JeffWartman.com is the blog of Jeff Wartman – a moderate political observer using reason, logic and progress as benchmarks for effective public policy based in Chicago, IL. A former elected official within the Republican Party, he left after the rightward shift of the party became too much to take. He is a sales professional for a dot com/advertising company.
Moderation is not to be taken as “fence sitting” or “wishy washy” on issues — this blog will come out strongly in favor of specific policy proposals and issues. Moderation is not compromise. Moderation simply means that the combination of issues that the Republican Party and the Democrat Party stand for are an oxymoron.
This blog will generally show a strong opinion for responsible economic policy. The only way toward a healthy economic system is one in which debt is kept to a minimum but social safety net is preserved and strengthened. Taxes should be low, but revenues coming in need to be able to sustain the necessary functions of government.
On the social side, this blog will generally show what can be considered a liberal view of social policy — strongly pro-choice, pro-gay rights and in support of full gay marriage. Immigrants need to be treated with respect and we as Americans need to remember the open arms by which immigrants were welcomed here in the past. I am pro-choice because I want to treat women like human beings. I am pro-gay rights because I want to treat gays as human beings. I am pro-immigrant because I want to treat people from other countries as human beings.
Enjoy most of what you have to say, but really wish you would not call the Democratic Party the Democrat Party. Using the noun where an adjective should be used has been a favorite juvenile insult of the Left by the Right for decades. You don’t strike me as someone who would stoop so low.
Please check out this web site. I am neither a Democrat nor Republican, but OUR government has been bought by the few and it’s screwing the many.
http://www.getmoneyout.com
By the People for the People!
I am in the beginning stages of bringing together a group of retired intellectuals, secular and religious (mainly Episcopal priests) who are interested in doing more than nodding approvals and nodding disapprovals. We aren’t young enough to carry signs and sleep in tents, but we want to offer support to those energetic youth who do. I just found your blog through a friend sharing it on FaceBook. Our first meeting will be during the second half of this month, as yet the time is not definite. Most of us have been Republican for most of our lives, however, almost to a person have now embraced the progressive nature of the Democrats. Would you be interested in our group and possibly being a participant with us in deciding where we should direct our activities for realistic results? I am Skip Higgins at higginskip@aol.com and cell phone 225-937-0700. Our group, so far, includes people from California, New York, Alabama, Missouri, Mississippi, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Texas, and Louisiana. We are, so far, five Episcopal priests, one New York Supreme Court judge, and several businessmen & women.
Jeff, I am excited to discover your blog re your decision to leave the GOP in its present crazy state, and equally excited to read about Skip Higgings’ group. You both give me a feeling of hope for our country. For 35 years, though I started as a Democrat, I have registered Decline to State and tried to vote for candidates who are fiscally conservative hence willing to tax when necessary (like Reagan), socially liberal like I believe all Americans should be, and alert to military-industrial war pressures (which Eisenhower warned against as he left the Presidency). President Obama best fits those criteria, so I will vote for him. In actuality, due to the rightward shift of the Democrats, Obama is a “Republican” as described by my intelligent young husband when I asked him, in the 1960s, “what is the essence of Republicanism?” At that time he was active in state GOP activities and later held top appointments under 3 Republican governors, including one who went to the White House. Thirty years ago I married another intelligent Republican, also active in and around politics, and though he shut me up when I ranted too long about Bush 2′s “preventive war”, torture, etc, last week he told me, quietly and unbidden, that he intends to vote for Obama. I was/am so stunned, that I have not yet replied — to think he would vote for a candidate with a D beside the name for the first time in his long life! (He doesn’t use the computer, and if someone alerts him to my post I hope it doesn’t hurt him or his company in any way.) My first husband, being retired, openly supports Obama. Maybe he’ll see this post and meet with your group, Skip.
Are you sensing that the people you know are “really seeing” how extreme right the Republican party has gone since the election of President Obama?
I can’t believe how often I quote Nixon on healthcare, Reagan or Bush on Immigration and Betty Ford on about EVERYTHING. This NEW GOP is so hate filled and vicious in their attack of Middle Americans, I’m with you. As an Independent voter, I’m going with Obama again for just the same reasons you outlined. Thank you!
I was a registered Republican for over 45 years. I voted for a Bush four times! But it is clear from Sarah Palin, Terry Sciavo, Roe V Wade, two wars on the credit card, and the religious right that the Republican Party abandoned me. I no longer care to be associated with the GOP and the kind of people that I saw Sarah Palin rallying; if that is the Republican base, it scares the hell out of me. The Republican Party no longer represents me. I miss William F. Buckley and the conservatives who were not anti-intellectual and anti-science. I have officially registered as an NPA. In 2008 for the first time since Reagan I was voting for someone instead of against someone for POTUS. For the first time I phoned, knocked on doors and donated to a presidential campaign! I will continue to do so for this upcoming election.
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Very insightful blog. Interesting spin on everyday issues.