The Kansas In Him

I've been thinking about this topic for a long time and i'll admit I'm having trouble forming coherent thoughts.  It would be nice if I could just create some kind of direct link from my brain to the internet so that my consciousness wouldn't have to be the middle man here.  Straight from brain to blog. Other people do it, obviously--why can't I?  Maybe it's just because I'm new at this. I'll try and be patient. On to matters at hand.
The current political climate worries me.

John McCain emerged from the 2008 Republican primaries as the Maverick candidate, the rightful heir to the conservative throne.  He wasn't exactly the next Reagan, but he was an honest, solid conservative candidate.  To be fair, then-President Bush didn't give him a whole lot to work with. His maverick-ness was played up a lot, especially with the super-maverick decision to pick Sarah Palin, the ultimate she-maverick, as his running mate.

As we all know, common sense and prevailed and Maverick/She-Maverick slinked into obscurity and let hope and ideas and all other things good flood the news cycle.  That lasted until the she-maverick decided she was too mavericky to be tied down by doing the public service to which she was elected.  McCain went back to the senate, serving his country in the best way that he can.  He's not in the news much anymore.
Sarah Palin has emerged as one of the faces of the Republican party, suggesting that the to be a good conservative, all you have to do is say that liberals are bad and wrong and are destroying America.  This kind of rhetoric is drifting from the fringe to the center of current Republican ideology, and that scares me.

The new combative voices of the party are not only stirring up harsh anti-Obama/democrat sentiments, but they're dividing their own party.  Where does this leave moderate conservatives, the supposed base? I have friends who are conservative and they are too smart and reasonable to buy into the Beck/Palin/Limbaugh "rhetoric," so where do they turn?  This did not go well for them in the apparently insignificant 23rd district of New York, where the Fox News Party decided to flex it's muscles and forced a moderate republican out of the race only to cede the district to a Democrat for the first time since the 19th century.

Are the events of upstate New York are a fluke, or if this is what we can come to expect from the Republican party?  As of yet, they don't really have any concrete ideas or values, and if the Obama's approval ratings keep falling, they might gain some seats in the midterm elections.  Hopefully those seats will go to conservatives with real ideas and initiative.  If not, the presence of more Republicans whose only goal is to get in the way of democratic legislation will grind the US Government to a halt.

I sincerely hope that the new conservative party that emerges is one prepared for real political and intellectual discourse for the betterment of our country.  Without a solid opposition and the possibility for discussion and thoughtful debate, the Obama presidency will be wasted.  An administration as intelligent and gifted as we have now will likely not be seen for another generation at least, and a Senate incapable of passing any bill because of pithy Republican whining is a depressing thought.  The sweeping affirmation of the new political climate in America is exhilarating; even if the Obama honeymoon is over, it's still a much much better place than it was a year ago.  With the new rise of liberalism and the general shift of the country to the left, this is a defining moment for the conservative movement and the Republican party.  It can be salvaged, and it's worth the effort.