Once we, as conservatives, review and reaffirm our principles and clarify our objectives (which the Twelve Points are meant to help us to do), we will be able to properly plan for the future. The following are a few questions for those who question whether this is needed:
- What have we done to ensure that the next attempt at conservative governance will avoid the same fate as the "Republican Revolution" of the mid-1990s, when Republicans fought for a balanced budget, reduced spending, and smaller government, and when their flesh was subsequently scattered by Democrats?
- What have we done to ensure that the next attempt at conservative governance will avoid the same fate as the Republican-controlled government of 2001-2007 (or, arguably, of 2003-2007), whose failures were not limited to the loss of elections?
- Have we firmly agreed which items of federal spending should be cut, in what order they should be cut, and how we will accomplish that, politically, in the real world?
- Do we know what will be required of us to restore the Constitution and the rule of law -- not in theory or in a dream, but in the next several decades?
- Do we know that our fellow "conservatives" agree with and understand the conservative conception of freedom and limited government?
- Do we know that our fellow conservatives understand the myriad arguments for and applications of that philosophy?
- Do we recognize that "big-government conservatism" is a sub-type of conservatism only to the extent that "fool's gold" is a sub-type of gold?
- Have we decided how to ensure that the "conservatives" who we work to elect really are conservative?
- Will our lack of focus and foresight continue to force conservatives to choose between winning elections and governing well?
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