The Grassroots of the Republic vs. Mitch McConnell

Being a libertarian is easy. You can criticize the Republicans and Democrats without any culpability.

Being a grassroots Republican is hard.

These people work tirelessly, not as paid political operatives, but as actively concerned citizens, fighting for the values and liberties they hold dear. However, they, as Republicans, are represented by the likes of Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House John Boehner. How do you work so hard within a party ruled by people who spend their every waking moment trying to subvert your efforts, divert your effects, rebuff your impact, and ruin your reputation?

Fringe, they call you. TEA Party they infer upon you, as if the public rising up against taxation and spending and debt is somehow sinister! Anti-social, immature, irrational, ignorant – this is what the Republican Party says about those Republicans who do the most work to ensure that the Republican Voter still shows up at the polls.

So, Mitch McConnell says that, “the president has done an excellent job on this”, referring to a pacific trade deal, mirroring NAFTA, which also gives the President further executive powers to negotiate trade deals. He calls Republicans “squeamish”. Clinton-prop George Stephanopoulos refers to Majority Leader McConnell as President Obama’s “point man”. The grassroots fought hard to give the Senate back to the Republicans… for this?

How you guys do it is beyond me. I respect you and I wonder about you. You, the grassroots, have dragged me into this horrifying world of Republican Politics and I witness in horror as the National Republican Party swings wildly left, on a tire-swing of excuses and “reasons” – and while you fight the good fight, sending more Republicans to Congress, and in effect raising the Republican Leadership to the heights of power, they spit in your face.

In a conversation with a Hanover grassroots activist, I pressed him on how he has kept up the fight so long. He said, “Every barn has to be shoveled out. Some wait for others to do it, some wait for it to clean itself, some pull on the boots and gloves, hold their noses and pick up the shovel”.

That seems to be the role of the grassroots in the Republican Party.

Coming from a Libertarian background, I marveled at the luxury of my old position. “Being libertarian is ideologically easier. You just say, ‘barns aren’t necessary. Screw the barn’”. And that’s what it has been like for me, for years, excoriating Republican and Democrat for the obviously poor political leadership we’ve seen during my lifetime. However, as a libertarian, I rarely get a chance to fight anything or anyone. When you get involved with the wonderful men and women fighting for the soul of the Republican Party, even when you disagree with them, it’s an entirely different experience.

If I had spent my life as a dyed-in-the-wool Republican, fighting for limited government, responsible government, equality under the law, and for this Constitutional Republic – and if I watched Mitch McConnell go on and on about our great President and his pursuit of further executive power, I think I’d throw in the towel. I won’t, because I’ve only been fighting beside you for two short years and I still have energy to spare.

But for those of your who have been fighting since Goldwater, since Reagan, since the 90s, or since 2008, I salute you! I don’t always have to agree with you, but I can admire your courage, your faith, your dedication to the Republic in the face of overwhelming odds.

I write this to say “thank you”, to say “keep it up”, to say “I’m with you”. I do believe that more and more libertarians will come to see you as I see you – not as the grassroots of the Republican Party, but as the Grassroots of the Republic.