Potential Republican Crack-Up

For the past 20 years, there's been a discussion in political circles and the media about the "fault lines" in the Republican party over the hot-button social issues such as the death penalty, abortion, affirmative action and gay rights.

The presumption has always been that these issues would ultimately cause a rift between conservatives and moderates that would split the Republican coalition. The pundits and the MSM have been expecting and predicting this split for as long as I've been watching politics and they've been puzzled by the fact that it has never occurred.

I believe that the reason that it hasn't occurred is that the underlying assumptions are wrong. There are no "moderate" Republicans. I think Republicans are almost all conservative. Today, there are no Republicans left who are philosophically in line with Nelson Rockefeller, John Anderson, Lowell Weicker or Mark Hatfield. I know that this line of reasoning may be challenged by the Maine & Rhode Island Republican senators but the Republicans in those states (who vote Republican in presidential elections) are conservatives. The New England Republican Senators get elected by appealing to Democrats in overwhelmingly Democratic states.

There were approximately 62 million people who voted for GW Bush in 2004. I believe that probably 61.5 million of those people (1) support the death penalty (2) oppose affirmative action and (3) oppose gay marriage. I also believe that an equally high percentage of Bush voters (even those who are pro-choice) believe that the Roe v. Wade case was a hideous decision.

Pro-choice Republicans also are aware of the dirty little secret of the abortion debate -- which is that even if Roe v. Wade were overturned tomorrow, there would probably be no effect... There are probably no more than 7 - 9 states where abortion would actually be outlawed and there are currently few (or no) abortion doctors practicing in those states today anyway. Overall, the number of abortions occurring in the next ten years would only be affected by 1% or less if Roe v. Wade were reversed.

So this is, I believe, why the Republican coalition never cracked or splintered. It has confounded and infuriated the opposition but the Republican coalition really never had the fault lines that so many people thought it had.

However, I now think that one may be developing. The impending divisions in the Republican party won't be "moderate" vs. "conservative". It will be "evangelical conservative" vs. "non evangelical conservative". The issues that cause the breach won't be abortion, the death penalty, gay marriage or affirmative action. Instead the divisions will be caused over: (1) stem cell research, (2) evolution and (3) the Terri Schiavo case.

I think that 25 years from now, we'll all look back on the Terri Schiavo case as a cataclysmic event in American politics. There were tens of millions of people who looked at the pictures of Terri Schiavo and thought just one thing: "My god, if that ever happens to me, pull the plug, stop the feeding or do whatever it takes to finish me off."

At the time many Republican leaders spoke of the fact that this was a unique case but the tone of the debate both in and out of the media was that this was essentially a first step.

I remember that pro-Brady Bill and pro-Assault weapons ban politicians repeatedly assured the public that this wouldn't mean banning guns while activists and media pundits indicated that this was a first step towards doing so.

With the Terri Schiavo case, activists -- evangelicals --similarly didn't view this as a unique case but as a first step towards preventing feeding tube or life support removal in any case regardless of living wills or not.

This had an effect on non-evangelical Republicans or "secular Republicans" . . . By itself, I don't think that it would be enough to cause a breach but this isn't just one issue. The other issues that are occurring at the same time are an inexplicable renewed debate over evolution and the stem cell research debate.

With regard to the former, there's no polite or nice way to put it so I'll just be direct. People who believe in evolution think that people who don't believe in evolution are idiots -- pure and simple. The perception that an evolution believer has of a non-evolution believer is of a person saying, "Duh, my grandfather wasn't no ape."

Secular Republicans look at people who publicly discuss their doubts about evolution and who don't want it taught in public schools with utter disgust.

With regard to stem cell research, secular Republicans are excited at the prospects and supportive of practically any scientific research and they simmer at the thought of obstruction of research on religious grounds.

These three issues: evolution, Terri Schiavo and stem cell research are close to causing (or may have already caused) an irrepairable breach in the Republican coalition.

I'm a conservative. I believed in a 2nd war against in Iraq to remove the regime of Saddam Hussein as early as 1998. I also believe in making the '01 & '03 tax cuts permanent; drilling in anwar; that members of al Qaeda who are captured are illegal soldiers and not entitled to due process. I believe in progressive indexing of SS benefits, support the confirmation of John Roberts, think Antonin Scalia is the ideal justice and favor ballistic missile defense.

I also support the death penalty, oppose affirmative action, oppose gay marriage and think that the Roe v. Wade decision was a farce. I could go on but the point is made -- I'm a conservative....

But, I also accept the truth that the human species has a pre-history and I support stem cell research and I think that keeping Terri Schiavo's existance without life going was cruel and sadistic. That feeding tube should've never been inserted 14 years ago.

As a result of all of this, I now find myself in a position that I would have never dreamed of 5 or 10 years ago which is that I object to Hillary Clinton far, far less than I object to Tom Delay. Or Rick Santorum. Or Sam Brownback. Or Tom Tancredi.

Hopefully, Rudy Guiliani will be the nominee in '08 and make this all a moot point but if he isn't then I'm confronted with the possibility that I'll probably vote for Hillary Clinton despite the fact that she stands against so much that I believe in.

If there are others like me out there, and I think there are, then get ready for a 2nd Clinton Administration.

Way back on the Original@ Undead Thread, we realized that "the end of the internet" was coming upon us apace, the posting limit of 65534 responses on a thread. So we decided to "move" to another thread.

The problem was, we had grown accustomed to our comforts. ... What to do?

We decided to take all the comforts of home along with us!

Here's how we proceded...

Flight Plan.

Deep beneath the castle, for weeks special equipment has been working. Hydraulic fingers inched their way through the broken rock and dirt of the fracture zone. Linked plates stitch together like a suit of chain mail, or a three-dimensional zipper.

Steel arch beams are welded together in an incredibly large carry basket. Trapezoidal towers spaced equidistantly around the castle are joined with a metal wall, like a chain link fence on super-steroids.

Metal vane plates rumble as hydraulic pressure builds. With a shudder and rumble, the entire structure inches upward like a rock heaving upward from the frost in Winter. The castle separates from the Earth. Groundwater begins seeping down to the lower section, providing a minor amount of buoyancy.

We have separation. Now, we need lift-off.

Moving the Castle

In the faint light of false dawn, the castle sits quietly, eerie stillness presages monumental events to come. The top of each trapezoidal tower opens slowly.

Strange sounds emanate as a frothy substance begins to extrude and expand. Bubble-gum blowing on an industrial scale. At first looking like a pastry chef’s hat, the shapeless form continues to expand. Large panel doors four stories high open on the trapezoidal structures to reveal tremendous engines on gimbaled struts. The engines extend outward and deploy.

Overhead, the plastic bubbles continue to expand, like parachutes operating in reverse. They reach up, higher and higher, expanding as they go. Veins of thread and rope-like material begin to show in the surface texture, apparently lending strength to the material. The expanding balloons seem to be like dragonfly wings, growing and inflating from a crumpled nothingness to an iridescent beauty in the early morning sunlight.

The engines fire with a muted roar, their exhaust dark and smoky at first, but soon clearing until only the dancing images show the heat of them. A funnel-shape catches and redirects some of the hot gases back into the structure. Now the balloons begin to inflate steadily, rising into the cool air of the morning like a slumberer stretching as he rises from his bed.

Soon there is the appearance of a huddle of clouds over the castle. The huge balloons, fully inflated, strain like captured moons to exert their tidal pull on the immovable mass of stone, and earth, and steel.

The jet engines roar to full power, flattening the grasses below them. Steam rises from the ground. Below the castle, the hydraulic vanes spring fully open, and the castle lurches upward half a foot. Then it steadies. Dirt begins to cascade downward around the periphery as the huge steel basket rises up, like a potted plant pulled up by its roots.

The castle rises. The gray steel walls of the basket move upward like the bucket of a tremendous earth-mover. Up, up they rise. A gaping wound in the Earth remains behind. Cascading dirt and water fall like rain. And like a vengeful rain-cloud the tremendous mass hovers over, and shades the pit it is leaving behind.

Upward still, and now the view across the empty pit can be seen. Bare dirt and rock line the walls, and underground springs begin washing muddily down to the bottom. A new lake will be born here; a round empondment called Lake Fate.

Inside the castle, all is as it was. Fires continue to burn in the fireplaces. Kitchen attendants watch over the rising bread. Revelers revel.

Those who are sleeping continue to sleep. Few notice the gentle turning of the sun across the walls as the castle spins very slowly in the air. The jet engines continue to roar with undiminished intensity, but inside the courtyard, the sound seems distant. Birds flutter among the fruit trees near the castle walls.

Majestically, magically, the castle rises, slowly moving eastward, rushing to meet the new day. Gaining altitude, it picks up a little speed with the upper air currents, but this will be a leisurely trip, like the old-fashioned dirigibles. Stately, dignified, and this one is not flammable.

The journey to its new home has begun.

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