OPINION: Conservatism never made it past the primaries.

In the musical 1776, there is a scene in which John Adams, frustrated by seeming lack of support for his independence proposals, enters the empty assembly chamber and sings his lament with these opening lines.

Is anybody there?
Does anybody care?
Does anybody see what I see?

He then continues to sing of his vision of a free America.

Those of you who believe in the basic conservative values, and who have looked to the Republican Party to represent your cause, must share the feelings of John Adams at this moment. I sure do.

The GOP leadership abandoned our values for a cheap imitation of the Democrat big government agenda. Instead if offering an alternative to the historically oppressive and failed policies of statism, the party of Lincoln and Reagan has offered up an inferior brand. Lyndon Johnson's butter and guns policy that ravaged our economy for a score of years was revisited with avengence in the Bush adminsitration -- running the national debt through the stratosphere. The appitite of Republican legislators for earmarked pork was on par with any liberal Democrat. Under the weight of reckless greed, the economy tanked. The conservative standard bearers all fell in the primaries -- essentially removing the conservative agenda from the general election. Yes! McCain was too much like a Bush third term.

In this campaign season, the Democrats offered the people a better life, and the hope of a rescue from the ravages of an economy mismanaged by the Republicans’ abandonment of conservative monetary and fiscal policies. The fact that the Democrats were only offering a stronger dose of the same toxic snake oil did not matter. I looked like change … and gave hope. They offered something. The Republicans offered nothing.

In times of fear, it is not uncommon for people to surrender freedom for a sense of security, false as it maybe. We have seen this in times of war -- Lincoln suspends habeas corpus, Roosevelt inters innocent Japanese-Americans and Bush signs the falsely named Patriot Act. This is equally true in times of economic fear. Against every warning and admonition of the Founding Fathers, we entrust government to take care of us.

With the Democrats in full control of our national government, we can expect to see the creeping plague of socialism spreading further in the body politic. Even before the election, and with the compliance of thoughtless Republican leadership, we have seen the banks partially nationalized. Almost a trillion taxpayer dollars appropriated to take control of the national economic tiller from the steady hand of the free market – ergo the people – in favor of the oppressive hand of a government cabal.

In this election, the Democrats claimed the credit for rescuing the people from a burning house, never to reveal that they were the arsonists who set the blaze originally. The witless Republicans willingly provided some of the fuel in a moment of irrationality.

In listening to the excuses and rationalizations of so many GOP leaders, one has to conclude that nothing has been learned. Some see resurrection through the same failed policies of the past. Many call on the party to be even more like the Democrats, and further abandon the conservative principles. For their own self interest, they arrogantly point the finger of blame at those of us who prefer an alternative to the Democrats’ liberal tax, spend and control policies – not the poor quality imitation.

Conservatism did not fail in this election because it was never on the ballot. What failed was mock liberalism offered up by a second rate party with a philosophically corrupted leadership. The old guard has become the very old guard.

Conservatives lack an effective political vehicle to offer the alternative to liberal Democrat “big brother” government. We must either take over the Republican Party or find a new platform … a new party. One of the other – but not the divisiveness of trying to do both.

I think the party of Lincoln and Reagan is the best means for many reasons, but we cannot allow the America of John Adams to be lost by the additional incompetence of even conservative leaders and believers. If we blame the Republican leaders for discarding our conservative values and policies, and surrending the election to the Democrats, then we must look at the failure of the conservative leaders within the party to keep the GOP agenda on the right rightward course.

Newt Gingrich mobilized a nation behind a positive conservative platform in his "Contract with America." Ronald Reagan was super salesman of conservaitve ideology. Where are those kind of leaders now? Perhaps it is good that the current GOP establishment has been decimated by the Democrat sweep. There now is a vacuum. It will be filled by either the clones of the vanquished Republican establishment, or the political descendents of John Adams and Ronald Reagan. The future of America rests in the balance.

I wonder … does any one see what I see?