Thread: The GOP in Meltdown

Originally Posted by Bugs

To me the key to the future of the party is moving back to basics – especially as they relate to the fundamentals of small government, and low taxes. IMHO the party has been controlled for far too long by special interests, and have placed the priorities of big business to the forefront of the agenda, and then attempting to cloak that big business agenda within what they try to sell as what is important to the party.

I totally agree.

I suppose, in a two party system, both parties cover a large amount of political ground. The Democrats encompass a more Leftist, Social Democrat agenda as well as the Centrist politics that are ascendant. The GOP encompasses the small 'c' conservatives, as well as the more Right wing Statists that were dominant in the Bush administration. Fortunately, imo, they have been thoroughly rejected by the electorate.

Logically, the GOP needs to get back towards it's conservative roots.

I think the GOP needs to use its base values and figure out how to apply them to the current age. Americans still seem to value the basic moral values. Many blacks voted to ban gay marriage in California, for example. (Oh, right, the Mormons used a big $ war chest to get out info to ensure Proposition 8 passed.) That's basic American values at work.

My opinion is that the Republicans need to stop toying with a partisan 'Socially Conservative' agenda if it wishes to remain relevant Jet.

^ Partisan? And what do you mean by socially conservatist? Because the govt bailed out the fin industry? You want the whole economy to melt? No credit = no business.

Nope, I don't mean the bailout (which could hardly be described as Conservative btw).

I mean the Republican marriage of convenience to the Religious Right, which no doubt gained their unswerving loyalty but at the cost of pissing off most everyone else.

Originally Posted by sabang

Nope, I don't mean the bailout (which could hardly be described as Conservative btw).

I mean the Republican marriage of convenience to the Religious Right, which no doubt gained their unswerving loyalty but at the cost of pissing off most everyone else.

Oh, I'll hold you to that, Sabang, as most libbies here see the fin industry bailout as a right-wing endeavour. (Oh, they make money!) I don't reckon religion was the big issue; it was Obama's vision of help for all the suffering folks (he will get my home back, get my credit back, save us). Heck, even most blacks voted to ban gay marriage in California. You forget that many blacks are church-going folks. Hallelujah.

In line with my small 'c' conservatism Jet, I'm a great believer in keeping religion out of politics- so I was never comfortable with the Bush administrations courting of the religious right.

Originally Posted by Jet Gorgon

I'll hold you to that, Sabang

By all means. I don't see the bailout from any partisan political perspective really- I didn't agree with the original 'toxic assets' proposal of course, but thats been altered now anyway. It's basically a bipartisan emergency package, and lets hope for the best.

Lexington
Ship of fools

Nov 13th 2008
From The Economist print edition
Political parties die from the head down




Illustration by KAL

JOHN STUART MILL once dismissed the British Conservative Party as the stupid party. Today the Conservative Party is run by Oxford-educated high-fliers who have been busy reinventing conservatism for a new era. As Lexington sees it, the title of the “stupid party” now belongs to the Tories’ transatlantic cousins, the Republicans.

There are any number of reasons for the Republican Party’s defeat on November 4th. But high on the list is the fact that the party lost the battle for brains. Barack Obama won college graduates by two points, a group that George Bush won by six points four years ago. He won voters with postgraduate degrees by 18 points. And he won voters with a household income of more than $200,000—many of whom will get thumped by his tax increases—by six points. John McCain did best among uneducated voters in Appalachia and the South.



The Republicans lost the battle of ideas even more comprehensively than they lost the battle for educated votes, marching into the election armed with nothing more than slogans. Energy? Just drill, baby, drill. Global warming? Crack a joke about Ozone Al. Immigration? Send the bums home. Torture and Guantánamo? Wear a T-shirt saying you would rather be water-boarding. Ha ha. During the primary debates, three out of ten Republican candidates admitted that they did not believe in evolution.

The Republican Party’s divorce from the intelligentsia has been a while in the making. The born-again Mr Bush preferred listening to his “heart” rather than his “head”. He also filled the government with incompetent toadies like Michael “heck-of-a-job” Brown, who bungled the response to Hurricane Katrina. Mr McCain, once the chattering classes’ favourite Republican, refused to grapple with the intricacies of the financial meltdown, preferring instead to look for cartoonish villains. And in a desperate attempt to serve boob bait to Bubba, he appointed Sarah Palin to his ticket, a woman who took five years to get a degree in journalism, and who was apparently unaware of some of the most rudimentary facts about international politics.

Republicanism’s anti-intellectual turn is devastating for its future. The party’s electoral success from 1980 onwards was driven by its ability to link brains with brawn. The conservative intelligentsia not only helped to craft a message that resonated with working-class Democrats, a message that emphasised entrepreneurialism, law and order, and American pride. It also provided the party with a sweeping policy agenda. The party’s loss of brains leaves it rudderless, without a compelling agenda.

This is happening at a time when the American population is becoming more educated. More than a quarter of Americans now have university degrees. Twenty per cent of households earn more than $100,000 a year, up from 16% in 1996. Mark Penn, a Democratic pollster, notes that 69% call themselves “professionals”. McKinsey, a management consultancy, argues that the number of jobs requiring “tacit” intellectual skills has increased three times as fast as employment in general. The Republican Party’s current “redneck strategy” will leave it appealing to a shrinking and backward-looking portion of the electorate.

Why is this happening? One reason is that conservative brawn has lost patience with brains of all kinds, conservative or liberal. Many conservatives—particularly lower-income ones—are consumed with elemental fury about everything from immigration to liberal do-gooders. They take their opinions from talk-radio hosts such as Rush Limbaugh and the deeply unsubtle Sean Hannity. And they regard Mrs Palin’s apparent ignorance not as a problem but as a badge of honour.

Another reason is the degeneracy of the conservative intelligentsia itself, a modern-day version of the 1970s liberals it arose to do battle with: trapped in an ideological cocoon, defined by its outer fringes, ruled by dynasties and incapable of adjusting to a changed world. The movement has little to say about today’s pressing problems, such as global warming and the debacle in Iraq, and expends too much of its energy on xenophobia, homophobia and opposing stem-cell research.

Conservative intellectuals are also engaged in their own version of what Julian Benda dubbed la trahison des clercs, the treason of the learned. They have fallen into constructing cartoon images of “real Americans”, with their “volkish” wisdom and charming habit of dropping their “g”s. Mrs Palin was invented as a national political force by Beltway journalists from the Weekly Standard and the National Review who met her when they were on luxury cruises around Alaska, and then noisily championed her cause.

Time for reflection

How likely is it that the Republican Party will come to its senses? There are glimmers of hope. Business conservatives worry that the party has lost the business vote. Moderates complain that the Republicans are becoming the party of “white-trash pride”. Anonymous McCain aides complain that Mrs Palin was a campaign-destroying “whack job”. One of the most encouraging signs is the support for giving the chairmanship of the Republican Party to John Sununu, a sensible and clever man who has the added advantage of coming from the north-east (he lost his New Hampshire Senate seat on November 4th).

But the odds in favour of an imminent renaissance look long. Many conservatives continue to think they lost because they were not conservative or populist enough—Mr McCain, after all, was an amnesty-loving green who refused to make an issue out of Mr Obama’s associations with Jeremiah Wright. Richard Weaver, one of the founders of modern conservatism, once wrote a book entitled “Ideas have Consequences”; unfortunately, too many Republicans are still refusing to acknowledge that idiocy has consequences, too.

The decline of the Republican Party | Ship of fools | The Economist

In fact now there will be a realigning of both party's with new names,, there will be the Democrats known as the HOMIES and the repubs known as the HONKIES.

Whiteshiva, I agree with your post. The republican moderates have been pushed to the back burner by the radical conservatives.

"And they regard Mrs Palin’s apparent ignorance not as a problem but as a badge of honour. " The Economist rules.

Originally Posted by benbaaa

This to me is the scariest part - the elevation of faith over thought.

Anyone who is well educated is elitist, out of touch, etc.
Anyone who plays dumb is somehow more real, more American.

Anyone who gives a nuanced, thoughful view on any topic is somehow a smartarse.
Anyone who just trots out a 10 word soundbite is somehow someone you should trust more to do the right thing.

these arguments are usually promoted by insecure people, like GW Bush who, at the end of the day, was just an insecure little bitch looking for the full attention of his daddy

Here is a Wiki. Note that it's Wiki. At the bottom are some of his positions:

Michael S. Steele - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Originally Posted by Bugs

I hope that race did not play a part in why he was selected.

it's probably just a coincidence that the RNC selected a black chairman in the same year that obama became president.

btw, in the end it came down to two people....a black guy (steele) and a white guy who because of this election, had to quit his country club because it didn't allow blacks.

Ok, Democrats.

Lead.

Show me.

Pretty simple, ain't it? You've got the world by the balls. Executive, Congress.


You fail, you're wrecked. Right? You gonna blame it on someone else?

Originally Posted by Mr Earl

This is such unbelievable bullshit. Everyone knows Africa is a continent.
Anyone who honestly believes she's that ignorant is a pure imbecile.

She's American - not only that, she's redneck American - this thread alone demonstrates the sorry state of education, especially when it comes to anything outside the borders of the USA, in America.

...and yes, she *IS* that ignorant - then again, as such, she was a perfect match for McCain who is just as disconnected.

Steele was Lt Gov of Maryland, no? He's been on Fox News several times (even as fill-in anchor for (horrors) Hannity). Let's see what he can do. A bit shifty putting a black at top as it looks appeasing, I think. Still, he's got class and brains(and he's cute -- 5555, oops). Let's see how he shifts the party.

The Republicans have gone even further than the Democrats, they have elected a gay black man as their leader, btw i'm just presuming Steele is gay by his voice.