On converting from Democrat to Republican

Posted by: ST on August 8, 2005 at 10:14 pm

Scott Kirwin at Dean’s World has a great post you should read on his conversion from a Democrat to a Republican.  Here’s a little of it:

I broke with the Democratic Party after Sept. 11, 2001, when the President prepared for war in Afghanistan and the anti-war Left summoned Jimmy Carter, Michael Moore and Ted Kennedy from the 9th Circle of Hell. The Democratic lurch to the Left after 9-11 was so hard, so anti-populist, that it got me to thinking deeply about what that party means and why it exists.

Make sure to read the whole thing.

On a personal note, I made the switch from Democrat to Republican back around 1994.  You can read the short version here (scroll down a bit for the conversion part as a lot of that is a post telling you who I am).  The long version will likely be posted at a later time ;)

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25 Responses to “On converting from Democrat to Republican”

Comments

  1. ArizonaTeach says:

    Heh, I’m trying to add things together to figure out your age. Which is shameful, I know. Anyway, I can tell you that my first Presidential Election was also 1992, and Arizona always goes for the Republican. We went with Goldwater, for heaven’s sake. 1996? Never happened, dammit. NEVER. HAPPENED.

    But it’s funny. Dad’s military, whole family’s Republican, so I should have rebelled, right? Went into education as a profession…there’s like 12 Republicans in the country. I’ve gone even FARTHER right in the past decade, for various reasons. I find these stories of Democrats who turn Republican interesting, not only because I think, “great, he gets it,” but I’m also fascinated by the vitriol spit at them by some of the hardcore Democats. Granted, it goes both ways, but I just see a lot more venom for, say Zoell Miller from the left than I do for Jim Jeffords from the right.

    Just sayin’.

  2. Nan Fitzsimmons says:

    I left the DNC the Summer of 2001 after I saw easily they were bamboozled by WJC.

  3. ArizonaTeach: Speaking of rebelling, I was sort of the ‘rebel’ in the family on politics. I was the lone Dem in a family of Republicans. My dad wouldn’t speak to me for a week after Clinton was elected ;)

    Nan: Glad to have you on board :)

  4. LCVRWC says:

    I, too, have been pretty much a liberal throughout most of my life (though I’ve been registered as an Independent since I was 18, and still am). Like Scott, 9/11 opened my eyes and I’ve been trying to smack the blinders off most of my friends ever since.

  5. Hey LC! Good to see you posting again.

  6. actus says:

    “he Democratic lurch to the Left after 9-11 was so hard, so anti-populist, that it got me to thinking deeply about what that party means and why it exists.”

    I wonder what this guy thought of the democrats when they proposed a department of homeland security, only to have it rejected by the president.

    Later the president flipped flopped, and introduced civil service rules in DHS unpalatable to democrats. Damn obstructionists!

  7. Baklava says:

    Actus has it’s facts wrong again. DHS is in place not “rejected” (never was a veto on that was there Actus). Sure there were debates….

    My conversion to conservativism was in 1991. More like libertarianism. I soon grew up and realized that an 80% cut in government wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. That’s why I call myself a centrist conservative (defined as wishing for the government to not increase spending for the next 10 years while we reprioritize spending according to the constitution – that is centrist but to the right of republicans…:wink:

  8. actus says:

    “DHS is in place not “rejected” (never was a veto on that was there Actus). ”

    No veto, but the president was against it. Untill he was for it.

  9. Baklava says:

    He didn’t vote against it and then vote for it as Sen Kerry did for the 87 Billion.

    You are simply implying something not quite right.

    Before an idea truly takes hold alot of people are against something. Equating it with a flip flop, rejection, voting against and then for is simply INCORRECT (as you tend to be)

    BTW, What’s your point? I believe 100% of Senators and presidents when they first heard of an idea wasn’t “for” it but to characterize it as anything further would be for what Actus?

    1 question. Do you fully support DHS and it’s policies and the way it’s currently implemented? What would be 2 big reasons why or why not?

  10. Morbo says:

    I’m still amazed why anyone would ever consider having anything to do with the Party of Slavery, Secession, Segregation, and Socialism.

  11. actus says:

    “You are simply implying something not quite right.”

    I am explicitly saying he opposed it. No implications here: its explicit. He was against, and then he was for. There’s lots of ways to be against and for things. Voting is only one of them.

    “1 question. Do you fully support DHS and it’s policies and the way it’s currently implemented? What would be 2 big reasons why or why not?”

    I think it needs a serious chief privacy officer with the ability to conduct investigations of other DHS components. I also think its privacy board should not have supporters of Total Information Awareness, or CEO’s of spyware companies on it.

    As for whether its better to have 1 big agency or several small ones, I don’t know.

  12. Baklava says:

    Thanks for stating Actus.

    However, you’ve influenced my opinion of Bush .00000000000% concerning the fact that he didn’t support at first (again doesn’t everybody not fully support something in their life when it is first proposed at one time or another).

    It was a waste of words. Only showed your negativity.

  13. actus says:

    “(again doesn’t everybody not fully support something in their life when it is first proposed at one time or another).”

    I have no idea.

  14. Baklava says:

    I know. :shock:

    I do. I say it happens to 100% of people…. to at one time in their life hear a proposed solution and not be initially for it.

  15. Baklava says:

    OK. Maybe 99% of the people.

    That darned Bush… He should’ve been the 1%…. Let me be negative about him toooo. :evil:

    Sis, I’m addicted to the icons…

  16. actus says:

    “I do. I say it happens to 100% of people…. to at one time in their life hear a proposed solution and not be initially for it.”

    It was more than just hearing the proposal. I mean, it was laid out and briefed. But I don’t fault bush for changing his mind.

  17. Baklava says:

    Seems you did though. Bugged you enough to write about it as if it was a negative…. :cool:

  18. actus says:

    “Seems you did though.”

    Problem is he did more than change his mind: he turned it into an issue of partisan division.

  19. Baklava says:

    Incorrect again.

    Bush urged and urged Congress to get the DHS bill passed. Democrats threatened filibuster for several reasons. Republicans didn’t have enough votes so they had to federalize the employees because otherwise the bill wouldn’t pass..

    So you can make incorrect accusations all day long but it only bites liberals right back in the butt because it exposes WHY the bill took longer to come out and WHY the bill was much more expensive and WHY the unions are in bed with Democrats….

    Wanna keep playing this subjective game of who politicized the DHS bill? Do you remember the attacks that Democrats were making on the president and Republicans concerning the employees of DHS?

  20. actus says:

    “Bush urged and urged Congress to get the DHS bill passed. ”

    Once he found it poltically palatable to do so. And once he found it having some civil service and other labor reforms too.

  21. lcvrwc says:

    Actus, can you give us any information/links supporting your argument? I recall the President proposing Tom Ridge as an advisor on HS well before the DHS was formally proposed.

  22. actus says:

    “Actus, can you give us any information/links supporting your argument? I recall the President proposing Tom Ridge as an advisor on HS well before the DHS was formally proposed. ”

    Having an advisor is different than reorganizing hundreds of thousands of federal civil servants.

  23. lcvrwc says:

    Actus, you’ve completely ignored the question. I ask again: Can you give us any information/links supporting your argument?

  24. Baklava says:

    Nope. He has a problem with Bush doing something that 99%-99.9% of people do and then when called for that hypocrasy writes, “But I don’t fault bush for changing his mind.”

    HA. He’s the one who thought it was a problem enough to keep writing about it with such great spin (warped thinking) and continue writing about it as if it were some “fault”. He’ll continue to write about it as a fault/problem and continue to probaly state “But I don’t fault him”. This’ll continue….

    You can never pin Actus down to anything. He’s like Jello.

  25. lcvrwc says:

    Baklava, I’ve run into Actus (and his ilk) before. He should throw up another strawman somewhere, then he’ll stop commenting on this thread, but continue to try to force the same theory somewhere else.

    I admit, tho, I’ve seen him make a couple of coherent arguments elsewhere–I’ve hope for him and is why I’m stopping short of thinking of him as a troll.