Why GOP lost - and will continue to do so

In 1964 Barry Goldwater received the Republican Libertarian vote, it wasn't enough. Reagan knowing he needed to win brought in the right wing vote - the Moral Majority to win the majority. It worked.

Though I agree that we ought to leave the social policies to the individual, I'm not sure we can win elections if we ignore them.

This election proved you cannot ignore the Libertarians: small government, fiscally conservative voter either.

The coalition of the Moral Majority plus the fiscal conservatives wins elections. The Democrats and their policies can't win if the Republicans pay attention to both sides of their base. The Libertarians will have to tolerate social conservatism to achieve their goals, the social conservatives have proved they will stay with the Republicans if their needs are also met.

We didn't lose this election because the social conservatives stayed home, we lost it when the Libertarians refused to vote Republican. Just look at the Libertarian vote, it had a major impact on the vote, we would still have the majorities if the Libertarians had stuck with the Republicans.

I do agree that the SC's have gone too far: constitutional amendments banning gay marriage are not something easily digested by the Libertarians, nor can they tolerate religion in schools.

A smart Republican party would find their majority if they kept to Libertarian principles on economic policies and found the middle on the social. Abortion, yes but with restrictions. No late term for 'health', parental notification for minors, and limit the time that a woman can have an abortion on demand. Gay rights determined by states, with federal civil union contracts.

I'm afraid that the damage done in the next two years will be irreversible if Bush doesn't stand up to the Democrats. I'm afraid at this point it doesn't look as if Bush's core is going to withstand the Democrat pounding. This will be a disaster.

On the other hand if Bush is able to find his veto pen and stand up to the nonsense we are about to endure, it will bode well for Republicans.

If nothing else, watching the old timer liberals in action is going to be quite a show.

It's interesting to note the percentage of our population that is homosexual is a tiny part of our population; yet it overwhelms the news and usurps the credit the success of the U.S. economy deserves.

You're right, particularly in the leave it to the states riff. What we really need is a president who will veto stuff that belongs to the states, per the 10th Amendment, and a Congress who, when it tires of the Court legislating, simply limits its jurisdiction, per Article 3, Section 2 of the Constitution. Until and unless the GOP limits the jurisdiction of federal courts, they will continue to legislate the Liberals agenda that the people never have passed. A cowardly Congres, however, with the ability to do just that for 14 years, never did. They'd rather complain than fix the problem.