Are Conservatives Recovering Their Enthusiasm?

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Do you feel a certain spring in your step these days?

Everyone who knows me well knows that I rarely pass up an opportunity to complain. I can spot the dark lining of a silver cloud from miles away.

So, it must give me a bit more credibility than the typical Pollyanna when I begin to sense a positive change in the air hinting at renewed enthusiasm for conservative ideas even as the aberration of Obama is still in it’s infancy.

After all, we knew that sooner or later the mists of “hope and change” that obscured the reality of an Obama Administration coupled with Democrat control of congress would drift away and the disinfecting power of sunlight would shine in and reveal the truth to voters who are only now waking up from their hopey-changey hangover.

Are Four Years Up Yet?

On Tuesday, Obama signed the hogzilla “stimulus” bill into law saying that it was “the beginning of the end” of our economic troubles. The quote itself is odd because it’s derivative of something Winston Churchill declared after the first big British victory over Rommel in North Africa. Churchill said “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”

Interesting that Obama would rephrase Churchill after banishing the bust of the man many Britons consider the greatest Englishman who ever lived. That action alone signaled to conservatives in the U.S. and overseas the true nature of the man we are dealing with.

Obama’s only been in office for one month and already there is handwriting on the wall which suggests there may only be 47 months of this aberration left to endure. To borrow Obama’s own phrase, we may already be at the beginning of the end for Obama!

If the economy rebounds Obama will get the credit and we may be in for a longer wait. But if the hogzilla stimulus bill actually damages the economy and the massive debt incurred ushers in a new era of mass inflation the remaining 47 months will just fly by despite the economic pain. It’s not that we want bad economic tidings, but it certainly makes it less painful to be proved right.

Early bets are running against Obama. The Dow Jones index is a predictor of future economic activity and the more Obama and the Dems talk and act on the economy the lower the Dow goes. Brush fires of populist dissent are springing up all over as people finally learn what kind of non-stimulative big government liberal nonsense was in this bill that was so urgent we were told there was no time to read it.

Obama Approval Drops

Another signal that all is not well in Obamaland is the first signs of downward trends in opinion polls. The latest Fox News/Opinion Dynamics Poll (summary, raw data-PDF) is especially troubling for Obamatons and heartening for conservatives.

A few highlights:

  • Obama’s approval rating dropped 5 points to 60% and disapproval rating went up 10 points to 26% (mostly due to hoodwinked Republicans waking up which is more good news for conservatives).
  • Obama’s personal approval ratings are also beginning to dip. Chris Anderson, Opinion Dynamics vice president said: “The 9-point decrease in Obama’s personal favorability rating actually masks a larger shift over the last month and that is a massive change of heart among Republicans towards the president personally.”
  • The number of voters confident the Obama administration will be able to make “significant positive change for the country” has dropped 11 percentage points from 75 percent in mid-January.
  • About one in five Democrats (21 percent) thinks the Obama administration is bringing more of the same partisan politics.
  • 16 percent of those voting for Obama in the general election wish there were more Republicans in Congress.
  • Turning to Obama’s cabinet, a 57 percent majority rates the quality of the people he selected as excellent or good, down from 60 percent in mid-January and 65 percent in early December.

If these present trends continue Obama’s approval numbers will be below those of President Bush in a matter of months.

Conservatives Freed to Be Themselves!

All of this is occurring at at time when conservatives have finally been freed to be themselves. For many of us, John McCain was a 2nd, 3rd or 4th choice as our presidential standard bearer. And as much as we appreciated President Bush’s strong stand on national security we weren’t always comfortable with his compromises with Democrats on spending or immigration.

But now, we are no longer bound by party loyalty or electoral necessity. And our leaders on Capitol Hill are finally speaking in unison about the need to counteract big government and return to the practical solutions to economic problems that were so soundly proved during the Reagan era.

The icing on the cake is that we have a new chairman at the RNC. Michael Steele has the energy and the spirited enthusiasm so many of us felt was lacking in that job for the last number of years. He’s the right man for the job at the right time and he’s already signaled that a priority will be to modernize the GOP’s technology of campaign communications which was something Obama mastered during his successful White House run.

The next big challenge will be for conservatives to recruit new candidates to run for office at every level from local party, city and county to the state and federal level. 2010 is not so far away and if Obama’s promises continue to trail his performance we need to be ready to offer voters an attractive, practical alternative.

I’ll be looking forward to next week’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington for more signs of growing conservative enthusiasm and hope that REAL change is not far away!

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Do you feel a certain spring in your step these days?

I’m sorry… but don’t you mean “thrill going up” your leg?????

16 percent of those voting for Obama in the general election wish there were more Republicans in Congress.

Count me among that 16%. I voted for Obama, but I also voted for Dana Rohrabacher, because I’m a firm believer in divided government. 1995 to 1997 (pre-impeachment) was a golden era of American governance.

– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA

Now this post certainly helped cheer me up, thanks Mike.

Been ripping the pages off my calendars trying to make it go faster, so far it isn’t working.

Yes, Mike, I think that enthusiasm is definitely returning.

The Dims will overreach on everything they try to do. They always do.

The American People are going to recoil from them. It’s already begun.

Santelli was just a very public salvo, a ‘shot cross the bow’ if you will, of an undercurrent which has already begun to shift.

The American People are tired of this foolishness. They are tired of working hard to support themselves and their families and to provide for their futures only to have Nanny Gov’t come in and take it from them so that the leeches and non-producers of society can suck some more out of the gov’t teat.

The tide is turning.

As Rush said on Thursday, there’s a “whiff of revolution” in the air.

This Revolution will be bloodless, but no less transformational.

Samuel Adams said:

“It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in the people’s minds.”

That quote is now my mantra.

2010 is right around the corner.

@MataHarley: That tingling feeling Chris Matthews had was likely symptomatic of a nervous disorder. I prefer to have a spring in my step. No mind control here, just sound policy.

@openid.aol.com/runnswim: You do have some redeeming qualities. What a shame that the balance is decidely to the left.

@Missy: You’re welcome Missy. I know how upset a lot of us were after the election. We know it’s going to be a long hard haul to 2010 and 2012 but the time will go faster if we re-energize around our core principles.

@Aye Chihuahua: That’s been a favorite Adams quote of mine for a while now.

I also like:

If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.

and

If ever a time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin.

More of my favorite Adams’s quotes here.

When americans have Vladimir Putin and the Chinese govt warning them about the evils of socialism, it really means that things have gone too far and now it really is TIME for a CHANGE.

After reading what Bobby Jindal said about stimulus money, for the first time since 1994 I felt genuine enthusiasm for politics. And how Mark Sanford outfoxed James Clyburn was icing on the cake. It is refreshing to hear from some bona fide fiscal conservatives who actually know what they are taling about.

Mike I think its more of an “American” thing we are seeing. Rick Santelli certainly was a great voice last week, and I now believe, for the first time, Americans are starting to wake up to the fact that if we sit back and do nothing, the America we love and fought for will escape us.

That said, I am a HUGE Bobby Jindal fan; have been for years. Best case scenario, the dems will ALSO wake up, and we can heal as a country of Americans and not enemies.

Larry makes a good point about the divided government years.

Do you feel a certain spring in your step these days?

Actually, quite the opposite.

I’ve never been so worried or felt such a sense of dread in my entire life. And I’ve had some pretty dark days…

@thebronze: We all share your concern. But people are waking up quicker than I thought. And that is encouraging.

thebronze:

I’m probably the biggest “doomer” on the board, although I like to see it more as “realistic.” That said, IF we wake up and fight, and act quickly, “We the people”, absolutely have reason for hope.

That said, things are moving VERY fast. It was only 6 months ago I first wrote of the perils of socialism/marxism. Needless to say, I was almost crucified. Now it’s the topic of newsweek and facbook.

The good news is that you ARE feeling dread. Until we “feel” it, we won’t react.

I can’t image getting out of this without some serious pain, but we CAN do if the country wakes up. A good start would be to get everyone you know reading the Constitution.

@Mike

Obama borrowing from Churchill is no surprise. A good percentage of his political marketing campaign is to compare himself in favorable terms with, and to slightly parrot, past famous Americans. (Washington, Lincoln, FDR, JFK, Martin Luther King, and yes even a little Regan tossed in.) His campaign went so far as to reference Obama in Messianic terms. Now he is branching out to “become one with” the historical figures of other countries. I expect he will try to borrow phrasings from or identify himself with far more other history-making personages: (Ghandi, Budda, Plato, Socrates, Leonardo Da’Vinci, etc ad nausium.)

This is so clearly much-more a Presidential marketing scheme, rather than an administration having any real substance. Obama is more akin with the personna of Professor Marvel, than as a Grand and Powerful Wizard of Oz.

Without the smoke, mirrors & showmanship, his administration is little more than a rehashing of the policies of others, blended with rhetoric, and packaged as “Change” and is being sold to those of America who don’t read history.

Good news? Not quite so fast. Michael Steele is not Obama with the haloed glow and army of media censors and supporters. He’s wishy wshy on life issues and thinks we need hip hop in the GOP.

Someone who will demand investigations of congress’ rolein the sub-prime, toss the Obama loving rinos off their committees and write an indelibly carved contract of conservative beliefs is needed.
Movement to attack the leftist propaganda would help and truely educating the masses to understand sound economics might also help (knowing ourselves is insufficient -each wise vote is counteracted by a mind numbed robot who likes Obama’s smile and hopenchange.)
Stop putting up candidates who’s time has come -the Doles and Mccains have killed us.
We need to learn to propagandize for the truth and to clean our house of corruption and big government types.

The motto – Return America to its people – take the constiution away from the penumbra lawyers -responsibility is golden – our children are not the property of the government- they are God”s gift to parents -voluntary dependence is corruption of the soul.

Love that motto Don! Good post, thanks.

We went to a gun show yesterday. The air of confidence was thicker than the one of fear 😀

@ditto: Maybe Obama was trying to make it up to the British who felt dissed by the banisment of Sir Winston’s bust from the Oval Office. But as usual, his focus group tested rhetoric got the Churchill quote backwards.

@Don L: I’m fully aware that their remain some sytemic weaknesses in our party. But the good news is that things are moving in our direction, the RIGHT direction.

You wouldn’t deny that would you?

If so, then let’s celebrate that and act to facilitate more of the same.

@Jolene: Thanks for that balanced appraisal of our situation Jo. You summed it up in in sentence:

“The air of confidence was thicker than the one of fear.”

Remember the Watts riots?

My wife, a good, conservative Black republican, predicts rioting in all the major cities this summer, when the poor folks realize that Obama hasn’t taken away all the money, Lexuses and bling away from the rich white folks and given it to them!

People are starting to wake up. And then the powers-that-be are going to realize what a sleeping giant they have awakened…

Would this be the same spring in your step you felt back in June when you thought some statistical noise meant Obama’s poll numbers were dropping? Or when Sarah Palin arrived just in time to save the McCain campaign? Or when Joe the Plumber finally broke through the media’s bias to bring the people the truth?

It’s so sad to see someone who has been proven wrong so many times about so many things still speaking as if he knows what he is talking about. Your Herculean display of denial and willfull ignorance will never cease to amaze me.

He wasn’t wrong. Those incidents did hit Obama in the polls, the banking crisis rescued his sorry rear end.

@Fit fit: As usual, you’re overreaching just like your Lord and Master.

Perhaps you would like to show me what I posted in June where I claimed that “some statistical noise meant Obama’s poll numbers were dropping?”

I’ll make it easy for you. Here’s my archive of all posts for June 2008:

http://mikesamerica.blogspot.com/2008_06_01_archive.html

Happy hunting Nit Wit!

And yes, Missy is right. If the Dems had not engineered the banking crisis, triggered by Chuckie Schumer undermining Indy Mac, Obama never would have been elected.

McCain made the mistake of walking into that Dem trap when he stupidly suspended his campaign.

None of that has anything to do with conservative enthusiasm.

In fact, just the opposite.

If we had a candidate that conservatives could support 100% I doubt we would have lost to the phony, lying socialist Obama.

@Fit fit:

It’s so sad to see someone who has been proven wrong so many times about so many things still speaking as if he knows what he is talking about.

Actually, it’s amusing rather than sad.

That’s why we’ve kept you around here.

Sheer entertainment value.