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Adam D. Elrod

The recent bout between Governor George W. Bush and Senator John McCain for the Republican Presidential nomination has had many people around the country questioning the validity of the current primary system. Furthermore, the disparities in the current system have many astute conservatives questioning the legitimacy of McCain's recent surge in nationwide polls.

The next so-called "Republican primary" is to occur in South Carolina on Tuesday, and the results of this primary could have lasting effects on the loser of the election. However, there is a distinct problem with this, in that the voters in the South Carolina primary will not be limited to Republicans. In essence, Democrats and Independents will have a voice in whom the Republican nominee will be.

This fact is only compounded when you consider that the Democratic Party has forgone a primary in South Carolina, thereby allowing Democrats the freedom to sabotage the Republican primary. In fact, in states such as South Carolina and Michigan, Democratic leaders have encouraged their party members to do so.

According to John Zogby, a political pollster, Bush leads among Republicans in South Carolina by a margin of 55.2 percent to 31.9 percent, however, McCain leads among Democrats, 55.7 percent to 20.0 percent, and among independents 62.9 percent to 21.3 percent. Basically, this means that if the Republican nominee were strictly left up to Republicans, as it should be, Bush would win by a relatively large margin. It is not until you allow Democrats and Independents to vote that the race becomes a dead heat.

As a Republican, one must question the conservative credentials of a Republican candidate that has the support of Democrats across the country. McCain claims to have captured the hearts of the Reagan Democrats (those Democrats who voted for Ronald Reagan despite their liberal tendencies).

However, I do not believe this is the case. Ronald Reagan acquired Democratic support by sticking to common-sense Conservative principles. Reagan did not gather liberal support by changing his views to fit theirs, he gathered it by persuading them that his views were right.

For a self-described conservative, many of McCain's stances have been far from conservative. He is for "targeted" tax cuts, because, as he put it, "the wealthiest in this nation do not need a tax cut." He has said, if his daughter were to become pregnant that they would have to discuss whether abortion would be the correct course of action. These are not conservative ideas.

To a true conservative, everyone deserves a tax cut because their hard work and sacrifice went into earning that money. To a true conservative, it is not the government's responsibility to tell people which candidate or how much money they are allowed to donate. To a true conservative, it does not take a "family conference" to know that abortion is the wrong course of action.

The truth is, while McCain has gotten significant support in previous primaries, this country has yet to hold a true Republican primary. The purpose of a primary system is to allow the members of a particular party to choose which candidate will represent them in the Presidential election. As long as we allow non-party members to voice their opinions in opponents' primaries, neither party will be represented by their own candidate. They will be represented by the candidate that the other party would rather run against. Regardless of the results of the South Carolina election, Bush, the true conservative, deserves the nomination of the conservative Republican Party.