Before you pronounce me dead
Posted on May 3rd, 2009
by Sean Scallon |
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In the wake of recent political news, that of Arlen Specter’s switching of establishment parties and the GOP’s loss in a New York Congressional District in which it had a 70,000-vote registration edge, its tempting to start thinking of the Republican Party as being on its death bed and wishing that another “conservative” party will take its place or some sort of party schism will occur. Before going in this direction, we should be mindful of few things.
The lowest number of representatives the Republicans have had in Congress came after the 1936 elections, when there were 88 GOP members of the House and 16 in the Senate. If there was any time the Republicans looked like they on the way out it was there and then and yet, they survived. Maybe that was due to FDR’s overreaching with the Supreme Court and the economic slump of 1938, but nevertheless, the party survived and probably will even through the age of Obama regardless if he overreaches or not. The two-party system has remarkably remained stable throughout our country’s history and, like it or not, only one major party exists that is a feasible alternative to the Democrats. I stress the word major.
The Whig party collapsed because a major faction of it, backed by many establishment politicians, political machines and financiers bolted from it after 1852 which represented the growing regions and industries of the nation at that time. They were quickly joined by members of the Democrats and the American Parties to form the new Republican Party. Ask yourself what schism in the GOP could possibly take place now? Arlen Specter’s switch simply reflects the last moments of a wing of the party that has been slowly dying for 30 years for historical, political and demographic reasons. I suppose Ron Paul supporters could bolt, but right now that would be another trip into the third-party ghetto which Paul will not do nor should do. Some writer, I can’t remember who or the piece it was in, suggested that the reason so many Republicans are scared of Rush Limbaugh is their fear that he could take his listeners out the GOP into a new party. I suppose he could try, but why when he’s got the party he wants? The purest of the purest according to Jim DeMint, rump faction or not.
So the GOP remains but it remains still a hollow shell in many parts of the country, and that’s the kind of situation perfect for non-establishment groups and non-major parties to move in and recreate the party from the ground up, especially in the U.S. major cities and metro areas outside the South. That’s how political change is made within the two-party system and its been true for so many nominees and Presidents over the past century.
Filed under: Congress, Politics
I imagine the test for the GOP will come right after it hits bottom. When it starts to broaden again, will the remaining GOP attack imperfect allies as it’s culled them so far. If so, the GOP is probably dead and certainly deserves to be. If not, the hypothetical third party might not be necessary.
Senator Graham says “Ron Paul is not the leader of our Party” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8sYGg4iREA
Ron Paul Folks Gaining Power Within GOP?
http://photontorpedotube.blogspot.com/2009/04/greenville-county-republican-convention.html
Speaking of Ron Paul, if the GOP would only rally behind this man and his platform we could begin to turn the tide against Democrats. The GOP might even have a chance at the next presidential race if Ron Paul was our candidate.
The current economic crisis (a bipartisan product ) provides an excellent opportunity to begin the process of breaking up
the “two-party” duopoly. A two party system moves both parties to capture “the center”. “The center” being the current consensus of elite opinion. You know, the same elites that put in this position and kept dismissing Ron Paul as a nutcase.
Sixteen states allow the voters to bypass the D and R party hacks and pass constitutional amendments by initiative and referendum. Reforms like Proportional Representation voting and Range voting give third parties a real chance to get elected instead of just waging futile protest campaigns. A few states might be enough to start a nationwide trend.
http://www.rangevote.net/
http://www.proportional-representation.org/
The long and short of it is that the GOP sold its soul when it adopted the Southen Strategy. It took two generations, but now the results of going for the votes of people pissed off at the Civil Rights movement are plain to see. They had to shift so far to the right to keep those voters onboard that they’ve lost everyone else, and those people would rather Rush Limburgh was leading the Party.
It’s over. There’s no way anyone half credible can come out of the modern GOP primaries. The lunatics have genuinely taken over the asylum.
Historical/Footnote 2012 - “Too Big To Fail?”
I love Ron Paul’s brand, and I worked very hard for him during the primaries. I do not think he is electable for 2012.
His supporters will divide into factions, like they did this year, and as a result will be a non-factor.
Personally, I like a Mark Sanford / Gary Johnson ticket. (Which means it will probably be Romney / Huckabee left standing. Sigh.)
TonyJ apparently thinks W and John McCain were racist extreme rightists. Talk about an alternative universe.
The intellectual fathers of W’s “extreme right” (i.e. Iraq War and the abuses attendant to the GWOT) policies were not Southern “rednecks” but Likudnik DC and NYC intellectuals.
As far the Christian fundamentalists go, they get nothing from the GOP except rhetoric.
I’d love to see the GOP rally behind Ron Paul. They all treat him like a step child, in reality he has inspired a brand new generation to take up the cause of liberty.
Right now, Ron Paul has introduced HR 1207, Audit the Fed. It already has over 100 co-sponsors.
I suggest that everyone reading this please call your reps and tell them to co-sponsor. For too long the Federal Reserve has manipulated our currency in absolute secrecy, its time we open the books on this private corporation.
Also-
The GOP needs to realize many conservatives are anti-war, and the Hannity / Levin style jingoism alienates the few that still identify with this disjointed gaggle.
I will work hard for Ron Paul’s Republican initiatives, but I will never sacrifice my principles for an R
Can we drive a stake, or perhaps pointy horn through the RINO’s heart?
Perhaps a campaign to starve the beast (think Terri Schiavo if required), so the RNC has to declare bankruptcy so the Indian (bangalore, not seminole) call centers might not get paid.
Ronaldus Magnus (Paulus or II) should form an exploratory committee or whatever as direct competition to the RNC. Perhaps the LNC or FNC (liberty/freedom), and mobilize everyone to send their contributions there instead of the RiNo Committee.
I put the “death of the GOP” in the same category as it’s “permanent majority” that we heard so much about until recently.
Demographically, this country is moving south and west. Unless the Obama team games the census in an extraordinary fashion, the resultant apportionment of House seats will favor the GOP in a big way.
At the same time, the dying GOP in the rest of the country will become fallow ground for the opportunists that ruined the spirit of ‘94 in the first place. They’ll leave, and they’ll be replaced by people who have more in common with Ron Paul and Ross Perot. The hemorrhaging economy will encourage this line of thinking, as will the craven misbehavior of the Democrats in power.
We’ll have come full circle by 2014 no matter what, but if we work hard and ostracize career politicians/bar association types, we might be able to do it sooner than that.
icr - Alternate universe? Please.
Bush was simply adored by the ‘redneck’ base, and they had zero problem with his War on Scary Brown People. You’re perfectly right in saying that he did nothing concrete for them, but he was always careful to make it look like he was ‘one of them’, and they loved him for it.
McCain, OTOH, won the GOP nomination because there was no one the base liked on the ticket who could generate as much MSM-love as Johnny Drama, and when it came down to him and the godless Mormon, there was only one dog in the race. And even though he spent the rest of his campaign shedding every ‘moderate’ position he’d ever held in order to keep the base sweet, he - still - had to bring in Palin to get out the vote.
So, yeah, now that you’ve got a base utterly convinced that the only way to win elecions is to put up candidates who they consider ‘conservative enough’, and the Chairman of the GOP telling moderates that they can only come back to the party if they shut up and leave the wingnuts to direct policy, the GOP is dead as an electorally viable movement.
And it’s all because the 21% who make up the base are racist extreme rightists, and they refuse to change.
“Scary Brown People”
Reminds me of how FDR lied the US into war against another bunch of Scary Brown People.
From George Morgenstern’s PEARL HARBOR THE STORY OF THE SECRET WAR
P.126
(…)
“The striking fact is that all of these statements promised Japan war with the United States if the Japanese attacked territory not belonging to the United States. Doonan threatened war on behalf of Britain and its dominions and colonies. Turner threatened war in behalf of Dutch and British colonies. Welles ruled out prospects of a peaceful settlement because Japan moved against Indochina, then the property of Vichy France. Roosevelt was thinking of the British empire lifeline when he gave his all-inclusive warning.”
(…)
p.140
Quoting from the journals of Ambassador Grew:
“For a prime minister of Japan thus to shatter all precedent and tradition in this land of precedent and tradition, and to wish to come hat in hand, so to speak, to meet the President of the United States on American soil, is a gauge of the determination of the government to undo the vast harm already accomplished in alienating our powerful and progressively angry country”
FDR and of State Hull kept stalling and demanded concessions in advance and the meeting never took place.
Regarding the current ongoing unpleasantness: we all know that the architects were Likudnik intellectuals, both Jewish and non-Jewish. We can blame Reagan for allowing the neocons to capture the intellectual leadership of the GOP(not that a lot of liberals didn’t play a big role in the frenzy for war), but going after the clueless GOP base is a case of “blaming the victim.” They were simply following their intellectual leaders. Do you think even(?) Limbaugh does his own thinking on these matters?
Godless Mormon? That’s a bit rough.
MattSwartz, you beat me to it! Our best hope to salvage a truly conservative party is resting in the hands of the Democrats. Our search for leaders at this point may be untimely. The mess the Democrats will make will define the type of leader that will emerge.
I don’t know if you agree with me about this, but I think the best course of action would be to expel pretty much the entire leadership of the GOP. It was sickening to watch Jeb Bush, Romney and McCain announce their re-invention of the party gimmick. Their faith in our stupidity is simply boundless!
If Jeb Bush is the nominee I heading to Belize.
Its great to see that in just over a month Ron Paul’s HR 1207 is up to 200 co-sponsors, just 18 short of half of the full House. Ron Paul’s message is too prominent to contain. If the GOP doesn’t conform to it, then some other party will.