Talk It Up America

A Message to ALL Republicans

This message is to ALL Republicans—establishment, fiscal conservatives, RINO, social conservatives, moderates, ultra-conservative, Trumpers, and never Trumpers.

On November 7^th, 2017, Virginia’s political complexion changed from purple to blue. On November 8^th, all the Monday-morning quarterbacks were out in force with full-throated criticism of Ed Gillespie. I am not going to counter the critics except to say that Virginia ran a rock-hard conservative for Governor in 2013, and we came up short in that election too.

To all the arm-chair quarterbacks out there, instead of picking on the quarterback—and forgive me while I torture the football metaphor—we should be trying to figure out why the Republican Team can’t win games (elections). Politics, like football, is a team sport. And, politics, like football, is a full-contact sport. To put check marks in the win column, we all must subordinate our personal agendas to the team game plan. If we all play for individual records, we may make it to the Hall of Fame, but we will never get to the Super Bowl.

If you want to wins games (elections), here are some football basics to live your political life by:

#1: If your favorite quarterback (candidate) doesn’t get the starting job (nomination), suck it up and start playing for the starter. As the old saying goes, “You gotta dance with the girl who brung ya.”

#2: If the starting quarterback doesn’t throw well, but can run the ball, then adjust your play to maximize your QB’s effectiveness.

#3: No quarterback can win games if the linemen don’t block, the running backs fumble, or the receivers don’t run their routes as planned.

#4: No quarterback can win games if the defense can’t stop the other team from scoring or controlling the ball.

#5: You will never win any games if you don’t show up at the field on game day to play (vote).

#6: Sometimes the other team’s players are bigger (population), stronger (money), and faster (cleaver). You will have losses on the field and in life. Winners pick themselves up, don’t pout or cry, and get back to the hard work of learning from their mistakes and becoming better.

If Republicans want to win, then let’s start to act like were on the same team, improve our skills, work out, come to practices, show up on game day, act like we want to win, play our hearts out, and win one for the Gipper.