Posted on 05/15/2021 8:39:13 AM PDT by Saint Athanasius
The brute fact is that the GOP today—unlike its original incarnation—has no rootedness in any specific moral conception of political life. It is an unmoored, mercenary instrument for hire.
By Tal Bachman
Once upon a time, the Republican Party didn’t suck. Actually, there were lots of times it didn’t suck.
It didn’t suck when, at its founding in the late 1850s, it declared slavery an inhumane, barbaric practice, and eventually ended it. It didn’t suck when it ended repressive and predatory Mormon polygamy a few decades later. It didn’t suck when it declared late 19th-century corporate monopolies to be injurious to representative democracy and citizen welfare, and diminished their power.
It didn’t suck under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who presided over a postwar era of peace and prosperity. It didn’t suck when it fought segregationist Democrats to ensure equal application of the law. It didn’t suck when it fought against communism for half a century, and then won.
But starting with the presidency of George H. W. Bush, it really began sucking.
It was Bush Senior who pushed America into the first Persian Gulf War amidst a massive PR snow job involving fake stories about little Kuwaiti kids. It was Bush who framed that war as a glorious opportunity and morally obligatory step toward a “new world order”—by which he meant the eventual dissolution of national borders (including those of the United States) and the rise of one-world-government.
(Excerpt) Read more at amgreatness.com ...
I teach at a major university. Political science is the major that attracts the “easy A” types who want to rule us all. Republicans are just milder Democrats, but still want to rule us and share in the spoils (government spending and regulation). In other words, you shouldn’t trust any politician. Usually Republicans are less toxic than Democrats, but toxic none the less.
Yes they do
Mostly agree !
Actually there is on huge difference between GOP (even cosnervatives !) and Rat followers ( I don’t think I need to say “leftists”, we already know that!) in regard to politics.
The Rats want power first argue later, the GOP\Conservatives want to argue first, power later.
Guess who gets to get power and likely keep it ?
Mel Brooks ‘History of the World’. “...they stink on ice”
Unfortunately we just disagree. The left captured their party. They hope we abandon our attempts.
Unfortunately we just disagree.
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And that’s OK. Its actually nice to get a mature response like yours for a change. Thank you for that.
Different views and opinions make the world go around. :)
And same to you. We all want the same. I’m more involved in local party and even school board workings than I’ve ever been. Plan to continue.
“The Rats want power first argue later, the GOP\Conservatives want to argue first, power later.”
A good line, with a lot of truth to it.
Ronald Reagans biggest mistake the First George Bush...
GOP has been useless ...they never like Reagan
Trump should primary all the rinos...
He should not run in 2024...But direct the rebuilding of the GOP int the WORKERS Party....
This isn't on Bush. It's on Bill Clinton and Jamie Gorelick, who installed the infamous "wall of separation" between the intelligence agencies to keep them from finding out about Clinton's campaign funding violations with the Chinese.
They also didn't discover the terrorist cells who, for two years, were practicing flying, but not landing, airliners.
-PJ
It sucked under Ford, too.
I voted for Donald Trump because I detest any politician who uses the U.S. military as a mercenary force to protect Muslims who just happen to be major real estate investment partners of the Bush family.
Republicans might suck but Democrats are. Communists nowadays. They’re not Bill Clinton’s Democratic Party of the ‘90s.
Thank you for the link. I don’t disagree with that constructive approach however the bigger problem IMO is that the national GOP apparatus (RNC, NRSC, etc.) works hard to convert all elected officials into RINOs and make them dependent on the party funding and the special interests that control it. Most people have no idea how corrupt the party is at the national level.
I just don’t see the bottom up approach working as it doesn’t fix the problems at the top, which are deeply entrenched. If it was easy to fix Trump would already have made progress doing it. JMHO.
Bush I didn't make things better by any means, but those trends had been going on before he took office. Industry was already in decline before GHWB. The country let down its guard before he took office. Deindustrialization was already a topic in the Eighties and even in the Seventies. There was some enthusiasm for a borderless world among people who called themselves conservatives, so you can't blame everything on some elitist establishment.
Any party is a coalition and will contain some people you disagree with. If you can't handle people of different views you lose elections. And the thing about purges is that the next time, you may be the one who gets purged.
Tal Bachman is a writer, Sirius XM host, and musician best known for his 1999 hit, "She's So High."
I guess that's why he knows so much about sucking.
Without a Republican Party the regressives gain power through the Dem party
I respect your efforts. I mainly ‘participate’ through donations to particular candidates I respect, which are very few. Most politicians are not principled people IMO. They tend to be imbued with personal tendencies to manipulate and deceive others for their own gain. That’s what made Donald Trump so unique; he was a man of principle who consistently put the interests of the country first. A very rare bird indeed. Damn, I miss him.
I agree with the basic premise. The Republican party is “mercenary” and can be bought, that they lack principals (McCain, Bush H and W. proved that) and will throw anyone and any value under the bus... Only a hand full have any moral/value based courage and the majority is inconsistent, flopping all over the place like a self professed conservative but big government Romney with his health care...
At first I thought maybe this was a bit of a smear job on Elise Stefanik
Sadly, the article is accurate. They replaced Cheney with someone even more liberal - worse.
Fact: some of the greatest expanse in government manpower, budget and scope of powers has happened under Republican rule.
Two major things the article did not mention and why the Republicans really do suck - these not only grew the government, but they led to the biggest violation of basic Constitutional rights:
1. Bush H. and under his tenure the interpretation that anything over IP is considered in the public sphere. The once former director of the CIA was very supportive of the IC and he ensured that the legal framework for the complete loss of any semblance in privacy was created by essentially allowing the government to decide this issue outside the public forum, legislatures, or judicial review. Federal bureaucrats essentially told the public what their rights are and how to interpret the US Constitution.
2. Bush W. and the Patriot Act and the creation of the DHS. Bush W. post 9-11 oversaw the most massive and rapid expanse of government intrusion in the privacy of the lives of average Americans. The Patriot Act aimed a massively expanded (and bloated) IC largely inward instead of the pre-911 outward orientation.
Todays Republican party is a big government party, just like the Democrats. Only they have different financiers in the private sector and abroad that will benefit when they are elected. They use other themes to push their big government ideas: national security, crime, bla bla bla; whereas the Democrats sell egalitarianism, social justice, bla bla bla. Very few are true conservatives like Reagan or Trump were.
Looks like to me that Trump believes that he is taking over the Republican party. And that he's now removed Cheney.
So in that sense, Canadian Tal Bachman, with his hipster haircut, doesn't know what's going on.
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