If America, is to remain the land of freedom, hope and dreams that our Founding Fathers intended it to be; traditional Americans must be willing to both fight and sacrifice.
I believe the Republican Party has the potential to be the leader of that fight and that sacrifice. However, in order to accomplish this, we (the GOP) must be smart, we must be disciplined, we must be unafraid and we must above all be unwavering in our values and relentlessly committed to our convictions.
If we are smart; when we win back the House and Senate, we should not “defund” the healthcare bill as some have suggested which of course would put us in the negative light of being obstructionist and thus giving ammunition to the President and his supporters. The smart course of action would be to write a healthcare replacement bill that the American people overwhelmingly support. We should then send it to the Presidents’ desk where he will be forced to veto it and thus twice subverting the “will” of the American people; first by passing a bill they did not want and then refusing to pass a bill they do want.
The discipline we show will be to stay on message, using the simplicity of common sense. Genuine people like, trust and understand other genuine people, not politicians; this means speaking from your heart and gut with passion and purpose, not platitudes or poll tested adjectives.
Being unafraid is simple, political correctness must not exist in our party; we’ve become way too easily offended in this country and as a result we can’t stomach anything. If the truth hurts so be it, pain is a wonderful teacher, honesty is the best medicine especially when the sickness is political dishonesty in the face of common sense.
There is no room for “politics” in this fight either, as an elected official; you must clearly define your position and defend it, not water it down hoping everyone will drink it, that’s the kind of “shades of gray” please-everyone B.S. that got us here in the first place. It’s not brain surgery, though I wonder if actual brain surgery is now necessary to correct the manner in which debate one another; very few of us say what we mean and mean what we say and that must change.
What is also of paramount importance is that we truly stand for something. While it is important to be a “big tent”; we can’t be so big as to incorporate the other circus in town, that simple doesn’t make any sense. In my humble opinion we should focus on three areas. We should champion rugged individualism and personal responsibility. We should be truly committed to fiscal responsibility, with regard to small business, tax policy and spending. Finally we should be the party of traditional American family values, but with an emphasis on states’ rights in these matters; this will allow for some flexibility in our social platform.
Michael Wendling is currently a senior sales associate with Wyndham Resorts. He is also a business entrepreneur currently in development of a social networking site on track to launch later this year. He spent more than two decades in the restaurant industry from a bus boy to general manger, most notably the historic Occidental Restaurant adjacent to the White House where he served on the management staff, focused on service and wine.