How ignorant people took control of the GOP
Brendan Mruk | Wikimedia Commons
Leading voices from the far right have recently joined the Democrats in declaring that the Republican Party is now controlled by dumb people. I prefer “ignorant,” a slightly more generous adjective.
A case in point is Bret Stephens’ recent editorial “Earth to GOP: Get a Grip” in the Wall Street Journal. It’s a hilarious piece for any Democrat; and, well, it’s a hilarious piece for any intelligent Republican.
A dedicated right winger, Stephens is the Boy Wonder of the neocon movement’s mainstream-media brigade. He’s the deputy editorial page editor of the WSJ. Before joining it he was editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem Post, and has written pieces such as “Why Hasn’t Israel Bombed Iran (Yet)?” I’m no fan of Bret Stephens, but I do respect his intelligence.
His “Earth To GOP” essay calls for fundamental change in the party’s direction. Here are some of his thoughts about the current direction:
“Fellow conservatives, please stop obsessing about what other adults might be doing their bedroom . . . This obsession is socially uncouth, politically counterproductive and, too often, unwittingly revealing.”
“Also, if gay people wish to lead conventionally bourgeois lives by getting married, that may be lunacy on their part but it’s a credit to our values.”
“Also, please tone done the abortion extremism . . . [such as] opposing abortion in cases of rape and incest, to say nothing of the life of the mother.”
“By the way, what’s so awful about Spanish? It’s a fine European language with an outstanding literary tradition – Cervantes, Borges, Paz, Vargas Llosa – and it would do you no harm to learn it. Bilingualism is an intellectual virtue, not a deviant sexual practice.”
“Mitt Romney won the nomination for the simple reason that every other contender was utterly beyond the pale of national acceptability, except Michele Bachmann. Just kidding.”
“Which reminds me: Can we, as the GOP base, demand an IQ exam as well as a test of basic knowledge from our congressional and presidential candidates? This is not a flippant suggestion: There were at least five Senate seats in the election cycle that might have been occupied by a Republican come January had not the invincible stupidity of the candidate stood in the way.”
Indeed, in just one generation, control of the GOP has gone from the elite global fiscal-conservatives to closed provincial social-extremists, with a redneck bent for pursuing foreign affairs with fists and guns.
Ironically, this ignorant but dangerous monster was created by Ronald Reagan, one of America’s greatest presidents.
In sharp contrast to Obama, Reagan was deft at building fluid coalitions, customized for each issue. He was a master at getting 80% of what he wanted in a particular bill, but where that failed, he would settle for 60%. He was very successful in bending the country towards his vision both when the GOP controlled Capitol Hill and when it was the minority party.
One of Reagan’s favorite methods for building Congressional coalitions was to pick off the southern Democratic block, loosely called the Dixiecrats. For at least two decades these rural social conservatives felt progressively alienated under the Democratic tent.
A Hollywood glamor animal with a solid Republican base, Reagan repeatedly persuaded Dixiecrats to vote with the Republicans. In return, he paid lip service to the South’s out-of-mainstream social positions, such as abortion, but not much more.
For Reagan, it was a tactical relationship. He controlled them like a western cowboy uses a campfire – throwing wood on it when more heat was needed, and putting it out when a new day and a new issue arose. Never in Reagan’s wildest dreams did he consider transforming the GOP core ideology to that of the rural south and rural midwest.
By the end of the Reagan era, this rural bloc became firmly anchored in the GOP. However, Reagan’s successors unwittingly lost control of this campfire, and over time were engulfed by the flames of what we now refer to as the Red State conservatives.
This is not the first time a political genius created a tool which none of his successors knew how to control. Otto von Bismarck ingeniously stitched together a number of independent states into a coalition that became modern-day Germany.
In “Diplomacy,” his seminal work on foreign policy, Henry Kissinger argues that because none of Bismarck’s successors had the extraordinary skills necessary to control this powerful new invention called Germany, it spun out of control within 50 years, leading to the two world wars.
Let’s hope that the GOP monster that Reagan created will burn itself out in the post- Iraq and Afghanistan war period. When folks like Bret Stephens make mirth of the GOP, how much longer can we consider it a scary monster?
November 21, 2012 - 6:00 AM
Finally a legitimate criticism of President Obama. I had begun to think you incapable of moving beyond the easy, superficial and fanatical distortion of facts you presented the other day.
Leading voices from the far right have recently joined the Democrats in declaring that the Republican Party is now controlled by dumb people. I prefer “ignorant,” a slightly more generous adjective.
Correct. But the ANALysis is backwards.
Here’s my simple basic question: If the social-issues crowd were in charge of the GOP, why didn’t Bachmann/Santorum/Perry/Cain get the nomination?
The fact is, the GOP leadership chooses the most moderate candidate of the bunch (excluding candidates like Huntsman who can’t win). They pick the candidate the Democrats want to run against; the one who will go easiest on them. McCain in 2008 refused to criticize 0bama. He scolded his team for doing so. Romney was AWOL on 0bamacare, and a whole host of other issues. The GOP leadership’s motto is to play nice, not upset the liberals with harsh or critical rhetoric, and to please the PC crowd (which they could never do anyway). Now notice the Democrat is never asked to pull punches. They trash the Republican any way they please.
This whole circumstance has been caused by the Communists successfully infiltrating the mainstream media, as they pledged to do as part of their 45 goals of the 1950s: This media launches the most savage smear campaign against conservatives just as they did to those who ran against Romney. They employ the Alinsky policies of ridicule, avoiding the issues, and personal destruction. They go easy on Romney until the nomination, then they employ the same tactics against him.
And now Republican authors like the one Mark J cited falls into the same trap. They end up believing the caricature created by the MSM/CPUSA. “Michele Bachmann is crazy”. But nobody can say why she’s crazy. I guess it’s because she’s exceedingly eloquent in voicing conservative values, she’s Christian, she’s accomplished, and she’s a WOMAN. And she would have ripped the hell of 0bama at every turn.
But it’s all getting to be irrelevant anyway. The GOP could put up Superman while the Democrats go with Michael Moore, and it wouldn’t make a difference because the elections are stolen. The Communists have also been successful in getting so many on the dole, they don’t care who’s running.
Picking a few things that Stephens said:
“Which reminds me: Can we, as the GOP base, demand an IQ exam as well as a test of basic knowledge from our congressional and presidential candidates?
and
One of Reagan’s favorite methods for building Congressional coalitions was to pick off the southern Democratic block, loosely called the Dixiecrats. For at least two decades these rural social conservatives felt progressively alienated under the Democratic tent.
The problem for the Republicans is that Reagan’s pet southern block turned into the Republicans base, with the kookiest portion being the most vocal. Stephens wants an IQ test for candidates. I think a good part of the Southern block does as well … except they want to make sure the candidate isn’t too smart. That helps keep Billy Joe Ray’s “Southern Napoleon Complex” in check and makes the evangelicals feel less worried because if a candidate’s IQ is too high then they might just put intellectual knowledge ahead of faith.
In fact there was a candidate IQ test during the Republican primary. They all denied evolution and climate change. And they wanted to severely cut or eliminate the Department of Education and the EPA and to defund educational TV for children (“Big Bird”). They failed the IQ test but the base loved them for it!
Whereas Mr. Stephens thinks it’s a problem with the candidates, I think the problem is with their shrinking, old, white, Southern, evangelical base that includes a vocal Tea Party minority financially supported by a couple of rich John Birch Society brothers.
Oddly enough, The right wingnuts of the world are still saying the GOP was not consevative enough. In my mind they are toast with this attitude. Picking on Ambasador Rice and repeatingly talking about gifts to certain segments of the public to win the election are examples. They just do not get it that gifts to the richest 2% is not as popular. Don’t look for a republican in the White House for a long time. Now that is something to be thankful for!
“Correct. But the ANALysis is backwards.
Here’s my simple basic question: If the social-issues crowd were in charge of the GOP, why didn’t Bachmann/Santorum/Perry/Cain get the nomination?
The fact is, the GOP leadership chooses the most moderate candidate of the bunch (excluding candidates like Huntsman who can’t win). They pick the candidate the Democrats want to run against; the one who will go easiest on them.
. . . And now Republican authors like the one Mark J cited falls into the same trap. They end up believing the caricature created by the MSM/CPUSA. “Michele Bachmann is crazy”. But nobody can say why she’s crazy. I guess it’s because she’s exceedingly eloquent in voicing conservative values, she’s Christian, she’s accomplished, and she’s a WOMAN. And she would have ripped the hell of 0bama at every turn.
But it’s all getting to be irrelevant anyway. The GOP could put up Superman while the Democrats go with Michael Moore, and it wouldn’t make a difference because the elections are stolen. The Communists have also been successful in getting so many on the dole, they don’t care who’s running.”
I have to say I take a bit of pleasure in imagining what the GOP would be like if Suzie was its leader. In the most recent election, they would have run a distant third to Virgil Goode!
Santorum/Bachman/etc. would have gotten totally creamed (or cheated if you just can’t accept reality) in the general election. Most people don’t agree with the social con agenda and the younger voters are, the less they tend to agree with it. That being said the “war all the time/cops of the world” neo-cons don’t exactly have a nation ready to go off to another war. Their agenda is at least as unpopular as social cons and probably more so.
With this post Susie confirms what we have long suspected. She lives in Bizarro World, where everything is backward. A conservative friend asked why voters were obsessed with social issues when the economy is weak. Traditionally, this should have been an easy election for the GOP. But their religious base relentlessly focuses on social issues. And the majority of Americans finds their positions repugnant.
Good golly, Dan, suzie’s commie-behind-every-tree/unproven, nonexistent fraud obsession is getting more boring than MMM’s nitpicking, word-twisting, dishonest tirades. One has to wonder about the mental stability of somebody like suzie who vows to make herself “scarce” after her complete election humiliation and then proceeds to spend oodles of time writing so many posts on a small local blog (no offense meant) when she/he/it has absolutely no prayer of swaying anybody to her viewpoint.
gdad, you mean suzie posted something? I must have missed it…
To be fair to Suzie, the belief of widespread, covert communism within the US is not limited to just her or a small handful of people. From what I’ve noticed, a lot of people who grew up in the 50′s & 60′s hold that belief, including my dad…who is absolutely convinced that Obama is towing the line of the Democratic Socialists and/or the CPUSA. The only problem with that is that if tit were the case, Obama would be the absolute worst Socialist or Communist in the history of the world.
Yep, I called it.
“Didn’t Dan say Mark once wrote 2 opposing views and got recognized as writing the best paper. For Both sides of the argument?”
Comment by Cold n P — November 19, 2012 @ 4:33 pm
Yes, the GOP is having itself a good old civil war. The Adults like Christie, Jindel and Jeb Bush vs the Norquist crazies. If the adults don’t kick Norquist to the curb, the GOP will become a shadow of a national party.
But more to the point, Mark J makes a valid argument that both parties need to look inward, decide on a mature and thoughtful course of action and articulate to the American public how to execute what is best for the country, whatever that might be. Anyway, that’s what I take from the posts. I look forward to reading fellow Gonzo takes as the day goes on.
Honestly, I am a little disappointed in today’s essay. On Monday, Mark penned a provocative look at the hypocrisy of the President’s economic performance. Whether you agreed or not, it was thought provoking and spurred much needed dialogue. Today, Mark told us what we already knew about the state of the Republican Party. We will likely spend the rest of the day rehashing what has been hashed on this blog for the last six months. Exhibit #1 is Suzie’s ANALysis in response.
Michele Bachmann is the epitome of a lot that’s wrong with American politics, especially the right wing. She takes fact shreds, applies crazy theories and out of that maelstrom emerge weird conclusions and beliefs, like that the founding fathers “tirelessly” fought slavery, or that poverty would end tomorrow if only the minimum wage was abolished.
She says she wants people off welfare programs, but Bachmann and her husband have sucked at the teat of social welfare programs for most of their married lives. It’s bizarre.
The GOP faces three main issues regardless who the candidate is:
1. Social issues that should not be part of the political spectrum. If one’s actions don’t adversely affect others. Let it go!
2. The group of teachers providing education to our kids. When a huge majority of the teachers are liberals, I believe their bias soaks into many kids.
3. Systemic liberal bias in journalism, and yes RT, this applies to you too.
Until these issues are addressed, it will be difficult to elect a fiscally conservative candidate for President. Success will be had in mid-term elections due to apathy from the many that only turn out for Presidential elections.
Cold N Play#11 / Nosaj#12 – This column is not about telling you “what you already know about the state of the GOP”.
Rather it puts forth a thesis about how the GOP got to its current state. It is not a commonly explored subject, and therefore, not a commonly put forth thesis.
I believe that one must understand history and root causes to fully grasp the present and better anticipate the future. For those that share this view, my column will be of interest and can serve as a basis for thought provoking discussion.
I must admit – I have know idea how many folks on this blog are political history buffs!
Dan is right. There will not be a republican president for a long time. Eventually, all democracies fail when half of the electorate figures out that, through taxation, they can live off the other half of the electorate. America has reached the tipping point and there will be no return. Whining, complaining, and entitlement has replaced hard work, delayed gratification and sacrifice. I’m OK, but I feel really badly that my kids will have to live in a world like this.
terps, there were far more government programs in the 20s and 30s than today. Tax rates were higher and the standards of living were lower. The continued apocalyptic talk that the end is near demonstrates the ignorance and lack of perspective some people have. If you think we’re in more dire straits than anytime in our history, you’re gravely mistaken.
“Dan is right. There will not be a republican president for a long time. Eventually, all democracies fail when half of the electorate figures out that, through taxation, they can live off the other half of the electorate. America has reached the tipping point and there will be no return. Whining, complaining, and entitlement has replaced hard work, delayed gratification and sacrifice. I’m OK, but I feel really badly that my kids will have to live in a world like this.”
1. Nowhere near half of the electorate, through taxation, lives off the other half. This is a lie.
2. To the extent that 47 percent pays no federal income taxes (BUT, they pay all sorts of other federal, state and local taxes), this is a function of REPUBLICANS in Congress. REPUBLICANS:
a) . . . designed the system of child- and college-tuition tax credits that wipe out most/all taxes many people would otherwise pay.
b) . . . marginally, lowered the rates so that some other lower-earners, who used to pay a little in federal income taxes, pay none now.
c) . . . are the ones who spearheaded the expansion of the earned-income tax credit, which pays some people who pay no federal taxes a “refund.” Terps, ALL of the garbage you bemoan is the creation of REPUBLICANS.
This raises two questions:
1) Did the GOP do this as some kind of long-range strategy, so that one day people like you they could whine, scream and rage at how unfair it is? Did they posit a “revolution of the rich” against this, as part of their once ballyhooed “permanent Republican majority?”
2) If you don’t like the way things are now, why do you vote Republican?
Finally I would make this observation, regarding the approaching “fiscal cliff.”
Republicans have realized the choice they face in that. They can opt for a) a return to Clinton-era tax rates on the wealthy, but not on the poor and middle-class; or b) a return to Clinton-era tax rates on everyone. Both would be in conjunction, by the way, with vastly lowered spending.
If they opt for “a,” it will cost them a little. It will cost wage earners roughly 4 percent more of their income above $250k, theoretically. So if their AGI is $350k, it will cost them $4,000.
If they opt for “b” it will cost them more than this. For that same person, it will cost $4,000, PLUS the income they lose in their business from the recession that will probably occur by raising taxes on everyone else, i.e. their customers.
Which do you think they’re going to go for, terps?
Sadly, terps, for the most part I agree with you. Unless the big ticket items such as SS, MC, realistic defense spending and the cost of or debt are addressed, we are Greece waiting to happen. The sad part is that our leaders see what’s been happening in Europe and are choosing to ignore it. And Obama is the head culprit. He is trying to convince us that by taxing the rich more(out of spite) we will be on the road to fiscal responsibility. What a joke! The only way to raise real revenue is to have an expanding economy, and the only way to deal with spending is to reform the big 5 expenditures.
Suzie, I hope the Republican Party nominates Michele Bachman in 2016….LMAO. BTW, she didn’t need the MSM to create her caricature, she did an excellent job of that herself. She is bat$4!7 crazy.
Terps#16 wrote “…through taxation, they can live off the other half of the electorate. America has reached the tipping point and there will be no return…I’m OK, but I feel really badly that my kids will have to live in a world like this.”
- – - – - – -
Terps don’t feel bad for your kids. Encourage them to go East young man. Since Russia moved to a flat 13% tax, tax evasion has all but stopped and revenues went up. There are huge opportunities in almost every field and English language and business skills are welcome from all over the world.
Russia is already rich in resources. But if you believe in global warming, man made or natural, then Russia will be a huge beneficiary. So much of the frozen tundra will return to being very rich fertile land with plenty of water and huge riviers, like it was during our planet’s last global warming cycle. The Arctic Ocean is already opening to shipping for a number of months, but it will be a normal shipping lane if the Global Warmers are correct.
Our European forebearors told their children they feel badly that they would have “to live in a world like this”, just like you are now saying, so they sent their children West to the empty American continent for new opportunity.
Given the way you feel, you should follow in the footsteps of America’s European foreberors and tell your children to go East…to Russia.
Mark J, I believe that R Reagan IS the root of what ails American Politics today. He cut taxes then raised them. Claimed deficits don’t matter, refused to enforce Monopoly laws, Anti-trusts, spent us into bankruptcy by escalating the Arms race then began the destruction of the middle class when he fired the air traffic controllers union. Trickle down economics my butt. Too Big To Fail began with R Reagan.
He reformed) made medical care for profit when it was doing just fine thank you. That’s not to mentioned the mess he made of our foreign affairs by meddling in South America and the middle east propping up Saddam while appeasing the Iranians and dealing drugs in SA to pay for his secret wars.
You may be able to argue my points, but I do consider myself a student of history. It just so happens the same events have been written and revised many times over the past 30 years. It just depends on what “history” you wish to believe. I try to look at all points of view and decide myself as to what passes the smell test.
What I wish is for a stable 2 party system with checks and balances as set forth in the Constitution of the US with both parties playing by the same rules. If we can get on board with this simple idea, then the US can right itself. If not? Well, the tipping point of no return may have been breached. I called a year ago that States would be calling for secession if the economy did not perform and recover. It’s starting. People are dismissing it but watch out. Bottom line to me is that our entire system is built upon an economic union. When the SS checks stop coming, the US will suffer the same fate as the USSR. I do not want that to happen, but thinking that it can’t is simply hiding ones head in the sand.
Why put the blame on dear Ronnie? Because the American people believed him. America had become that shining city on a hill, a beacon for the world. The Hero Restored. In reality, Reagan was just playing another Hollywood role, this one happened to have consequences. America restored was just an illusion. American politics for the next 30 years have evoked Reagan as the Savior of America, and have tried to re-create his model of success, all the while Jobs have been bleeding away, the middle class pressed from all sides, Flat wages, Boom and Bust economies which have stolen hard earned retirement funds, out of control medical costs, higher education costs, and it goes on and on.
Start with repealing Citizens United. Get this hidden money out of politics and maybe we will have a few REAL Patriots come to our rescue.
All right, there’s some discussion you’re looking for. Right or wrong.
Dan
I opt for “c”.
And “c” would be for the Republican Congress to dictate terms to Obama and teach him who writes the laws in our system of government. Let Obama shut down the government when he does get his cherished tax hikes.
You will say that the republicans will pay at the polls in 2 years and you would be right. The public now believes that government checks are their only hope. But at least I could have 2 years of satisfaction that someone stood up to the socialists before our dependent society finally craters.
Mark, I am no historian, but I believe the forces driving the current GOP have solid roots in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. The Republican party has, in my opinion, has periodically appealed to racist, ehtnic, and political fears to advance their political goals with things like the communist trials and the southern strategy. Reagan borrowed heavily from these strategies, but I don’t buy that he gave birth to the current divisions in the GOP. The social attitudes that cost them this election have been a a foundation of GOP politics for over 60 years, if not longer.
The idea of terps encouraging his kids to go to Russia is tickling my funny bone right now.
“Dan, I opt for “c”.
And “c” would be for the Republican Congress to dictate terms to Obama and teach him who writes the laws in our system of government. Let Obama shut down the government when he does get his cherished tax hikes.”
–Comment by Terps
Unreality is a big part of the problem we face as a nation. There are many people who grasp at unreality. Terps’ option “c” — that the Republican Congress dictate terms to Obama — is unreal, because there is no Republican Congress. It could be real only if they controlled both the House and the Senate, and they do not.
Dan,as you well know, the Clinton model is not relevant to today’s economic situation, and to continue to perpetuate this false notion is wrong for you and its wrong from our so called leaders (Obama.) Clinton enjoyed huge GDP increase due to a rapidly expanding economy….therefore large revenue increases. Part of that expansion was based upon the dotcom boom which failed miserably, but it sure did bring in the tax dollars for a good part of his terms. Clinton and Gingrich did have a nobel effort in terms of welfare reform!
Even under those ideal circumstances, Clinton still increased out debt rather largely. That is due to the sneaky DC trick of labeling spending less than an aribitrary budget increase a deficit reduction. Come on, man!
terps fits the group described in the article linked below.
http://www.nationalmemo.com/meet-the-republicans-who-still-cant-accept-obamas-win/
And Republicans wonder why they lost the election.
http://www.nationalmemo.com/after-cutting-child-tax-credit-michigan-republicans-want-a-deduction-for-fetuses/
“This whole circumstance has been caused by the Communists successfully infiltrating the mainstream media, as they pledged to do as part of their 45 goals of the 1950s”
Much as I hate to say it, Screwzie’s right. The Red Menace is growing larger and scarier every day. Even Ben Stein, notorious Republican, is not immune to its stealth-like grasp.
http://front.moveon.org/republican-ben-stein-dominates-an-interview-on-fox-news-is-called-a-communist/
and the dream lives on. Sad but true.
http://www.nationalmemo.com/tea-party-nation-still-trying-to-make-romney-president/
I think people like terps are still living in some fantasy land where the GOP didn’t get its butt kicked at the polls.
Cold n Play#22 – You do raise some points that can be debated, effectively in many cases. I personally think that when you add up the pluses and minuses of Reagan – he was a Giant Plus I for one will not debate that here today, for lack of time to go on that tangent.
My keep point in the essay is that Reagan, like him or not, was the one who locked into the Republican party the rural folks from the south and mid-west. And now, their ideology is dominating the GOP show.
Apparently the TP/R Party is just not capable of being honest and living within the reality of what “is”.
If “fiscally conservative” means punishing the poor and working class more, eliminating the middle class and having even more wealth protection and a wider disparity (which is what you all are demanding), then yes, it will be impossible to elect a fiscally conservative candidate for President in the next ten years.
If you cannot come to your senses, and it is apparent you cannot, prepare to live the bitter, angry, miserable and more tax paying lives you so fear.
I am certainly good with that. Nothing makes me happier than seeing you right wingers implode.
Gee, everything old is new again…“Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party of the United States?” No, but don’t let that stop you idiots.
” It could be real only if they controlled both the House and the Senate, and they do not”
Dan
They don’t need to control the senate. The senate cannot pass anything without the house. The house can effectivley block all of this socialist crap and they will.
Sandi, thinking about an implosion, how are the Democrats going to able to keep the 71% of the Hispanics and virtually 100% of the blacks in the fold? You do realize(generalization) that both of those voting blocks are strongly against the gay agenda,and the Hispanics (generally)are very Christian in their beliefs? I can see a large shift in the Hispanic vote especially in the next election cycle.
Actually, I think it was Nixon that did that “locking in” you are speaking of. His “Southern Strategy” is a living legend. And it had nothing to do with values of the good kind. Still doesn’t if the numbers are to be believed.
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/books/phillips-southern.pdf
Worth the read for those who claim a political history knowledge.
Reagan was a light brained glad-hander with a good schtick. What he started, some of his own now decry.
http://nymag.com/news/politics/conservatives-david-frum-2011-11/
http://billmoyers.com/segment/bruce-bartlett-on-where-the-right-went-wrong/
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/opinion/01stockman.html?pagewanted=all
“…This approach has not simply made a mockery of traditional party ideals. It has also led to the serial financial bubbles and Wall Street depredations that have crippled our economy. More specifically, the new policy doctrines have caused four great deformations of the national economy, and modern Republicans have turned a blind eye to each one.
The first of these started when the Nixon administration defaulted on American obligations under the 1944 Bretton Woods agreement to balance our accounts with the world. Now, since we have lived beyond our means as a nation for nearly 40 years, our cumulative current-account deficit — the combined shortfall on our trade in goods, services and income — has reached nearly $8 trillion. That’s borrowed prosperity on an epic scale.”
Lambasting Obama for his spending, economic outcomes and Stimulus when all those chickens came home to roost (in the face of the worst Congress in memory) while ignoring the spending and malfeasance of the TP/R Party is sophistry at its ugliest IMO. I expect no less.
How the GOP CAN STILL Elect Mitt Romney President
Y’all, if you want some giggles click on that link above. It outlines the dream of a Tea Party leader on how Mitt Romney can still, constitutionally, be elected president, despite that fact that a) he lost the popular vote; b) he lost a majority of the states; and c) he lost the Electoral College in the 2012 presidential election. The author is a guy names Judson Phillips, and he wrote an entire column about it, that was published on the Dan-Casey-is-the-kind-of-creature-I-can’t-stand website, World Net Daily.
Allow me to boil down Phllips scheme, which is “according to the constitution:”
1) The president is elected by the Electoral College.
2) The EC meets in December to choose the president.
3) It may not choose the president without a 2/3 quorum.
4) Romney won 24 states
5) If electors from at least 17 Romney states hang tough and don’t show up, the EC won’t have a quorum. So they will be unable to choose a president.
6) In the event the EC cannot choose, the House chooses the prez and the Senate picks the VP
7) Because the Republicans have a majority in the House, they could pick Romney.
YAY! YAY! YAY! and ha! ha! ha!
Except that now, Phillips’ World Net Daily column has a big, fat “oopsy” editor’s note that leads it off, saying his scheme could not work BECAUSE his entire theory is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the constitution — the required 2/3 quorum in the EC is hogwash. That applies to the House, not the EC.
I submit to you, ladies and gentlemen, that this is the EPITOME of the problem with the Tea Partiers (as well as a large swath of the GOP) for whom a little knowledge is always a dangerous thing.
Unless the TP/R wises up about immigration, you are only dreaming, Another Chuck. I do not see them having the sense or the support to do that. It is true that the Hispanic vote is theirs for the low low cost of crumbling on their anti-immigrant spiel. How do you see that playing out?
Sandi#38 Thanks for the thoughtful comment and challenge. I have been challenged by other folks arguing that Nixon had a southern strategy. He did. But, for example during Carter times, this bloc solidly came back to the Democrats.
Other folks credit Goldwater with starting the ball rolling, even before Nixon, despite the fact that he got creamed by LBJ. He also deserves credit.
Using patent law terminology, this is all Prior art, that should be credited. I credited it in the essay that this historically democratic bloc was getting progressively alienated under the Democratic tent over the 20 years preceeding Reagan.
But, it was Reagan that locked this bloc into the Republican party. Not just during presiential elections. But at the Congressional and local level. Further, this region still had strong Democratic representation on the Hill during Reagan times. But he got those Democrats to often vote with him. And, by the end of the Reagan era, most of these Democrats were either voted out of office or changed party affiliation to the GOP.
If you data mine the Internet, you will find this to be factual. I argue, it is my opinion that this fact is key to understanding how the GOP ideology has transformed so dramatically to what it is today.
Hasn’t the GOP come clean about the fact that they hate Romney? Unlikely they’d go too far to put him in office.
It’s interesting that Mark still calls Bret Stephens a “Boy wonder”. Not “former Boy Wonder” or some such. In fact, today, Nov. 21, is Stephens’ 39th birthday, meaning that he has entered his 40th year of life. That is a telling insight into Mark’s perspective and the slow-to-adjust tendencies of so many “conservatives” that he shares it with.
Similarly, it is telling that Mark’s ideological compatriot, poster #2, refers to Stephens as “the one Mark J cited”, seemingly having never been familiar with Stephens before. One thus thinks the “work” of Strassel, McGurn, Rove and the other WSJ propagandists are also unknown to poster #2. Clearly, in the days when Thomas Franks’ token progressive column appeared there his writings would have escaped the poster’s notice, much less those published elsewhere like Barbara Ehrenreich and William Greider. Now all we need is Micheal Howdyshell to lecture us about the WSJ, because he thinks it impressive that he’s read it since the late ’80′s!
Mark might react to the above by saying that I’m not addressing the topic itself, but since he premised this column on someone else’s essay, quoting liberally (pun intended), it’s appropriate to start by including some review of Mark’s own perspective. And as pointed out, that perspective is that the author is still the “boy wonder” he was called when Newt Gingrich was the choice of leader for “conservatives” like himself. Which further explains how, despite clumsily using “Dixiecrats” to refer to a red state bloc long after it had evolved into something else, Mark sees the realignment as having been a Reagan phenomenon, “created by Ronald Reagan, one of America’s greatest presidents”. Which it manifestly was not. Reagan was the most visible head of a movement whose maturation coalesced around him, not the singular figure pulling it along that GOTP mythology presents.
Despite his inaccurate chronology and mistaken attribution of Reagan as the creator of the GOTP “igno” strategy, I have no issue with Mark’s recap of the (unoriginal) premise that the GOTP has offered safe haven to regressive elements that have become a detriment to it’s electoral efforts. But, as central as exploitation of those elements is to the business plan of everyone from Jerry Falwell Jr. to Tim Phillips, Wayne Lapierre and many others, Mark would do better to find an author to build from who offers some suggestions for how to divorce the GOTP from those self-interested parties.
Sandi Saunders:
1.”Finally a legitimate criticism of President Obama. I had begun to think you incapable of moving beyond the easy, superficial and fanatical distortion of facts you presented the other day.”
Like clockwork.
I am no fan of Reagan, and I blame him with a lot of things, but I think you have way, way, way oversold him on birthing the ideology that is the TP/R Party today. He was an American first and a Republican second, as his many collaborations with Tip O’Neill proved. I think you are treading in dangerous waters to credit him with the belligerence, intransigence and insanity of the TP/R Party. That is all on Gingrich & Co IMO.
“Acrimony and hyperpartisanship have seeped into every part of the political process. Congress is deadlocked and its approval ratings are at record lows. America’s two main political parties have given up their traditions of compromise, endangering our very system of constitutional democracy. And one of these parties has taken on the role of insurgent outlier; the Republicans have become ideologically extreme, scornful of compromise, and ardently opposed to the established social and economic policy regime.
In It’s Even Worse Than It Looks, congressional scholars Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein identify two overriding problems that have led Congress—and the United States—to the brink of institutional collapse. The first is the serious mismatch between our political parties, which have become as vehemently adversarial as parliamentary parties, and a governing system that, unlike a parliamentary democracy, makes it extremely difficult for majorities to act. Second, while both parties participate in tribal warfare, both sides are not equally culpable. The political system faces what the authors call “asymmetric polarization,” with the Republican Party implacably refusing to allow anything that might help the Democrats politically, no matter the cost.
With dysfunction rooted in long-term political trends, a coarsened political culture and a new partisan media, the authors conclude that there is no “silver bullet” reform that can solve everything. But they offer a panoply of useful ideas and reforms, endorsing some solutions, like greater public participation and institutional restructuring of the House and Senate, while debunking others, like independent or third-party candidates. Above all, they call on the media as well as the public at large to focus on the true causes of dysfunction rather than just throwing the bums out every election cycle. Until voters learn to act strategically to reward problem solving and punish obstruction, American democracy will remain in serious danger.”
It’s Even Worse Than It Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided With the New Politics of Extremism
These two AEI folks lay the case and the blame for this snowball to hell at the feet of Gingrich and the “take no prisoners” attitude that literally shut down the government. Nixon, Reagan and the myriad Congress critters before Gingrich had almost always managed to rise above the acrimony and the opposition to do the right thing. Gingrich was the game changer and not in the remotely positive way that Reagan was (as far as style and compromise). Reagan did raise taxes, Reagan did care about the workers and the middle class, Reagan courted conservative Dems but not by turning them into Republicans, Reagan was no bomb throwing, burn this mother down before I compromise radical right wing Tea Party fathering hater.
#15: Mark, pal, this is hardly “not a commonly explored subject, and therefore, not a commonly put forth thesis.” That’s utterly incorrect, and barely disguised self-flattery, and a good example of why those with equal or greater knowledge easily detect an air of excessive self-impression in your writing. From one who’s so patently proud of his mundane knowledge, your pride in being a political history buff starts to sound like a music history buff who parrots Rolling Stone.
Mark J: “I believe that one must understand history and root causes to fully grasp the present and better anticipate the future.”
Freshman Rhetoric 101, anyone?
Mark, I agree that Reagan was the one that locked them into the Republican Party. I would add that The Moral Majority had a huge part to play in this. The 1980 presidential election was the first presidential election where abortion was the main voting issue for many religious conservatives (and it still is today).
I think it was around ’78 when Jerry Falwell hit the road in his bus hawking The Moral Majority. Falwell was the first Southern Baptist to really mix politics and religion. Falwell supported Reagan and demonized democrats for supporting a woman’s right to choose. The rest is history.
Cold in P #22. Good observations about Reagan.
I have long detested the sales job he did for our billionaire masters with “trickle down” economics. His legacy is the crushing defeat of the common man. And the so-called recovery during his years had nothing to do with him, but was merely the result of the micro-computer and internet boom. When that was gone (by 2000), so was the recovery, though the collapse was avoided for another 8 years by banking crimes and war industry economics… which we now have to pay those credit cards.
Also offensive was the way he condescended to Carter, a good President and great human being, who said we needed to look into our hearts for what ails us.
Carter had embraced what the great reformer Jesus taught and few Christians ever really take to heart, namely, love and the golden rule. He simply didn’t care what someone believed as long as those ideals were their guiding light. This is why both Sadat and Begin genuinely liked him. Someone like me who openly detests Christianity (and all religions, for that matter) wouldn’t have bothered Carter in the slightest. But Reagan pissed on his wisdom and adult spiritual soul searching as being weak, and the dogs who prefer delusions of U.S. grandeur helped him reverse the country’s spiritual gains of the 60’s and 70’s.
Or in layman’s terms…. uckFay eaganRay.
Mark: if instead of data mining the internet, you rigorously study primary sources and, most of all, allow in the views of those who lived it longer than yourself, and I mean really lived it, in the sense of having been personally involved at important levels of the process, you’d know that the realignment that you want to credit Reagan with was a strategy that began in explicit and concrete ways during the Truman administration. In the wake of 1948 and 1950, the ’52 election was the prototype for all those that yielded the later results.
It’s even on the internet!
Mark, I obviously don’t need to data mine the Internet, as a fair number of posters on this thread share my view that this is old news. Warren said it best, I think, “Reagan was the most visible head of a movement whose maturation coalesced around him, not the singular figure pulling it along that GOTP mythology presents.”
Reagan presided over a great period of good will for the U.S., but the seemingly incessant string of scandals that marked his tenure outweighed the good he did. In fact, I do credit President Reagan with being the modern father of avoiding responsibility. He was called the “Teflon President” because he and his staff never allowed the buck to get to his desk.
I do agree with you when you say that you believe one must understand history to fully grasp the present and better anticipate the future. Apparently, I don’t understand history as you do. Is that my mistake?
BUT Bill Perdue, the Congress was not overrun with those radical thinking clods (to the extent that the Moral Majority fizzled) and the firebrands were kept to the fringes by Reagan and the Republicans such that the conservative Democrats COULD support some of his policy. Gingrich starting in 1993 and his subsequent rebellion and repudiation along with the renegade uprising in rules and conduct of the House and Senate, and the coming out of his compatriots, Dick Armey, Tom Delay, Bob Barr, et al laid the groundwork for what we see here, not Reagan IMO. THAT is when the south became “solid” (after electing Carter and Clinton) and the Republicans lost control.
Reagan had a strong populist message but it was not the Moral Majority, anti-immigrant, anti-women, anti-science, anti-compromise that Gingrich ushered in. I just do not see that.
Mark J,
You might find it refreshing that unlike on your last post where all the myopic left castigated you, and call you names, because you sullied obama; I, as a conservative actually agree with much (but not all) of what you present here.
Many of the R’s have focused (strangely), way too much on social issues, which should be addressed at a state level where (also strangely) they seem to be gaining.
If (national) R’s focused more on the constitutional constraints of federal government, and less on expanding federal government into the areas you opined, I believe they would be much better served.
MarkJ: re: 11:51,
Very interesting perspective; are you now suggesting “Russian as a second language instead of Spanish?”..lol…
Sandi, re: “If “fiscally conservative” means punishing the poor and working class more, eliminating the middle class and having even more wealth protection and a wider disparity…”
Do you have any cite or is this typical bs?
With this post Susie confirms what we have long suspected. She lives in Bizarro World, where everything is backward.
Let me ask it again: If the GOP is controlled by the social conservatives as you liberals say, why did the least conservative candidate get the GOP endorsement?
Romney ran away from the social issues and got beat.
The GOP faces three main issues regardless who the candidate is:
1. Social issues that should not be part of the political spectrum. If one’s actions don’t adversely affect others. Let it go!
2. The group of teachers providing education to our kids. When a huge majority of the teachers are liberals, I believe their bias soaks into many kids.
3. Systemic liberal bias in journalism, and yes RT, this applies to you too.
Until these issues are addressed, it will be difficult to elect a fiscally conservative candidate for President. Success will be had in mid-term elections due to apathy from the many that only turn out for Presidential elections.
1. The Republicans will get questioned and baited into a discussion of social issues no matter what. Leftwing moderators brought it up when nobody else was talking about it.
That said, conservatives shouldn’t back away from those issues. Romney did, and it cost him. Akin and Mourdock lost because they fell all over themselves apologizing for their remarks even if they sort of stood by them. I wouldn’t have apologized, but I would have publicly the leftwing media loud and long for lying about what was said.
2 and 3 are correct. The schools and MSM have both been inflitrated, as promised.
The only problem with that is that if tit were the case, Obama would be the absolute worst Socialist or Communist in the history of the world.
Question, OJ. If someone were intentionally trying to take capitalism under, how would they have done it any different than 0bama?
Mike O, I think the last 30 years speak for themselves:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/10/24/us/politics/income-stagnation-and-inequality.html?ref=incomeinequality
Reagan was the perfect stooge. Just ask J Edgar Hoovers FBI. He became president of the SAG (Union) then helped the corrupt FBI blacklist hundreds if not thousands of unwarranted folks from making an honest living. All to get ahead. It is said he accepted personal and political favors from the FBI. You can mine the internet if you choose.
Maybe this IS what has been the star in the eye of recent GOP presidential Candidates and leaders. Get in a position of power then piss on everyone who you are supposed to be representing.
I just do not accept the numbers and Thesis Mark J presents without the whole context of Reagan’s Legacy. It is a story of abuse of power, slick cons and dirty tricks. If that is the example the GOP now accepts as a formula for success, then I guess Reagan is the model for how Ignorant people gained control of the GOP. I say its about how the GOP via Ronald Reagan gained control OF ignorant people.
Change a few names, dates and events and you come up with a Thesis on how Stalin was the Greatest Leader of the Soviet Union. That may be true, however, makes him no Giant to be admired.
MikeO#53 – I think the right wingers should consider your suggestion. If the land of opportunity is defined primarily by:
- very low taxes,
- low government investment in safety nets,
- opportunities to rise from nothing to a billionaire
- vast resource rich empty lands far from the reach of the capitol,
then Russia is at or near the top of the list! Might be a more useful language to offer in schools these days than French or German, which have been losing their importants since WW II.
The Right’s neocon wing and Christian Zionist wing could take as an example our number one ally, Israel, which is trilingual country – Hebrew, English, and Russian.
From what I’ve noticed, a lot of people who grew up in the 50′s & 60′s hold that belief, including my dad…who is absolutely convinced that Obama is towing the line of the Democratic Socialists and/or the CPUSA.
OJ,
Initially I hadn’t thought that, but now as I look, everything fits. 0bama’s background: born to communist parents, raised by communists, mentored by communists, educated by communists. And now governing in a manner that could only suggest a desire to intentionally bring down capitalism.
How else could you explain a president who has increased the deficit more than any other president and displays no signs of stopping? How else could you explain a president who actually recruits people to get on public assistance? How could you explain a media that totally ignored his background and his irresponsible spending while hyperfocusing and destroying any conservative that could pose a threat.
Look what’s happening to Marco Rubio, the presumed GOP front-runner now?
once the admin of communists get the internet under their control, I wonder if old sandi will be able to blog all day at work, instead of, uh, actually WORKING…hmmmmmm
Mark J #60… Please spare us the propaganda wherein you say, “…our number one ally, Israel….”
Isreal is certainly NOT our number #1 ally. That title belongs to the British for a long time now. Moreover, I would say the Canadians and even the French are much better friends… Israel is merely our new partner in war crime.
Dave#63, Oh Dave! Are you sure its OK to say things like that?
Thanks for the comment. I wish you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving.
Another thing that does not favor the idea that Reagan cemented the “solid south” is the Clinton elections in 1992 and 1996. He won some of those states both times.
Also, the division and bitter partisanship in Congress has more to do with the divide than the red state/blue state elections ever did and THAT started with Gingrich and it was deliberate. Reagan got Dems to work with him, Gingrich forced them to choose a side as he drove wedges that may never be healed and gerrymandering did the rest. Besides which, Obama has proven, twice now, that only Republicans “need” the south to win.
And finally, the very argument Mark J uses to assist his argument is the rant about the social issues ignorant people who spoiled the party have used. THAT is pure, unvarnished, unadulterated Gingrich, not Reagan.
I despised Reagan’s politics, policy, duplicity and faux populism but I will not blame him for the ignorant people Gingrich et al beat the bushes to bring in and have been hamstrung with ever since.
Sandi#65, when examining this subject, one must look much deeper than the once-in-four-years presidential elections results.
For example, there were sweeps like Nixon is 1972 and Reagan in 1984, but that does not mean that the blue state infrastructure disappeared in the entire country durng those eras.
More meaningful when studying long term party shifts is what is happening from grass roots, to state government to Congressional and Senate representation, all combined. Taking those parameters into consideration, meaningful trend lines start to emerge.
Sandi#65, when you describe how Reagan managed this bloc and his coallition building and his working with the opposition, compared to how Gingrich did it in the post Reagan era…I fully agree, and my essay is consistent with you on this particular point.
Obama would be a much more successful president if he could only grasp some of these skills that Reagan had.
Long term party “shifts” have more to do with the party in power when the Census comes out and districts are re-drawn than “grass-roots” at the state level and even in Congressional elections (the House for instance).
Obama’s “skill” is not as problematic as the right wing death grip on issues that matter. He is making headway where none would have been possible, and the intransigence in Congress has and will continue to backfire (that is my fervent hope). You think Reagan’s deal making and so called consensus was a good thing, in truth it brought about the beginning of the end for the American economy. Why you all are so all fired enamored of that, truly remains a mystery.
#62 Aiyeeeee, work nanny pammalalala is back!!!!!