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  1. #1
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    GOP: now & in the future

    The GOP has changed, like parties do in recent years. The world is different than it was during Reagan's time and the priorities of Americans have changed, as the article below notes.

    I think this article hit on a lot of points. And I agree that the Republican has indeed change since 1988, when Reagan left office. 1994 Congressional elections were a potential turning point or reinforcing point, but the GOP of today is very, very different not only from the 1980s but from 1994 and the "Contract with America."

    GWB has spend on average, twice as much Clinton did.

    The GOP has radically changed.

    So....where is the GOP headed after this election - regardless of whether McCain wins or lose?

    Close-up
    Life after Reagan

    They'll praise him, invoke his legacy and summon his blessing on their quest to hold the White House. But as Republicans gather at their...
    By Steven Thomma
    McClatchy Newspapers

    PREV 1 of 2 NEXT


    SCOTT STEWART / AP
    The late former President Reagan is shown at his Oval Office desk as he prepares a speech on tax revision. Reagan died on June 5, 2004.

    By Steven Thomma
    McClatchy Newspapers


    SCOTT STEWART / AP
    The late former President Reagan is shown at his Oval Office desk as he prepares a speech on tax revision. Reagan died on June 5, 2004.


    CHIP SOMODEVILLA / GETTY IMAGES
    Workers run through stage movements at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn., ahead of the Republican National Convention, scheduled to start today.



    DENVER — They'll praise him, invoke his legacy and summon his blessing on their quest to hold the White House.

    But as Republicans gather at their national convention in St. Paul, Minn., to nominate Sen. John McCain, they face the prospect that the era of Ronald Reagan is ending after dominating their party and American politics for nearly three decades.

    The winning coalition that Reagan built of economic, foreign policy and social conservatives is splintered. The issues he used to define the party have changed. And the national rejection of an unpopular president — Jimmy Carter — helped Reagan launch a political revolution but now benefits the other party as Democrats rally against the legacy of George W. Bush.
    "It doesn't look good at all," said Frank Luntz, a Republican strategist who helped the party seize control of the House in 1994. "They can't re-create the Reagan coalition. Life has changed. America's priorities are different."

    Indeed, 2008 could punctuate a turning point in the way that Americans view the role of government — a shift potentially as significant as those that ushered in the rise of big-government liberalism in 1932 and the turn to modern conservatism and skepticism about government in 1980.

    Now, after a decade in which Republicans increasingly embraced a more activist government, the party is facing a pivotal decision about what it thinks about big government — for it, against it, or what Lee Edwards called "something in between."

    "Americans are still small 'c' conservative. That may be changing in regard to the Republican Party," said Edwards, a scholar at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.
    In the recent Republican primaries, he said, "there was a lot of lip service paid to Ronald Reagan by the candidates. But when you get down to specifics, they are tilting away from Reagan toward some new mix."

    Times have changed, and the issues that bound the Reagan coalition together have changed.
    The unifying threat of the Soviet Union is gone. The federal government's highest tax rates no longer top 50 percent. Welfare has been reformed to require work.

    The new political environment pulls at some of the core principles of conservatism that have defined the party since Reagan.

    On national security, for example, "neoconservatives" push for an interventionist foreign policy and nation building in places such as Iraq. Others push for warrantless spying on U.S. citizens, alarming the civil-libertarian wing, which is skeptical if not hostile to unabridged government power.

    On social policy, religious conservatives want an aggressive government to regulate marriage, traditionally an issue left to the states.

    And on fiscal policy, Republicans have increased the size and cost of the federal government and its debt. Domestic spending grew much faster under President Bush and a Republican-led Congress than it did when Democrat Bill Clinton was in the White House.
    "The coalition that elected Reagan is no longer there," said William Lacy, a political director in the Reagan White House and now director of the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas.

    "Neocons are willing to throw out some of the principles of conservatism," said Lacy, who briefly managed former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson's presidential campaign. "Christian conservatives are more demanding in tactics and goals than they were. What they've done is take conservatism from being a federalist approach with focus on liberty and make it a big-government style of conservatism using the federal government to dictate what people do."
    Some of what melted the glue of the coalition simply is rooted in personality.

    Reagan was a masterful politician whose personality and communication skills allowed him to hold together rival factions in a big-tent party. His intolerance for public fights in the party was so well-known it became known as the 11th commandment: Speak no ill of a fellow Republican.
    "It's a very rare leader who can bring together disparate groups when they agree on 70 percent and disagree on 30 percent," Luntz said. "Reagan was able to succeed at that. Bush has been much more typical, more susceptible to these divisions."

    More than that, new power centers such as talk radio and the Christian right now openly enforce ideological litmus tests and aggravate divisions. "People now are looking for reasons to argue rather than reasons to cooperate," Luntz said.

    Indeed, one of the most frequent targets of criticism within the party has been none other than the man they're about to nominate, McCain.

    Should McCain go on to win the White House, he could redefine the party — perhaps tougher on federal spending, more protective of civil liberties at home — yet also remain suspect to many conservatives for such stands as advocating limits on political speech as part of campaign-finance law.

    If he should lose, a party that likes to go to the next guy in line will have no heir apparent and likely will break into the kind of hot debate that it saw in the political wilderness years of the mid-1960s.

    That era saw Barry Goldwater and Reagan plant the seeds for a conservative ascendance — but one that wouldn't take hold until after moderates Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford had been president.

    "There are big elements still out there waiting for someone to unite them," Lacy said.
    But that won't happen in 2008, Luntz said. Even if McCain wins, he said, it will be because voters reject Democrat Barack Obama, not because McCain was able to forge a new Republican coalition.

    Said Lacy: "We don't really know what we've got."

    Copyright © 2008 The Seattle Times Company

    Link: Nation & World | Life after Reagan | Seattle Times Newspaper
    ............

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    "rebranding" as it has been sullied.

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    Days Work Done! Norton's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by pai nai ma
    So....where is the GOP headed after this election - regardless of whether McCain wins or lose?
    If they don't free themselves of the "ultra" ideologues who have been driving their policies since Reagan left office they are sure to fall into a third party status behind the Independents.

    I consider myself to be a "common sense" conservative. The current Republican bunch are the epitome of stubborn ideologues bent on imposing their ideological message in spite of the common sense needed to judge and adapt policies that make sense for the entire country.

    John McCain represents someone who I believe is not hung up on the Republican ultra ideology. He can bring change to the party if they allow him to do so. Unfortunately, he seems to be pandering more and more to the ultra side.

    If he wins I hope his old maverick "common sense" conservative side emerges and he tells the Christian fundamentalist they have a right to their belief's as long as it stops at forcing it on others who don't, the pro lifers can choose not to have abortions but must respect the right of others to choose, all should be allowed to legally own a gun for protection but the 2nd Amendment does not give anyone the right to own a battle tank, diplomacy to achieve bilateral agreements are far superior to destructive and costly military action, the education of all citizens is the only way to ensure our global economic competitiveness, the US will be most secure when it eliminates it's dependence on foriegn oil or any other commodity, having social programs which help those that need help is not just a "liberal" concept but a humanist one, and IMO the most important, the US can be secure without denying our citizens the very rights on which the nation was founded.

    All boils down to common sense conservatism. If the Republican's can achieve this they will get me back!
    "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect,"

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    The GOP party seems to have moved to heavily towards narrow social issues to distinguish itself from Democrats.

    What the GOP needs is to move back to a Reagan style of politics, fiscally conservative without trying to impose a single version of morality on everyone.

    Personal independence as opposed to dependence upon the government; tolerance over life style choices instead of attempting to impose a single set of moral values on the nation.

    As far as foreign policy goes, not much difference between the two main parties despite all the heated rhetoric. Clinton authorized a US military attack in the Balkans without UN approval, but with support of most GOPs in Congress, while Bush the second authorized a US military attack in Iraq without UN approval but with the support of the majority of Dems in congress.

    Same-same, but different

    But I agree, the GOP has lost its way, the only reason this coming election will be close is that the dems have also lost their way to some extend. Clinton had the good fortune of having a fiscally conservative GOP congress and a fast growing economy fueled by technological advances (nothing to do with government policies). But still, dems as a whole have not embraced the centralist path and to win the nomination a dem has to appeal to the left wing element of the party. I am sure Obama is way too smart to do all the outlandish things he promised in the primaries, but he will have to throw the radical left a bone or two if elected to appease that side of the party. Obama is a great speaker, but I can not see him being able to speak out of both sides of his mouth as well as slick willy did. Willy was able to keep the left-wing part of the party solidly behind him without actually following a left-wing agenda.

    I will most likely vote for McCain, but not with any real enthusiasm, nor will I be deeply disappointed if Obama wins. Either way, the country will continue to move forward and while the president is important, he (or someday she) is only one person and our system does not rely solely on the whims of a single individual.

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    The Republicans are a pathetic shell of what they were in the 1950's and early 1960's. They're idealogically bankrupt and nothing more than servants for corporate interests and lobbies such as AIPAC, the NRA and Christian fundamentalist groups. Chuck Hagel and Ron Paul are the only prominent Republicans who recognize this and have become pariahs to their own party as a consequence.

    OLD REPUBLICANS: The US Constitution is a document to be cherished and used as a guide to abide by existing laws and craft new ones.
    NEW REPUBLICANS: The US Constitution is a quaint relic, an irritant that necessitates clever government lawyers spending countless hours to circumvent.

    OLD REPUBLICANS: The federal budget should not exceed the amount of money taken in by the government, which in itself should be as modest as possible.
    NEW REPUBLICANS: The federal budget can be as bloated as necessary to fund foreign adventures overseas and corporate giveaways. To tax-and-borrow from the future and bankrupt the federal treasury is perfectly acceptable. To quote Dick Cheney "deficits don't mattter".

    OLD REPUBLICANS: Israel is a foreign nation not to be completely trusted because it will always pursue it's own interests, even at the expense of American interests.
    NEW REPUBLICANS: The tail wags the dog. When Israel says "jump", the Republicans ask "how high?"

    OLD REPUBLICANS: Foreign military intervention should be modest and used only to address threats to America's security, in keeping with the wishes of America's founding fathers.
    NEW REPUBLICANS: Having military presence in over 100 foreign countries and a military budget almost equal to the combined military budgets of the rest of the planet is perfectly acceptable, even desirable.

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    I would like to see a viable third party emerge, in pretty much every major democracy- but that seems unlikely. They never seem to last. So I guess we're stuck with what we've got.

    I haven't written the GOP off, and indeed one would hope that some time in the political wilderness will allow them to reform from within. The neo-con/ religious right cabal enabled a disastrous administration under Bush. Even the Reagan admin's foreign policy was belligerent, at least in Central America- although I did agree with most of his domestic policies. But I think the straying of the GOP from it's conservative roots can be traced back to then- the Republicans became a right wing idealogical party, no longer a Conservative party in the traditional sense. Perhaps the fumes arising from the collapse of the Berlin Wall made them giddy, and misguided. Bush seniors admin seemed a common sense republicanism- but then the loonies took over.

    If and when the GOP realise not everyone sees the world thru their goggles, people in foreign countries cannot be forced to see the world their way at the point of a gun, and the office of the Presidency is still accountable under the US Constitution, UN Human rights Charter, the US legal system and general moral and transparency considerations then I might become pro- Republican again. They would also need to regain their fiscal conservatism, and stop this ridiculous attempt to legislate their 'pro-life' beliefs.

    The moderate, conservative Republicanism as represented by Eisenhower I was much in favour of.

    But right now, they deserve an electoral drubbing- why should failure be rewarded? And fail they did, on every major count I can think of.

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    I am pasting part of this article because I agree with the author that the GOP seems to be composed of those who don't realize that the middle-class is taking it on the chin. Phil Gramm's comments, etc.

    At the very bottom of this article there is a note on the number of new voter registrations. Are these new voters included in polls. I believe there are at least two types of polls: registered voters and registered and likely voters.

    How do these polls track recent registrations?

    Are recent registrations even enough to matter?


    Two points in the article:

    • Story Highlights
    • Cafferty says GOP once stood for small government, tight spending, integrity
    • Cafferty: Republicans have lost track of principles and damaged their brand
    Commentary: Republican land of make believe


    Editor's Note: Jack Cafferty is the author of the best-seller "It's Getting Ugly Out There: The Frauds, Bunglers, Liars, and Losers Who Are Hurting America." He provides commentary on CNN's "The Situation Room" daily from 4 p.m.-7 p.m. You can also visit Jack's Cafferty File blog.
    Jack Cafferty says the Republican party has lost track of what it stands for and is losing its hold on voters.

    NEW YORK (CNN) -- This week the Republicans gather for their convention. For four days, they will labor under the illusion their party is still relevant. It's not. It is entirely fitting that the headliner for this masquerade is a feeble looking 72-year-old white guy who doesn't know how many homes he owns.

    It's more than symbolic that when a million Americans are losing their homes to foreclosure, the Republican candidate for president has lost track of his holdings.

    McCain surrounds himself with people like former Republican Sen. Phil Gramm who called America a "nation of whiners" and said we are only suffering a "mental recession."

    That's the same problem the Republican Party has. It has lost track of what it used to stand for: small government, a disciplined fiscal policy, integrity.

    In a way, the perfect storm of a rapidly changing population -- old white people aren't going to be in the majority very much longer (and isn't that who most of the Republicans are?) -- has combined with the total abdication of principles, Republican or otherwise, of arguably the worst president in the nation's history to mark the beginning of the end of the Republican Party as we know it.

    Republican Congressman Tom Davis of Virginia said it best: "The Republican brand is in the trash can. If we were dog food, they would take us off the shelf."

    It is so bad that more than 10 percent of the Republican members of the United States Senate aren't even bothering to attend their own party's convention. They recognize dog food when they see it.
    And it almost doesn't matter who the next president is. We are witnessing the beginnings of a sea change in this country.

    A wakeup call has sounded for young people who are suddenly interested enough in politics to make a difference. New voter registrations across the country are making a mockery of the old polling models.
    Link: Commentary: Republican land of make believe - CNN.com

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    i think there is every possibility that what we know as the republican party will splinter within the next few cycles.

    and mccain being forced by the fundamentalist christians to choose gimmick for his VP will only expedite that split.

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    It am not so pessimistic. America will continue to be a two party political system. The GOP will just have to regroup, refocus and form a new coalition. It will, and the Dems are not really taking advantage of the GOP's dissaray. The Dems should be staking out a centralist position, but the dem party can not completely really break free of its socialist roots leaving the GOP an area to still compete in.

    McCain ain't lost yet, and I am not sure he will. It ain't going to be a Nixon over McGovern type of landslide either way, so to call one political party finished after two straight presidental victories and running close in a third seems a bit premature.

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    Remember this thread is about the GOP party. The election is relevant, yes. But after this election and future RNC moves, and the basic "tent" is what I am interested in, in this thread.

    AA:
    America will continue to be a two party political system.
    3rd parties are basically, legally, and realistically not allowed.

    The system is to protect and perpetuate the two-party system.

    Both parties have a monopoly on power and on special interest money. Just follow the money. Big Business gives lots of money to both parties. When either party wins, they have leverage because of this.

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    Under the current system it is very unlikely that any third party will grow to any substantial size and make it in the long term. Realistically if the US is ever to move beyond a two party system it will require a complete changeover to basically a parliamentary type system – which is not likely to happen.
    "Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you'd have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, it takes religion" - Steven Weinberg

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    ^
    Bugs, you are right. I have often said this, in the US we have coalition governments as well, and each political party is basically a coalition of interests. So our compromises happen before the general elections while in a parliamentary system the coalition building and compromises happen after.

    I think both systems can be equally democractic.

    We have splinter factions in both parties whose interest each party must address, but at the same time since these splinter groups (Extreme Christians or hard core socialists) do not represent a majority they don't get to run the show. Isn't that fair? Minority views are taken into account but do not dominate? Same as in Europe?

    Same-same, but different?

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    Parties are always evolving, no? Different times call for a re-evaluation and new approaches, using history as a base.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Accidental Ajarn View Post
    ^
    ...So our compromises happen before the general elections while in a parliamentary system the coalition building and compromises happen after.

    I think both systems can be equally democractic.
    Actually I would disagree. Making the compromises prior to the election makes folks choose the lesser of two evils - rather than really picking the person/party with the real views they most closely support. A two party system makes each party pretty much pick sides on each issue, rather than allowing them to focus only on the issue(s) they feel are most important. Rarely does one find themsleves in a situation where they vote for the person/ party they agree more than about 75% with. Whereas with a multi-party system everyone can choose specifically the issue(s) that mean most to them - as opposed to picking which party shares the most issue(s) in common.

    On the parlimentary side of things the number of parties/ platforms are limitless and folks are far less likely to feel that by voting for candidate X they are wasting their vote.

    Making the compromises happen after the election is a better option IMHO. Granted this does not lock in a platform for anyone going into things. But rarely does anyone agree with the complete platform in a two party system anyway.

    In a parliamentary/ multi-party system every election gives folks a real chance to shake thing up. Much less likely to lock folks into one party long term, as opposed to a two party system. Two many times in a two party system folks hunker down with their party and stick with them come-hell-or-high-water. Not the case with a parliamentary/ multi-party set-up.

    Believe me I practically bleed red-white-n-blue, so I don’t wish to change the constitution unless absolutely necessary (I depend greatly on the existing consitution to keep hold of my individual right to keep and bear arms). But I think we have practically exhausted the real benefits of a two party system and it’s time to move on. Part of the beauty of the constitution is that it allows for the people of the future to change it, and thus bring new life into our country. If it were up to me, we would significantly change things to make our system more of a parliamentary type system yet keep a stand alone executive branch, and thus keeping a three way balance of power between the executive, legislative, judicial.

    Sadly it's not up to me....

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    Days Work Done! Norton's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    Sadly it's not up to me....
    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    Believe me I practically bleed red-white-n-blue
    Are you sure?

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    Quote Originally Posted by Norton View Post

    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    Believe me I practically bleed red-white-n-blue
    Are you sure?
    Well it's kind of blue when it's still in me, and it's red when it comes out. I guess two out of three ain't bad.

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    Days Work Done! Norton's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    I guess two out of three ain't bad.
    Still sounds like you're a voting American?


    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    Sadly it's not up to me....
    It is!!!

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    Quote Originally Posted by Norton View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    Sadly it's not up to me....
    It is!!!
    No it's not. Sure I get A vote, but I don't get to make all the decisions. Hopefully there are few people out there that if they really had control would put the US in the position we are in right now.

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    Days Work Done! Norton's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bugs
    No it's not. Sure I get A vote, but I don't get to make all the decisions.
    Agree for current "viable" choices.

    More and more disaffected Democrats and Republicans are moving to an independent stance. Should both parties continue their win at all cost partisan politics, it will only be a matter of time before a party with a creditable leader, policies which embrace broad acceptance, and a support base (funding) will emerge to knock the Dems and GOP off the throne to which they have the misguided belief they are uniquely "entitled".
    Last edited by Norton; 04-09-2008 at 01:43 PM.

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    I don't believe it's about "class." I disagree with the headline. But I do witness the further divisions of the US between Urban & Surburban vs. Semi-rural and rural.

    Different values, different beliefs. You can simply look at the country wide electoral maps of red and blue, and the degree of the red and blueness, to see this different.

    And, recently studies do show that Americans are tending to move into areas where more people agree with their view and percieve society, the nation, and the world, they way they do.


    Op-Ed Columnist
    The Class War Before Palin

    By DAVID BROOKS
    Published: October 9, 2008

    Modern conservatism began as a movement of dissident intellectuals. Richard Weaver wrote a book called, “Ideas Have Consequences.” Russell Kirk placed Edmund Burke in an American context. William F. Buckley famously said he’d rather be governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the faculty of Harvard. But he didn’t believe those were the only two options. His entire life was a celebration of urbane values, sophistication and the rigorous and constant application of intellect.
    David Brooks

    Driven by a need to engage elite opinion, conservatives tried to build an intellectual counterestablishment with think tanks and magazines. They disdained the ideas of the liberal professoriate, but they did not disdain the idea of a cultivated mind.
    Ronald Reagan was no intellectual, but he had an earnest faith in ideas and he spent decades working through them. He was rooted in the Midwest, but he also loved Hollywood. And for a time, it seemed the Republican Party would be a broad coalition — small-town values with coastal reach.

    In 1976, in a close election, Gerald Ford won the entire West Coast along with northeastern states like New Jersey, Connecticut, Vermont and Maine. In 1984, Reagan won every state but Minnesota.

    But over the past few decades, the Republican Party has driven away people who live in cities, in highly educated regions and on the coasts. This expulsion has had many causes. But the big one is this: Republican political tacticians decided to mobilize their coalition with a form of social class warfare. Democrats kept nominating coastal pointy-heads like Michael Dukakis so Republicans attacked coastal pointy-heads.
    And the divide by education, and rural vs. Urban & suburban:


    Over the past 15 years, the same argument has been heard from a thousand politicians and a hundred television and talk-radio jocks. The nation is divided between the wholesome Joe Sixpacks in the heartland and the oversophisticated, overeducated, oversecularized denizens of the coasts.
    And:

    The Republicans have alienated whole professions. Lawyers now donate to the Democratic Party over the Republican Party at 4-to-1 rates. With doctors, it’s 2-to-1. With tech executives, it’s 5-to-1. With investment bankers, it’s 2-to-1. It took talent for Republicans to lose the banking community.
    Link & Entire: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/op...brooks.html?em
    Last edited by barbaro; 12-10-2008 at 01:31 PM.

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    When someone says they are a Republican I don't know what he/she means. And I've felt this way for a couple of years or more, before the media started reporting on it. The days of the GOP of the 1980s are long gone, as it was a different time, a different era, a different world make-up. The boomers were largely in their 40s back then, and the "Reagan Democrats" were blue-collar working and middle-class people who voted for Reagan and Republican Congresssional members.

    There does seem to be splintering. And the Religious right still have too much influence. But there seem to be different groups, and some have been marginalized during the last 8 years: small government Repubs and older conservatives.

    Analysis: The GOP's Identity Crisis

    The Washington Post's Dan Balz Writes That With The Country Under Stress, The Republican Coalition Is Splintering

    In the final weeks of Campaign 2008, the Republican Party is in the midst of an identity crisis, but it is nothing compared to what could happen if John McCain ends up losing the presidential race to Barack Obama and the party suffers another shellacking in House and Senate races.

    Nothing is certain, but most indicators now point to a bad election day for the Republicans. Republicans could lose 20 or more seats in the House and half a dozen or more in the Senate. That would come on top of major losses two years ago.

    At its height, the GOP coalition brought together economic, social and national security conservatives. At different times, the glue that held these disparate conservatives together was anti-communist or anti-government sentiments or, more recently, the commitment to waging war against terrorism.

    The bedrock elements of the coalition were a belief in smaller government, low taxes and a strong defense. But the party's greatest success came with the arrival, in the 1980s and 1990s, of a newly active cadre of social conservatives who promoted a values agenda and provided ground troops that helped the party win turnout battles in close elections.


    Today, all three pieces of the coalition are under strain. Under President Bush, economic conservatives first witnessed the most significant rise in federal spending since the Great Society and, in the past month, government intervention in the private sector on a scale unprecedented since the Great Depression.
    Entire article is worth skimming: Analysis: The GOP's Identity Crisis, The Washington Post's Dan Balz Writes That With The Country Under Stress, The Republican Coalition Is Splintering - CBS News

  22. #22
    I don't know barbaro's Avatar
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    Perhaps the splintering started here. And later, George H. Bush broke his promise.


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    Thailand Expat Boon Mee's Avatar
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    Don't sound the Death Knell just yet...


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    Days Work Done! Norton's Avatar
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    Now ya got it Booners. A few minor changes to it's "complexion" and the Republican party can be saved.

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    I don't know barbaro's Avatar
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    These seems to be the case, at least in this election cycle, with the crowds that have gathered at McCain-Palin rallies and campaign stops. The GOP will have to open its tent in many different ways in the future, perhaps. Conservatives, Neocons, Xtians, moderates, and yes, non-whites.

    Unbearable whiteness of being


    Frank Rich makes a great point in my short video interview with him, which you need to go watch. The GOP is now virtually an all-white party, and being an all-white party in the United States of today is an unmitigated liability.
    The party hasn't had one non-white federal office holder in several years - not one. John McCain is going to get maybe 5% of the black vote, perhaps 25-30% of the Latino vote, and maybe a slightly larger percentage of the still-small Asian vote.

    America is just getting more and more racially diverse. It's about 68% white now (we'll have an exact figure at the next census in 2010). But look at it this way. In eight years' time, given the way we elect presidents via the electoral college, it won't be possible - I mean won't be possible - to get 270 electoral votes if you're still this white a party. The big electoral-vote prizes are states that are increasingly racially diverse (and mark my words -- under the right circumstances, even Texas may be a Democratic state in eight years). The older white states are small.

    That means the GOP will have to change its outlook on immigration and on civil-rights types of questions. But if it does that, it won't be the GOP anymore.
    Glad it's not my problem.
    Link: Lack of diversity in the Republican party could be a liability | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

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