Letters to the editor

Modern Republicans have lost their way

The Republican party has lost its way and has lost the ability to refer to itself as the Grand Old Party. I am a registered Republican and I am very displeased with the current state of this once glorious party. This party has been home to some of the greatest leaders in U.S. history, including Theodore Roosevelt and Robert La Follette, two of the original Progressives. In addition to these two men, the greatest president the United States has had, Abraham Lincoln, was indeed a Republican.

This once great party which emphasized fiscal and governmental responsibility has since been hijacked by the neoconservative movement. A party once led by progressives is now led by closed-minded, stubborn ideologues. It seems bizarre that men such as Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity can call George W. Bush a great Republican leader when his administration's policies reflect the exact opposite. We have a government that is rapidly expanding in size, and thus further interfering with the lives of private citizens. We have a record deficit, which seems to reflect anything but fiscal responsibility and sound leadership. What happened to the party that believed that the individual citizen could operate without the watchful eye of the government following us around every corner? Our party gives more credit to the opinions of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson then it does to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., arguably the most respectable man in the Senate. Why is it that the party that supposedly emphasizes small government seeks to regulate such private institutions as marriage and come increasingly close to breaking the separation of church and state?

The purpose of this letter is not to push people away from the Republican party; its purpose is to motivate my fellow Republicans to take our party back and restore it to the Grand Old Party.

Nate Hays

History '08