Conservative ideas I like - and why they are so rare.

Most of my blog comes down pretty hard on the Republicans.  I despise their opposition to the First amendment (Religion, speech, press, assemble and petition), their ridiculous belief that you can cut taxes and reduce the deficit, their demand for corporate rights while stepping on the individual rights, their anti-abortion, anti-gay,anti-intelligentsia, anti-civil rights and anti-poor biases.

But there are some things they got right.

So I decided to list a few of the Republican Ideas that I agree with.

1. We do need to simplify the tax code.  That does NOT mean lower taxes for businesses - even small business.  It means get rid of a bunch of the loopholes that deductions that people and businesses use.  Tax deductions should be simpler - and abuse of them should be rare, not common.
2. Our educational system does need some work.  The major problem is we don't know how to fix it - Teachers are not the problem, though sometimes working around their contracts might make solving the problem harder.  I would probably require Teacher Unions to allow exceptions for 'test-case' schools, to help us figure out how to fix the problems.  No more than 5% of schools could opt-out of the standard contract.
3. Nuclear Power is safe  and should be considered a green/renewable energy source.   I wish the DNC would commit to it's use.  Of course, if they did, the GOP would deny they were ever for it and claim Nuclear Power is a socialist plot. 
4. Unions should not have the right to force people to join or pay them, just as businesses should not have the right to prevent people from joining them.  Similarly, a business should not be required to use the same contract for a Union employee as it does for a non-union employee.  You don't pay for collective bargaining, you don't get the bargain.   If a Union can not find a way to survive without requiring the 49% that did not want to join it in a company that has 51% of it's employees union members, then the Union should die.  But I don't think they will.  Unions are strong enough to survive.

I would add I favor a strong Defence, but the GOP is turning away from that view.  It costs money - which many in the GOP would rather cut from our taxes then spend on defence.

There are probably more ways I agree with the GOP, but it is hard to tell. They so often use words to mean the exact opposite of what they say.  (Democrats do this too, but to a lesser extent)

For example the GOP say they want schools to teach a fair scientific viewpoint on Intelligent Design vs. Evolution, but all scientific evidence is for Evolution and almost none for ID. They work very hard to phrase certain ideas as if they meant the opposite of what they really do mean.  We know this because they only do it when talking to the general public.  When they speak to conservative only groups, they drop the strange phrasings. 

Worse, they insist on pulling crap like calling a bill "Revoke Excessive Policies that Encroach on American Liberties Act" instead of "Revoke Obama-care".   Then there was "Reducing Barack Obama's Unsustainable Deficit Act".  Such things do not help you pass a bill, it makes it harder by pissing off people that may agree with some of the rules but despise your childish behaviour.   They think they are boosting their base by creating sound clip for the media. 

In actuality, they piss off their opponent's base the same amount.  Net net, your opponent ends up boosting his popularity the same amount as you do - but you are the one that spent all the money and political capital. It's kind of like what happens when you put up an advertisement to join the local Gay Community in a town's only newspaper.  Sure, you may get new recruits, but don't be surprised if certain church groups start picket your meeting.