Eric Cantor defeated by TEA Party rival (Page 2)

I see both points, but I think to defend Drew a little bit,  I feel the establishment Liberals and Establishment Republicans both are heavy into crony capitalism, but when you get out into the core beliefs of people in both parties we fundamentally agree on personal liberties, curbing government spending, and a fair playing field.

The establishment liberals have their green jobs industries and the republicans have their military engine.  They both do the same things using scare tactics to justify the spending, but ultimately it's about propping up their buddies that put them in office.

You left out that they like to wear puppy fur coats too.  

This is ridiculous and demonstrates one of the thing that drives me crazy with so much political discussion these days - on both the right and the left.  It's not enough to disagree with a policy, we have to attack the motives of the other side and make them the enemy to justify the righteousness of our beliefs.  Could it be that Joe sixpack liberal could *gasp* actually believe that promoting green jobs, curbing too big to fail banks or fighting climate change could be important issues that need to be addressed on their own merits?  Of course not.  Liberals could only care about them as part of a scheme to turn the country communist and line their own pockets.  

You haven't defined "the core economic philosophy of American liberalism", you've defined the core economic philosophy of politicians who want to get elected and need lots of money to do that.  If you think that liberals couldn't be just as vehemently opposed to the incestuous relationship between big government and big business than you need to head down to a Phish show and ask some people what they think about Wall Street these days.  The whole reason Brat won was because he convinced people that Cantor was in the pocket of big business and its lobbies and wasn't looking out for them.  You might even say they had an incestuous relationship, and last I checked Cantor was no liberal.   And that's why I think it's so interesting.  I'm sure conservatives like Brat and liberals might cite different reasons, see different causes and come up with different solutions to crony capitalism, but in the end, it's not just a conservative issue - it's something that cuts across ideology and actually unites liberals and conservatives.  Both sides are guilty of it yet both sides have constituencies that really want to do something about it.  I think libertarians and liberals have a lot more in common sometimes than they'd like to believe.

Nice.  Next you'll tell me you knew Ben & Jerry when they just had an ice cream truck.

So this is an argument I can wrap my head around, rather than some blanket indictment and smear.  I can see better where you're coming from and I can agree with you up to a point.  Bigger govm't does mean more money sloshing around, more and bigger cracks to fall through, etc. and so more opportunities for shady dealings.  But at the same time, crony capitalism isn't exclusive to big government.  You hear all the time about some small town mayor giving his brother-in-law the contract to fix the potholes.  It's not on the same scale as the bailout of AIG, but does that make it any more defensible or less egregious?  

Big business doesn't have to have big government to survive.  Goldman Sachs will be fine whether or not there's a Dept. of Education or Commerce, or...  What was the third one?  Big business could use government for protection and power just as easily with a small government as a big one, as long as there's a lack of transparency and elected officials who need their money.  I think there's an unquestioned assumption that small government automatically = less intervention.  Maybe that's true, but probably not as much as people want to believe.  I get that there's more opportunities for govm't to direct resources in a bigger government but that's only one part of it  There's lots of other ways big businesses get what they want beside direct spending and it's just as easy for a small government to create a tax-loophole as a big one. For me, it's more about the size of the influence than the government.  As long as big businesses have a disproportionate amount of influence over politicians they're going to get what they want, regardless of how many federal employees there are. That's why I get frustrated when people say there's some "right" size for government.  Like a lot of things in life, it's not the size, it's how you use it.

I'm the same way, I have pretty strong faith views, but I wouldn't have the slightest problem voting for someone who was an Atheist or Pro-Choice.

I guess I am technically an issues voter, but my issue is fiscal conservatism.  The social issues combined probably add up to about 5% of my consideration and the fiscal conservatism is the other 95%  

Can you name me a few?  Maybe ones in the House or Senate?  

I just have this feeling that these are the ones I'd probably consider 'reasonable' members of the GOP that will work with the other side for the betterment of the country... Having a difficult time finding them.  Please assist.

For me, It's really hard to put a name to a specific individual because it depends on the issues.  For example, somebody could be socially conservative, but fiscally liberal or vis versa.  A Republican could support SSM but also be pro-life or a Democrat could be pro-life and support SSM.  It would be hard to classify either one of them as "liberal" or "conservative" in my mind.

The national journal compiles a ranking (based on votes) every year of house and senate members to determine who are the most liberal and who are the most conservative.  They also break it down on Social/Economic/Foreign policy votes.  There are a bunch of republicans and Democrats who are right in the middle.

It's not perfect by any means, but you can glean what you want from it.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/2012-vote-ratings

http://www.nationaljournal.com/2013-vote-ratings

Well tony- I looked at the list.

So- the most liberal GOP senators are Lisa Murkowsky, Susan Collins, John McCain, roy Blunt and Lindsay Graham.

And, as McCain is my state's senator... I guess I would agree with Jack- yes, he's very dishonest, a political grandstander and hyper partisan.

but Liberal?  he he he.  

lol, yeah it's really weird to try and put various labels on these guys.  I personally think of McCain as "very liberal" but my context is on the fiscal issues.  I feel he's a big spending, big government, pro-wall street, establishment guy.

There's no question that socially, he's fairly conservative but I really don't care about the social issues near as much as I care about the fiscal issues.  Others are completely the opposite of me and they could give a hoot about the fiscal issues and care dearly about the social issues so their perspective and opinion would be completely different than mine.

You may 'feel' that, but I don't believe it to be at all correct.  McCain isn't a spender.  In fact- he has long been on the 'no earmarks' kick.  He regularly shuts down any government program that might benefit his state of arizona.  Especially in the years around his presidential bid, as he didn't want to be saddled with a dime of "bridge to nowhere" publicity.  

However- he's a hawk.  In that he is always a proponent of sending troops into every problem around the world.  So- I guess that might constitute being a big government spender- but it's not on social programs.  I put 'big military' and a meddling foreign policy into the GOP camp, although I do realize there is a libertarian wing of the GOP that doesn't follow this doctrine.

I see McCain more of a political opportunist than a politician that is ideologically driven.  So- he'll take any opinion that suits the moment where he feels like he can take a jab at the other side.  for instance- he was for the Bergdahl swap before he was against it... and lest he forget, he personally was released in a prisoner swap deal.

Yeah, i should have been a little more specific.

My thoughts on him being a big spender are heavily slanted towards his support of TARP, auto bailout, mortgage bailout, AIG Bailout, and the defense machine as a whole.  I'm sure there's others I'm missing.

You are correct, that he's against various little things and ear-marks which many "big spending" republicans are, but they sure manage to spend a ton of money on really big things that dwarf the bridges to nowhere.  

Coming in to this late, but I'll add my thoughts as a resident of Cantor's district.

1. Virginia has an open primary.  You don't have to be a registered republican to vote.  I'm not, so I voted against Cantor.  Many other Democrat-leaning friends also voted against Cantor.

Why?

2. People in the 7th District want Eric Cantor out.  That applies to Republicans and Democrats.  He's not doing anything to benefit our district and is never around.  Why should he continue to represent us.

From my perspective, it wasn't about immigration or conservatism.  A lot of people just want someone other than Cantor.

I heard something on the radio several days after the primary that there was a successful effort to re-district his congressional district in order to make it "more conservative" as well.  Obviously we don't know, but I thought that would be an interesting "backfire" for sure if it contributed to him getting whacked in the primaries.  

Dick Lugar. Oh, wait, no.  He got sniped from the right in the last primary, and then his idiot challenger got obliterated in the general.  Much like will happen here with Cantor.

the TEA party cannot die fast enough.  Unless some hyper-liberal equivalent suddenly emerges and starts doing the same crap on the left.  And then the rest of us can just ignore the noise from both extremes, an start getting some sh%* done around here.  I've had it.

From what I've read David Brat's district is pretty conservative and his opponent Jack Trammell as recent as two weeks ago was running on a homemade webpage, using a gmail address, with no paid staff and zero funds raised.  Obviously anything can happen, but I think the optimism of the left in trying to write off anyone who isn't a party machine centrist is kind of silly.

Brat isn't even a Tea Party guy, but the media is trying to label him as one and the "establishment" Tea Party is trying to do the same but he had no support from the Tea Party at all on his primary run.

Just out of curiosity, you seem to have a disdain for the "Tea Party" movement.  What is it you dislike so much about it?

Compared to the platforms of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party I have a lot more in common with the Tea Party platform than I do either of those.
I'm more in tune with the Libertarian platform for sure, so I'd go Libertarian, Tea Party, Republican, and then Democrat if I were to order them matching my philosophy on government.

Cantor was defeated in the primary wasn't he?

I'm curious what sh%* it is that you want done around here? 

Our system of government was set up to make it difficult to make changes. My understanding for that is if we are going to make changes, pass new laws that we need to have a consensus  of a majority of a couple of different governing bodies to prevent change that didn't have a lot of support and provide some stability in our country. Do you see it differently?

With a representative democracy we are supposed to have people that vote based on their constituents beliefs.  If the country is split 50/50 on an issue then it should not be placed into law, period.  It's not a matter of working across the aisle, it's about changing the country's view on the issue at hand if you want it to be law.

ACA is a good example of what happens when one side jams something through without any support from the other side.  It's very divisive and when the other side loses control of part of the government (house of representatives) it becomes paralyzed.  It wasn't a matter of working across the aisle with ACA because constituents in the opposing party states didn't want it passed, so they tried to stop it.

If universal healthcare is such a great idea, then it has to be sold to the people first and then the representatives will follow.

I would say there are a number of things the Federal Government has passed or created that we, as a country would be better off today had nothing been done. 

Our founding fathers set this system up so it would be difficult to make changes and that if changes were made it would require, as tuwood mentioned a majority consensus. Now, one is seen as an obstructionists if you're not for increasing the power and size of the Federal government and it''s ability to control what the people do. Which, I'm pretty sure isn't what they fought and died for in the revolutionary war. ymmv

Now as far "some idealized libertarian fantasy" I would suggest that if you see people who are truly committed to following the constitution and fiscal responsibility win primaries and elections against the establishment Republican & Democratic party that even they will for fear of being kicked out of office be more inclined to do the peoples bidding rather than what we've seen both parties do in the majority of my lifetime.