You don't think it's the answer because you are a Liberal. "Moderate Republican" has now become nothing more than "Liberal Lite" and that is what isn't winning elections, because the Conservative base isn't falling for it anymore. Bush ran as a "Compassionate Conservative" which technically means, social conservative & fiscal liberal. It worked because the social conservative base is very strong, and does tend to cross party and racial/ethnic lines. However, the key to success of Ronald Reagan, was ultra-conservatism, both social and fiscal conservatism, promoting and advocating strong conservative principles, on both the social and fiscal fronts. After Reagan, the party drifted away from those principles, especially with the populist success of Bill Clinton.
Rush and I don't want to "expel" anyone, we just want them to decide if they believe in social/fiscal conservative policy, or if they don't. If they are more comfortable supporting liberal policies, they need to be in the other party, because there is no more room for liberalism here. It is what has cost us votes in this election and in the previous midterms, as well as making the 2000 and 2004 elections as close as they were. The more our party has chased down the road after "moderate" votes, the more we have gotten away from our core conservative principles and lost ground.
What are these core principles? Socially, the sanctity of life and marriage, gun ownership, strong national defense and family values. Fiscally, smaller government, lower taxes, less government intrusion, and reforming entitlements. Republicans need to get back on message with those things, and stop pandering to the 'moderates' who are now liberals.
Granted, times have changed since Reagan, and we can't go back to 1980, nor should we try. Our nation faces a whole new set of challenges, and those need to be addressed in a conservative way, with conservative ideas. Education is a good example of where this is evident, Republicans need to articulate the benefits of a voucher program, and address the cost of college tuition. As for the "youth" of America, there are a whole LOT of conservative youth, and they are the best source for mining ideas of how to address their own issues in a conservative way. Republicans should certainly be interested in listening and learning from them, but the core conservative principles are the key to turning the party around for the future.
The 'kiss of death' is to remain on this path of chasing the moderates to the left and trying to out-liberal the liberals. In recent years, it seems the Republicans think that dangling a "tax cut" promise out there, is enough to gain the conservative vote, and it's not. It will take a fundamental return to core conservative values... moderates need to decide which side of that coin they are on, and if they aren't on the side of conservatism, they need to go.
