Talk about reforming the Republican Party has become all the rage these days, but the means to doing that are scarcely mentioned. No one wants to assign blame or risk their popularity by suggesting unpopular dissent.

Many commentators will mention something about the need for a conservative revival, but in the end, their time is spent lamenting the infeasibility of third parties. They rarely mention how they plan on actually enacting the “revival,” doing nothing but emphasizing the need to keep supporting the Republican Party.

Republicans will probably have a few losses in the 2006 midterm election. After that, all the fuss over the party’s lack of conservatism will probably be forgotten, and winning elections will return as most people’s foremost objective. Another stale, empty, failed suit – Newt Gingrich, perhaps – will emerge as the chubbiest, most obsequiously genial candidate, and receive the party’s nomination. The revolution will be over before it began, and so will the next eight years.

The gears of change need to begin moving now, and the methods need to be determined. It’s true that third parties aren’t going `to be the most effective avenue to institutionalizing conservatism, and shouldn’t be the first option. A better government would be actualized more rapidly if an existing party apparatus could be seized.

If conservatives wish to possess a party of their own, they’ll need to accept that tolerance isn’t always a virtue. A broad party base needs to be come from a general attraction to the party’s superior ideals, not from the party’s greater outreach program.

Those ideals must be manifest in the party’s representatives. If the party’s representatives are failing in that task, they need to be replaced with individuals more willing to fulfill their duties. If any member of the government isn’t acting within the context of their Constitutional obligations, they need to be removed simply on the basis of that fact. Anyone who promotes earmark spending, for example, has failed to perform their job as a member of the government.

That end of a nobler party requires our expulsion of sleazebags like Tom Delay. He’s been paid $180,100 a year – and for what? He’s done nothing but increase the size of government and aggrandize himself. His over-hyped connection with Jack Abramoff isn’t nearly so disgusting as his performance in the House. When he said that “after 11 years of Republican majority we've pared [spending] down pretty good," it was an outright lie. For that, he doesn’t deserve any votes from any of his constituents.

Hopefully the next majority leader will be a real conservative, such as John Shadegg. If Shadegg runs for the position but loses to an establishment candidate like Roy Blunt, Blunt should be ousted in his next election. So should any other unqualified Republican leader who takes a leadership position, until the party accepts that it can’t keep electing pragmatic liberals.

In reforming the party, we must focus on all of the areas in which government has failed. Talking about our nation’s problems in broad terms, hailing the virtue of a “small government,” and then moving on to other issues without ever mentioning exactly what a small government means won’t result in anything. It’s a euphemism without meaning. A small government means cutting federal spending on social programs and dismantling departments we don’t need. That must be emphasized, or reform won’t go anywhere.

One of the very few worthwhile achievements as of late has been the nomination of Samuel Alito. It could have been worse; the appointment could have been a liberal chosen for the sake of affirmative action (or just a liberal appointed for no reason in particular). Liberal Republican judges do as much damage as anyone else. Take John Jones, the Republican judge appointed by the current administration, who authored the recent Kitzmiller decision, thereby prohibiting public schools in his district from teaching any alternatives to evolution.

In "Spirit of the Laws," Montesquieu wrote, "When once a republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil." Thomas Jefferson copied the quote in his "Commonplace Book."

Too many people are fearful of pointing fingers, and refuse to do anything beyond hinting mildly that we have some friendly internal policy differences. Change will proceed only from the destruction of those who have stagnated in the quagmire of bureaucracy.

Rudy Takala is 17 years old and was homeschooled for nine years. He spends his free time working on a book about education.

Sources:

http://clerk.house.gov/members/memFAQ.html
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/nominations/index-date.html
http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/jonesbio.htm
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20050914-120153-3878r.htm