Tuesday, January 10, 2006

Evolving Right - Where I Came From

I started very young as a Kennedy Democrat. Believing “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what can you do for your country.” This lasted most of the way through the Johnson administration, when I started to realize that all of the programs that were being set up to give a person a hand up, where morphing into strictly entitlement programs that were actually trapping people at the level they entered the system.

Nixon did nothing to reassure me that the Republican’s had a better answer, being bogged down in Viet Nam and the asshattery of Watergate, and Ford just did nothing.

Carter was the definite turning point in my evolution to the right. Here was an administration that made everything worse with every act. ? Unemployment, sky high gas prices (if gas was available), the Iranian hostage crisis.

Then came Reagan. He had been Governor of my state and had pulled it out of the fire. He said what he believed and was able to articulate it to the people of the country. He loved America. He firmly believed, as I do, that this is the best country on Earth and its system of government offers the best hope for a people to live free.

Since then I have watched the Republican Party drift away from less government to trying to match giveaways with the Democrats. I stay with the GOP because I feel it still can be brought back to its roots. The option of Libertarian, while appealing in some ways, would leave me railing outside the window. The Democrats have just gone to a straight Communism/Socialism/One World platform. While I believe we should help any person in need, I do not believe we owe everyone an equal lifestyle regardless of their contribution to society.

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