Yes, we can and should have a litmus test somewhere

Wow... this makes no sense to me.

Anyone else see the irony of harshly attacking a fellow Republican for... harshly attacking fellow Republicans?

Seriously, though: I strongly believe in Reagan's 11th Commandment - but you have to draw a line in the sand SOMEWHERE, where you say "once you cross this line, as far as I am concerned, you are no longer a Republican worthy of the 11th Commandment."  Where is that line?  Well, it varies for all.  For Bob, it was supporting the largest tax grab in Oregon's history.  I can respect that.  That's a well defined line.

If you have no line, then what is to stop democratics from just saying "oh yeah, we're Republicans now" and demanding party support?

Draw your line - and defend it!

Jack, it is time for you to realize: the era of playing nice is over.  We are in the greatest crisis most of us (all of us born after 1945) have ever experienced in our lifetimes.  Playing nice will destroy America.  We need to fight hard and win without any more "compromise" pushing America further to the left towards the precipice of outright socialism.

Comments

[Independent Thinker]

"The role of party leader as an enforcer of ideological purity was customary in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. It is not part of the American political tradition."

Funny... it is has been a mainstay of DNC politics for as long as I can remember, and it got them total control of federal government. And even those booted out by the party, like Joe Lieberman, still caucus with them and vote in lockstep with them 90% of the time.

What's wrong with some GOP unity on fundamental core beliefs? Why shouldn't Bob Tiernan, as a conservative first and GOP Chair second, be able to exercise his First Amendment rights to both freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, to say out loud that he personally thinks these two reject Republicans should get lost?

Jack is off the reservation. It is time for us to listen to CONSERVATIVES first and "politics as usual" hacks second.

[Jack Roberts]

Actually it was the primary voters, not the party leadership, that ousted Lieberman. If Tiernan was speaking as "a conservative first and GOP Chair second" then he should have made it clear that he was not speaking as the GOP Chair.

Instead, he sent the two legislators letters on state GOP stationary, signed the letters as party chair, had the state GOP send out a press release making the letters public and posted the release on the GOP's website.

[Gullyborg]

You can say what you want about the delivery of the message (and you are probably right), but the content of the message is correct:

Support the largest tax increases in the history of Oregon while taking PEU support, and maybe you should just go play for the other team.

[OregonGuy]

In my opinion, these two guys turned their backs on what was right, and what can be shown to be empirically correct, policy on taxation.

Oregon ranks 47th in job creation among the states.

Is it any surprise?
.

[gullyborg]

My question for those opposed to what Bob did:

At what point is a GOP incumbent so reprehensible that it is ok for the GOP chair to denounce?

Let's pretend we have imaginary HD 61. The incumbent is a 5 term Republican named John, and he is running again in a contested primary. Let's say the media breaks news of a scandal with John. He has been arrested - but not yet tried - for a number of heinous crimes, including mass murder, many rapes of children, selling heroin to children, and burning down a nunnery with all the nuns killed in the blaze. Let's say there is a LOT of evidence, including video of him caught in the act. So it is all but assured he is going to prison or even a death sentence. But for the moment, he is innocent until proven guilty, and his trial won't begin until after the election.

Would it be OK, in this extreme hypothetical, for the GOP chair - acting in his capacity as the GOP chair - to say publicly and to publish on GOP letterhead - that he calls on John to resign and withdraw from the election?

If you say yes to this, then you can't agree with Jack's arguments about it. You can disagree with the belief that these two real incumbents should go - and you can vote for them. But you can't say Bob shouldn't be making the statement at all.