Clarifying My Comments

Samantha Supported 100% Pro-Life Peroutka

After having written my last post I felt the need to clarify a few of my thoughts before people were up in arms. First of all, although I am an opponent of the party system this does not mean that I discourage people from supporting local, state, and national candidates that are members of political parties. I myself was a delegate at the Constitution Party this past election year. I chose to refrain from support of the President on moral grounds. It was a matter of conscience for me and I do not regret my actions. Mr. Peroutka is a wonderful man and the vast majority of CP members are God fearing constitutionalists.

This having been said, I would have voted for him if he was running as a Republican. It was not a matter of party (at least not entirely), rather, it was a matter of the man I felt best fit the need of America. Had he run as a Democrat I would still have voted for him (as I voted for a Democrat on the local level). Once again, it was not strictly a matter of party affiliation. It was a matter of conscience and my conviction that he was the best man fit for the job regardless of the odds of his victory.

Do I believe that it is wrong to be a member of the GOP or the CP? No. Rather, I am not sure, in historical hindsight, that it has been advantageous to the Christian cause of Reconstructive social change to be a member of a political party.

If you are a Republican you may have the odds in your favor for electoral victory but the odds of any real Christian change happening through that party are slim. Ask yourself how many times we have heard Republicans give the same old promises over and over and never follow through. Worse would be the fact that the Christian constituency is the primary reason for Republican dominance and yet they have become like the blacks of the Democrat party; a default constituency. This being said, the 3rd party advocate must admit that the odds of social change are greater from within the Republican party than it is outside the party due to the fact that they at least have a shooting chance of getting into office.

If you are a CP member you may have a great platform but the odds of you having any real impact on national politics (the local odds are much greater obviously) in a two-party environment is about as probable as finding aliens on Plato enjoying a round of Five-Card-Draw. There is also the fact that in the present system you would be seen as a fringe group only to be discarded. This has happened to many a great mind in this party. Only if you were to persuade the people of America that the two-party system (or the party system as a whole for that matter) is dangerous for the Republic and the end of truly representative government will you see any significant change. We could debate the validity of this claim for some time but history is my vindicator.

So I conclude that, at present, party politics may have to be a reality we must deal with. Questions immediately arising are whether one should rely on integrity or pragmatism in deciding which party to work within and to what degree one should commit oneself to that party. These are all questions to be dealt with in future posts but I felt that it was necessary for me to at least clarify my statement(s).