The above photo is of my hardhat during the run-up to the 2012 campaign. The stickers remained until they wore off....long after the campaign ended. Although there were people at the top of the Conservative movement that encouraged Jim DeMint to run, he chose not to. I was disappointed but I really can't blame him. Even the conservative base, as evidenced in 2016, is difficult to reason with in this modern political culture.
As strong as the Tea Party and Conservative movements were in 2012 we were not able to discern true strength and integrity nor distinguish between the genuine and the fake. Our strength grew over the next four years but discernment lay dormant, as a cheap imitation of conservatism in Donald Trump lured us over men and women of greater character, wisdom and purpose.
Consider if you will the following letter that was published in the Wall Street Journal on November 3, 2010 as an open letter to conservative Republicans who had just been elected to the 2011 Congress with the help of the Senate Conservative Fund that was founded by then South Carolina Senator DeMint. The key words are..."you must now overcome determined party insiders...."
Congratulations to all the Tea-Party candidates who overcame a determined, partisan opposition to win their elections. The next campaign begins today. Because you must now overcome determined party insiders if this nation is going to be spared from fiscal disaster. Many of the people who will be welcoming the new class of Senate conservatives to Washington never wanted you here in the first place. The establishment is much more likely to try to buy off your votes than to buy into your limited-government philosophy. Consider what former GOP senator-turned-lobbyist Trent Lott told the Washington Post earlier this year: "As soon as they get here we need to co-opt them."
Don't let them. Co-option is coercion. Washington operates on a favor-based economy and for every earmark, committee assignment or fancy title that's given, payback is expected in return. The chits come due when the roll call votes begin. This is how big-spending bills that everyone decries in public always manage to pass with just enough votes.
President Trump has been co-opted. This man of few principles was trapped by his own voluminous ego. He who lived by coercion was himself coerced by even stronger personalities. I've written before that even Jim DeMint could not turn this country around, but what he and others could have done is given us the high ground in this battle....and given us integrity in leadership....which would at least be fertile ground for what we are most in need of.....that is evidenced in this portion of of a resolution for a "day for National prayer and humiliation" that was adopted in the Senate, placed on the desk of President Lincoln, and signed on March 30,1863.
