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Dr. Clyde N. Wilson

Just What You Would Expect from Republicans

6/3/2022

4 Comments

 
Picture
Our friend Neil Kumar conducted a bold and energetic campaign in the Arkansas primary elections for a Republican nomination to a U.S. House seat. Not unexpectedly, he lost.  Here is his official statement.
​I was the third candidate in US history to be disavowed by the Republican Party during a contested primary. Twice—both at critical times—my online fundraising was shut down, once by the Republican Party of Arkansas and once by the Republican National Committee.

A virtual unknown, this was my first time running for office. My opponent, a six-term incumbent backed by the Republican Establishment, the Walton Family, the Defense Lobby, Big Pharma, AIPAC, and every other evil entity on earth, had a 20-to-1 funding advantage.

The local media refused to cover me at all, while the national Leftist media ran constant hit pieces against me—the ADL, the SPLC, Right Wing Watch, the Guardian, Business Insider, you name it. GOP operatives ran a smear operation against me on the ground.

Arkansas has an open primary system, and I know for a fact that thousands of Democrats crossed party lines specifically to vote against me in the Republican primary.

Yet despite all of that opposition, subterfuge, and sabotage, I still managed to secure at least 22% of the vote—assuming my numbers weren’t actually higher and no “election fortification” took place. I am investigating rumors of some shenanigans, but I’ll save that for another time.

The key here is that despite the fundamental unfairness of this fight, I still managed to secure almost a quarter of the vote in a race for United States Congress. That’s at least 16,400 people who voted for me.

We are not alone. We are just beginning. And this is but the start of my career.
What is most interesting about this matter is the behaviour of Establishment Republicans, confirming how afraid they are of ideas and issues.  Republicans must maintain their “respectability.”   They must never allow a real issue to  intrude into public discussion.  That might make the clueless voters restless and threaten their profit and prestige.  Democrats are not afraid of issues.  That is why Republicans are utterly useless and  always have to be for the latest Democrat fad, just respectably  less so.

Kumar’s incumbent Republican opponent is an Empty Suit carbon copy of most Republican members of Congress.  Kumar brought up the need for an immigration moratorium. All the opponent could say is that “America is a nation of immigrants,” a half-truth slogan from early in the previous century. He added that if immigration is cut down “no fresh ideas, no new blood can come into this country.”

Everything this fellow had to say is meaningless words invented by PR men of the central Republican party.  This man has never given one minute’s thought to the issue that Kumar brought up or probably any other real issue.  Or given one minute’s thought to what his country needs to address.  That might be controversial and upset the comfortable status quo.  Obviously the current immigration situation is unprecedented in American history, a new issue,  and cannot be answered with pleasant bromides of earlier time.  And are Americans incapable of fresh ideas and have to be continually enlightened by foreigners?   Must we be forever a country of immigrants and not a real country?  And what about the morality of continually robbing poor countries of their educated people?  Ask the growing company of unemployed Americans. Foreign tech people are no better than Americans.  They have no new ideas—they are just cheaper and more docile.    
Neil Kumar was a recent candidate for Congress from Arkansas.
4 Comments
William Smith
6/4/2022 06:50:42 am

RINO (Republican In Name Only), in the popular usage, I suppose, means a GOP politician who has betrayed the true conservatism of the party, perhaps running for office and talking conservatively, but in the final analysis, functioning as the shadow of progressivism that Rev. Dabney warned us about so long ago.

But, as you and others have pointed out so very often, Dr. Wilson, when has the Republican Party ever been conservative? From its inception until now, it may have used true conservatives and conservative talk to garner votes and support their endless corporate welfare and hobby wars, while despising anyone with actual conservative convictions like Dr. Paul or Pat Buchanan, or even Mr. Kumar.

At the risk of sounding pedantic, then, I say we need more RINOs, that is, folks who are actual conservatives, in both word and deed. Many of us vote Republican only as a matter of pragmatism, hoping we can empower the few real conservatives among the party, and at least slow down the rot, thus buying some time.

But if we're going to do that, then let's at least make plans for the death of the GOP, and prepare for What's Next, and not naively view a Trump victory or a Republican takeover of Congress as our deliverance!

Reply
Clyde Wilson
6/4/2022 11:28:44 am

Mr. Smith--right you are. No Republican betrayed the "true conservatism" of the party because there never was any. I have been saying for 50 years that the first goal of conservatives must be to kill the Republican Party which stands in the way of everything good. At least some of the Democrats actually believe their evil ideas.

Reply
Bernhard
6/6/2022 07:44:45 am

As always, Dr. Clyde speaks the truth and bores through the jungle of propaganda. Even if Mr. Kumar had won the party of Lincoln would have ignored him and he would sit on no committees or in on important decisions.

Pogo, Mencken and Alexis de Tocqueville all were correct about democracy.

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Billy P
6/6/2022 08:01:03 am

Arkansas missed out on a real conservative and defender of American and Southern culture and heritage. Mr. Kumar would have represented Arkansas with real courage in Washington DC. With very few exceptions these days, Republicans have become predictable compromisers and prepared losers, conserving nothing along the way- just as you have consistently stated, Dr. Wilson. The fact that it is so difficult to break the RINO barrier shows just how far we have to go as real conservatives within the Republican party. Conservative southerners, in particular, have been kicked to the curb by the Republican party, who have for too long taken our vote for granted. It's past time to turn on them and find a new true conservative route. I don't have the exact answer as to what that route is, but I feel comfortable saying it doesn't exist in the Republican party, not today at least.
That said, reaching 22% of the vote with all of the RINO and liberal headwinds Mr. Kumar faced in this contest is still encouraging and shows that while the wheels may be turning slowly on a conservative rising, they are still turning. God bless Mr. Kumar, best wishes for him in the future and I hope he will continue the fight.

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    Author

    Clyde Wilson is a distinguished Professor Emeritus of History at the University of South Carolina He is the author or editor of over thirty books and published over 600 articles, essays and reviews

    Dr. Wilson is also is co-publisher of Shotwell Publishing, a source  for unreconstructed Southern books. 

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