Ring, which escaped to triumph later with the final part of the three part book, The Return of the King. He also came back, to steal a line from another favorite movie (Star Wars), “mightier than you can possibly imagine” (Obiwon Kenobi to Darth Vader, just before he was struck down: “you can strike me down but I will come back mightier than you can possibly imagine.”).
It is not a “pyrrhic victory” by the GOP House last week. If the voices of an impressive 1.6 million who signed “dontfundit.com” petitions and who called and wrote their Senators and Congressman and who represent the majority as we can see in all public opinion polls, is ignored, then the liberals will be the ones who had the short term victory but a long term defeat.
Bill O’Reilly gave his “backhand compliment” to Senator Cruz on this, finally acknowledging that his stance may end up strengthening him in the long term. Denigrating him as a guy who “wants to take over” and who is personally ambitious doesn’t change the truth: if you read between the lines you’ll see that liberal Republicans – or perhaps we should call them “fellow travelers” Republicans, are deathly afraid that their ability to suppress conservatives, is getting very shaky right now.
The “don’t fund it” website that Senator Cruz is championing, contains a Senate “whip list” of Senators to telephone to urge them to STAND WITH CRUZ as he faces off right now in the Senate together with Senator Lee and others against the numerically superior forces of Barack Obama and Harry Reid in the Senate. We urge you to visit the website and at the least, call your own two Senators and if possible, call every undecided Senator on the list to ask them simply, STAND WITH CRUZ, defund Obamacare.
The news media has made much of the “crazy Republicans” because they dared oppose what is scheduled to happen on October 1. They have said it is “crazy” to actually use your vote to oppose what Barrack Obama proposes.
These “French Republicans” as Mark Levin called them this week, have ALWAYS done this, and for those of us around the conservative movement awhile, as Sarah Palin said today on Fox news, “no we are not at all surprised by their opposition.” Levin said quiet plainly, we have ALWAYS had to fight both these loser Republicans and also the liberal Democrats.
We conservatives are the party of change. We conservatives have ALWAYS been opposed by both the liberal Republicans with their anti-conservative, GOP establishment allies and by the liberal-left. This anti-conservative coalition has ALWAYS said we are crazy.
In fact, I recall an old joke I was told as a high school Young Americans for Freedom Member… that liberals were really upset with The Conservative Mind and The Conscience of a Conservative … because they were always treating our movement as a bunch of brainless crazies whose opposition to them was based on kneejerk reaction, not based on any real philosophy.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s extensive reports about life in the Gulag Archipelego included detailed descriptions of how dissidents were treated – not just silenced, shut down, imprisoned, tortured, killed…. But also treated as and branded as “crazy” people in need of incarceration at the crazy house, replete with straightjackets and drugs.
As I pen these words, Senator Ted Cruz is making us all proud by making a courageous stand against the Balrog, and those who may yet overcome him to enact Obamacare, may very well be the ones who will find theirs is the Pyrrhic Victory and that later, it will be written that THEY were the ones who must have been crazy to attempt to destroy American freedom and think they could get away with it.
On October 17, a series of speeches will be put on the record at the monthly Freedom Leadership Conference in Virginia, on the subject of conservative alternatives and change . This month’s conference will be sponsored by The Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy with its President, Michael Thompson, outlining a new proposal to change the tax system in Virginia to make business growth more likely.
Other speakers at the conference (which starts at 7 PM with a coffee and dessert social) will review Mark Levin’s Liberty Amendments and as has been the case for each of the previous ten monthly conferences, there will be some attention to a portion of The Thurmont Statement of Conservative Principles.
Only liberals and their GOP allies would say that Redstate readers and Freedom Leadership Conference subscribers and attendees, are “crazy” for standing firm for our principles as Senator Cruz is this very hour. We conservatives don’t want to “take over” but to change America back to what the founding fathers had in mind. The conference in northern Virginia is dedicated to that purpose as is this my first, and future columns at REDSTATE (comments and suggestions welcome).
Free subscriptions are available to the conference newsletter, and if you are within drive distance of the Fairfax Marriott at Fair Oaks, Northern Virginia, you are encouraged to attend, see Freedom Leadership Conference. There is also a new Facebook fan page for the conference.
Glenn Ryt looks for new coalition minded, full spectrum conservative friends at Facebook. This article is cross posted at the Freedom Leadership Conference, with a link and reference to REDSTATE.
This article is cross posted at REDSTATE and at Freedom Leadership Conference, referencing both posts at both websites. The writer is a longstanding reader of REDSTATE and Human Events.
