Subject Author Date Time Information Doctor George Sprecace Letter to the Republican PartyGeorge SprecaceDec 6, 200810:29 AMEvent DetailsNew London RepublicansDoctor George Sprecace provided some wisdom for us to consider as we prepare to build a strong surge moving toward November 2009 Municipal Elections:

Date: Sunday, November 9, 2008, 11:31 AM

The Republican Party does not need just an oil change and lube job. It needs a new motor to drive its better and lasting ideas, a new suspension to support those positions with facts and not simply with emotion and tradition, a new catalytic converter to expunge the more odorous parts of its reputation, and a new transmission to get its message from the motor to the driving wheels. The body is OK. Simply giving it a new paint job would be rightly seen as "putting lipstick on a pig". So let's get to work

1) The one absolute that cannot be modified in any way, the only Republican position that is a matter of life and death, is abortion: at any time from the moment of conception; for any reason other than to save the life of the mother. The Republican Party's constant position must be reversal of Roe v. Wade, reversion of the issue to the States, and a U.S. Constitutional Amendment declaring the conceptus a human being with all of the accompanying rights – especially the right to life. That will lose votes. It will lose some elections. But it will move the national discussion along to final acceptance.

2) All other positions can be modified, depending upon existing circumstances. This includes the desirable "strict interpretation" of the Constitution. The "eight hundred pound gorilla sits where it wants to sit", so work at selecting the most compatible judges -and let them do their work.

3) We can work toward a more moral society, especially by example. But we cannot legislate it. That work is for parents and for societal pressures on individuals and corporations.

4) Immigration is a foundation stone of this nation. The DAR and SAR were immigrants. Only Indians were not immigrants. This problem must be addressed: legally, practically and humanely. Nativism is a self-inflicted wound, one of many, for the Republican Party.

5) Civil Union, YES. Gay Marriage between two committed persons, NO. Adoption by responsible gay couples, YES. Artificial methods of birthing by gay couples, NO.

6) Individual responsibility, YES. Social responsibility by society to help its poor, YES, by both volunteer action and by government action when necessary. (See the responses of Hoover and of FDR to the severe dislocations of the Great Depression).

7) Lower taxes and responsible government spending, YES, except when the times and national challenges require a different approach.

8) Free enterprise, YES, but under the watchful eye of society to encourage fairness in the face of the baser instincts of human nature. (Alan Greenspan, take note!)

9) International trade, YES, subject to realistically fair proportionality.

10) Cooperation with other world nations, YES, but always consistent with our own self-interest and with a real-worldview - not with wishful thinking.

I could go on. But the perennial argument between "conservative" and "progressive" views, within both the Republican and Democratic Parties, has gone on since the founding of this unique nation. It has become clear that, for the Democrats, it is a matter of barely ordered chaos that makes good theatre; but for the Republicans is a matter of organizational life and death.

FELLOW REPUBLICANS, WAKE UP! GS