WHAT A GIRL WANTS
With McCain as a Republican gal’s option, perhaps it’s time for an ‘I’ by my name

I may not be ready for full-fledged flag-flying Libertarianism, but I don’t think I can remain a registered Republican much longer. As I explained to the 39 McCain fundraisers who phoned in May: “When the GOP stops sliding leftward and gets back to Goldwater-Reagan values, I’ll write more checks. In the meantime, stop sending me these pretend party platform surveys that a one-armed tree monkey could complete. They’re insulting.”

Is it too much to ask for a conservative candidate who is a true conservative? Can we please have a guy who talks about traditional ideas as if he really understands them? I want to be talking about slashing our $3.1-trillion federal budget and balancing all remaining ledgers. I want a cessation of all entitlements and an end to unnecessary bureaucracy. I want wide-sweeping tax reform, clean legislation out of D.C., and all earmarks to die a fiery death.

Let’s run a pipeline or two over the tundra and ruin the scenic view of three Arctic terns. I want gas prices back down in the $2 range while we decide what will fuel our future. I don’t want crap-and-trade energy policy or corporations exchanging “carbon emission credits.” (Can we please stop inserting abstract ideas into the economy as if they are commodities that can actually support our markets?)

I want an end to the “drug war,” which is costing us billions, filling up our prisons and accomplishing little. I want prison reform, including the system-wide establishment of work camps in which convicts pay their debt to society by laboring 40 to 50 hours per week (like the rest of us!) I want these prison workplaces to produce something useful and to be managed like a business: efficiently and for profit.

I want us to abolish or considerably reduce the scope of the failed Department of Education as well as the influence of the teachers’ unions. I want more charter schools and more home schools, plus better educational and job tracking based on our kids’ abilities and interests. I want more kids to go to vocational schools and for everyone to stop pretending that every child needs (or wants) a four- to nine-year college education. I want an end to affirmative action in academics, such that the smartest and hardest working kids are accepted into our colleges, period.

So, what’s my beef with the GOP and their latest maverick poster-boy, John McCain? He isn’t an authentic conservative, nor is he an actual maverick. For example, his pro-life credentials are decidedly shaky. He’s also notorious for pandering to the left and has echoed their lies by calling the Bush tax cuts “for the rich.” He’s repeatedly changed his tune on immigration policy and favors constitutional rights for foreign terrorists. He helped legitimize the filibustering of judicial nominees in the Senate and championed bad campaign-finance reform. He co-sponsored the McCain-Kennedy illegal immigrant “Forgive, Forget and Let’s-all-have-a-Scotch” bill. He also voted for Arlen Specter’s ridiculous Let’s-ask-Mexico-if-we-can-build-a-fence on-our-own-freaking-border bill. He’s against drilling in ANWR no matter what, and he talks about green living like he personally dreamed it up.

As for McCain’s tax credit for health care, I’ll take it —but let’s remember that if income taxes weren’t so high in the first place we wouldn’t need a credit in order to afford our family’s medical bills. I am glad the man talks about supply-side economics, but how much credit does a future president really deserve for understanding the basic principles of ECON 101? And please don’t hand me any lines about McCain’s commitment to appoint constitutionalist judges. That should be a no-brainer, so no brownie points are awarded. 

I’m well aware that what I want cannot be had — at least not this year. Whatever my vote this November, I’ll probably have an “I” rather than an “R” on my voter card by 2012 — if for no other reason than to let the GOP know how disgusted with things I really am.