Former Congressman Joe Walsh sees conflict in Republican Party politics:

The Coming Civil War in the Republican Party

The country is broke.

We have a government that we can’t afford.

It’s a government that does too many things for too many people, and we have a private economy which is stuck and unable to grow … And Illinois is even worse off.

We arrived here because the Republican Party — traditionally the party of freedom, limited government, and individual responsibility — lost its way a long time ago.

Democrats are the party of big government.

They want everyone dependent upon government because they believe once they have a voter dependent upon big government, that voter will always vote for their party.

Republicans, too lazy to make the case for freedom and too afraid to lose elections, have quietly gone along over the years and done their best to sound ”Democrat lite”, arguing that they can manage big government better than the Democrats.

So we’ve been without a true freedom and limited government party for years.

That is changing.

There is a civil war brewing in the Republican Party, both nationally and in Illinois, and it will be a good, necessary, and often ugly thing.

The base — the Tea Party movement, conservatives, and independents — woke up in 2008 and said,

“Stop! Quit growing government. Quit running up these terrible deficits and bankrupting future generations. We’re taxed too much, and we’re regulated to death.”

This movement put its faith in the Republican Party in 2010 to get it right.

This movement is at odds with the establishment wing of the Republican Party, which simply wants to cling to power and stand for their version of a “better managed” big government.

This movement has begun publicly fighting with the Republican establishment and if the establishment doesn’t embrace the freedom movement, the movement will leave the Republican Party, both nationally and in Illinois.

The new political dynamic is no longer Republican vs. Democrat.

It’s freedom and limited government vs. Big Government dependency.

Abraham Lincoln left the Whig Party because he and others would not compromise on slavery.

We will leave the Republican Party if we must because we will not compromise on freedom and limited government.