WASHINGTON, Sept. 23, 2006
Will Conservatives Come Out For GOP?
Republicans Confident That Frustrated Base Will Vote In November
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Play CBS Video Video Immigration And The Election While politicians jostle over Iraq, the debate over immigration continues to rage in cities across America. Bianca Solorzano visited one town to see just how big the issue can be.
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Video New Jersey's First Family The son of one of New Jersey's most popular governors hopes to be the state's first Republican senator in 34 years. Katie Couric reports on Tom Kean Jr.'s election bid.
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Video Primaries All About Iraq With the control of congress at stake come November, voters cast their ballots in primaries in nine states and D.C. Gwen Belton reports the general election is shaping up to a referendum on Iraq.
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White House Press Secretary Tony Snow speaks at the 2006 Values Voter Summit on Friday, Sept. 22, 2006, in Washington. The summit featured Republicans contemplating running for president in 2008. (AP)
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Interactive Campaign 2006 Complete coverage and analysis of Senate and key House races, plus gubernatorial elections.
"We're disgusted somewhat with some of the Republicans, but we'd be in a whole lot worse shape with the Democrats," said the Rev. Don Wildmon of Tupelo, Mississippi, chairman of the conservative American Family Association. "So, if you can't get the whole loaf, take a half a loaf."
Together, fiscal and social conservatives make up a significant segment of the Republican faithful, and the Republican Party always needs them to vote in droves. That's especially important this year for November elections because turnout typically is low in a non-presidential election years and polls show the public favoring Democrats to control Congress.
"If they don't come to the polls, we're in trouble," said Bishop Harry Jackson of College Park, Maryland, an evangelical Christian who leads the High-Impact Leadership Coalition, which promotes "moral issues" in urban communities.
With seven weeks left in the campaign, there's some concern among Republicans that conservatives — evangelicals included — might not vote in Nov. 7 elections because of their unhappiness with Congress and President George W. Bush.
A recent Associated Press-Ipsos poll found that 42 percent of white evangelicals disapprove of the job Bush has done as president. In 2004, exit polls showed 78 percent of white evangelicals voted for him.
"Republican voters are very soft, and I have no idea what this November holds," said Phil Burress, president of Citizens for Community Values in Cincinnati, a proponent of state and federal constitutional bans on gay marriage.
The fear of low turnout has led prominent conservative groups to initiate voter mobilization and outreach efforts. In that vein, hundreds of people attended a four-day "Values Voter Summit" sponsored by the country's leading conservatives and featuring several Republicans contemplating running for president in 2008.
Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, Senator Sam Brownback and Senator George Allen addressed the conference Friday, and Senator Rick Santorum and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich were on tap Saturday.
Absent from the agenda were, among others, Senator John McCain, the Republican whose maverick style and votes on gay marriage and embryonic stem-cell research have irked conservatives, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who also has drawn the ire of that constituency.
After speaking to the conference, Republican Congressman Mike Pence said in an interview that he is confident conservatives will overlook Congress' lack of final action on their main issues.
"Conservative Americans are beginning to awaken to the perils of a Democratic Congress," he said.
The House and Senate hope to adjourn next week so lawmakers can spend the final few weeks before the election campaigning. That leaves little or no time for the House and Senate to vote on passionate issues for conservatives.
Congress still has not sent Bush an immigration reform or border security bill. Efforts to rein in federal spending this year have been piecemeal. And, the Senate has made only marginal progress in getting the president's judicial nominees confirmed.
Divisions among Republicans in which moderates have clashed with conservatives have stalled some of the legislation.
Meanwhile, a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage is dead for the year and Congress has not finished a bill aimed at preventing girls from crossing state lines to get an abortion without parental notification.
To make matters worse in the eyes of conservatives, Congress also sent the president a bill expanding the scope of federal involvement in embryonic stem cell research. Bush promptly vetoed it, his first.
Said Robert Bradley, the founder of the Massachusetts Family Institute: "Ultimately the conservatives, as annoyed as they are, will understand how awful the alternatives are in this case."
©MMVI, The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The secrets of tennis legend 
Republican is no longer having the government not interfere with anything - such as taxes & Buisnesses. Democrat is no longer having the government protect people from taxes & monopolies
It is now the standards & no-standards Parties.
Does this sound messed up to anyone else?
The lies and distortions of republican political machine have become so vicious and un-Christian, that their's has become little more than a sinister effort to hide the graft and immorality resulting from their record of governance. They have countenanced torture, and engaged in an unnecessary war in which now tens of thousands have died in direct violation of the First Commandment. They have benefited the rich at the expense of the poor, thereby ignoring Jesus. For true Christians, such behavior needs to cleansed by the truth, so that we may deserve entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven. While God may love you, this by itself is not a ticket through the Gates of Heaven. One must not break ANY of the 10 Commandments and one must truly follow the teachings of Jesus, not simply pay lip service for the sake of political gain.
God has commanded that there is a severe punishment for those who commit the bearing of false witness. What this election comes done to is whether true Christians will themselves bear false witness by consciously overlooking the record of the Republican party and in doing so loose their souls. The temptation of riches and false righteousness has proved too strong for some, even among the clergy. But what of the true Christians? The fate of your soul is in your hands.
Bush and company blew it in a big way, but they were not on a solo flight. They had help, lots of it, in fact. It came by the indifference and silence from the one group whose primary purpose should have been as Devil's Advocate. But only silence resounded %u2013 had Congress been recessed, I doubted it could have been more complete.
It was only when it was discovered by most that their constituents did not believe the US would be safer if we invaded Iraq. At no time prior to our invasion of Iraq were any objections raised or inquires demanded to be answered in full. As if it invading Afghanistan under some pretence of discovering the whereabouts of the multi-millionaire extremist suspected of engineering 9/11, another ridiculous piece of fiction was then concocted to justify our invasion of Iraq %u2013 and Congress stupidly and criminally followed along behind. Let us not reward this worthless bunch for not doing anything but allowing them four more years to not do anything at our expense. Vote %u2013 register to vote %u2013 vote even if it%u2019s against a candidate.
The GOP/Conservative/Republican movement, failing in almost every aspect of governing our country is a reality, and a travesty. To have a strong voter base they need to hide their incompetence, and make the public think, "things would be WORSE with a evil Democrat". So what we're going to see and hear in the next elections is the GOP doing everything in their power to make ALL Democrats look like, terrorist loving, abortionist, atheists.
Democrats tend to be more centered. Republicans lean hard to one side, which in my mind shows that the GOP is a minority. So the GOP needs to create differences between us in order to pull voters from the other side. What this means for us in the coming elections is we are going to hear allot of things being repeated over and over again by the "Talking Point Pushing Republicans" orchestrated by the REAL President, Karl Rove. The goal is to KILL debate, and CREATE baseless and "simple", hard-fast opinions that get driven into the minds of Americans through repetition. Like with marketing, the people fall in line to buy the *** car from Ford that guzzles gas and breaks every 6 months. Willful ignorance is created in the minds of the public through sensationalism and repetition.
How will you fall in line? Will you vote with a centered mind, or an ignorant one?
Since 2002, no governing party since Lyndon Johnson has held a better hand of cards than the current Republican Party. They have done virtually nothing with it except start wars they can't finish, enrich a few people at everybody else's expense, borrow and spend like drunken sailors, and appoint a few more conservative judges.
Voters not among the base notice these things. Even Republican-leaning independent voters notice these things. Independents may yet be frightened into voting Republican by the boogerman of "terrorism", but they are certainly not going to do it for any other reason, such as the Republican Party's success at ushering in an era of responsible government--and this by anybody's standard, including that of the Republican base.
At this point it is simply a question of whether the Independent voters finally get fed up by constantly being frightened by shadows into voting against somebody, and start basing their voting on actual performance.