A return to Reaganism is what conservatives, voters want

Ronald Reagan, the 40th president of the United States is generally considered to be the standard bearer for the Republican Party.

The ideals espoused by Reagan are what a large portion of the voting populace - both Democrat, Independent and Republican - want, according to Rasmussen Reports. According to the polling organization, 83% of Republican voters around the country still agree with Reagan along with 40% of Democrats and 60% of those not affiliated with either major party. The Reagan ideal is what voters want to see in modern Republicans. Fifty-nine percent of voters still agree with Reagan's stance that government is the problem.

In 1981 Reagan said:

"From time to time we've been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people. Well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else? All of us together, in and out of government, must bear the burden. The solutions we seek must be equitable, with no one group singled out to pay a higher price.”

Reagan's words still resonate today despite the seemingly opposite tack taken by the Obama administration.

A note to my conservative friends - let's take the GOP back

Like me, many of you have been highly disappointed in the direction of the Republican Party over the past decade. It has abandoned its traditional tenets of limited government and individual liberty. Many of you, like me, walked away from the party that we rightly felt had abandoned us, the traditional conservatives.

But now is the time to return to the fold. Last night's election was in no small way a rejection of the current state of the Republican Party.

As my wife and I watched Obama give his victory speech, I noticed so many people in the crowd with tears in their eyes. My jaded heart couldn't really understand it, and my wife chided me saying I had no causes to be passionate about, like those people did. After sleeping on it, I realized she was correct. I'd lost my passion for politics because I was feeling like a jilted lover.

But today I am changing that. Since moving to Illinois, I am no longer restrained by journalistic ethics of becoming involved in party politics. As of this morning, I've contacted the county GOP to use my skills to rebuild the party and re-install the core values - limited government, fiscal responsibility and individual liberty - to the party. My backside is coming off the sidelines and I'm going to get back in the game. This blog is part of that effort. The Illinois GOP, like the GOP in my beloved North Carolina, is poorly organized and I believe I can make a difference and help restructure state and local politics. So my fellow disillusioned and jaded conservative friends, now is the time to act. I challenge each of you to get off the sidelines and work to make sure the values we hold aren't forgotten.

To steal the mantra of our president-elect, YES WE CAN