Posted on 04/30/2013 7:07:38 AM PDT by Kaslin
A cancer is eating away at a once Grand Old Party, and if the party doesn't wake up and take precautions, it may wind up only a shadow of its better self -- a hollowed-out refuge for haters and paranoids and the kind of ideological parasites that can reduce a major party to a minor one.
The historian Richard Hofstadter spoke of a "paranoid style in American politics," and noted its "sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy." He called it "an old and recurrent phenomenon in our public life," one that it isn't confined to left or right. It's an equal-opportunity form of craziness and, sure enough, it's back. If it ever went away.
Somewhere there must still be a remnant of the John Birch Society buried in the woodwork of American politics and still burrowing away. Such types swarm in the fever swamps of any society's culture, but in hard times, or just uncertain ones, they tend to overflow and threaten the health and stability of even long established and respected institutions, societies and whole civilizations.
Think of Germany in the 1930s and the Nazi sickness, or the conditions that led to the rise of bolshevism in Russia as the West destroyed itself in a first world war that would prove but a harbinger of an even greater and more calamitous second one.
Or take the long view and see what has befallen Islamic civilization since it was once renowned for its arts and sciences, its tolerance and hospitality, its architecture -- and its poetry! The civilization that gave us Ibn Khaldun and Harun al-Rashid now languishes, and in its decline produces al-Qaida types whose idea of progress is death and destruction. Their murderous rhetoric, once lightly dismissed by a West grown fat and careless, proved all too serious.
There's a lesson in all this if we in the West will ever learn it -- and act. Whether it's Mein Kampf or the Communist Manifesto or today's fatwas coming out of the Arab world, words can lead to acts. Horrible acts. And shouldn't be lightly dismissed.
Consider a couple of recent rhetorical performances here in bucolic Arkansas of all places:
Right in the middle of the citywide shutdown in Boston that followed the bombings at the finish line of its famed Marathon, a state representative and gun enthusiast named Nate Bell twittered a nasty little message about Bostonians "cowering in their homes" without firearms -- just when the rest of America was thinking of their calm courage and vigilance. (Which once again paid off.)
Happily, that state legislator was rewarded by a flood of responses -- not just from Arkansas but many another state -- that let him know just how far over the line he'd wandered. America seems awake to the danger that words as thoughtless as his represent. Even he soon thought better of them -- though he apologized only for their "timing," not their substance. Sad.
About the same time, a Republican couple in the hills of picturesque Benton County up in the Ozarks spewed out the same sort of vitriol -- not in private conversation or emails to their fellow fanatics but in the newsletter of the county's Republican organization. Words like "traitors" and "turncoats" were used to describe their party's state legislators. Or at least those who finally, patiently worked out a compromise on the contentious and convoluted issue of Obamacare and its impact on Medicaid in this state.
At one point the article in the newsletter referred to legislators who don't agree with its views as "bullet backstops." The article asserted that the Second Amendment "means nothing unless those in power believe you would have no problem simply walking up and shooting them...." No reservations or context can justify that kind of trash talk. Which has a way of leading to trashy actions. Or worse.
The head of that country's Republican organization wasted no time demanding these people's resignations from the party's county committee, which may be the best news about this whole mess. Because if Republicans aren't vigilant, loudmouths like these will become the voice of their party -- and decent Americans of all political persuasions will be repelled. Rightly so. And react. Which is what happened to the Birchers in their less than glorious heyday.
Lest we forget, the John Birch Society didn't fade away on its own, any more than malignant cancers clear up on their own. All good men -- and women -- came to the aid of their party and cleaned it out. Thinkers and leaders of courage and conviction, and of unquestionably conservative credentials, rose up to expose and oppose the danger the John Birch Society represented. Thinkers and leaders like the late great William F. Buckley Jr., who would not be silent in the face of what he recognized as a fatal threat to his party and its principles -- and to the conscience of conservatives regardless of party.
For what is conservatism except an attachment to the tried and true, to the wisdom of hard-earned experience over the zealotry of empty theory, to custom and tradition, to the civilities and grace notes of life, to tolerance and manners rather than the crudities of the moment? For conservatism is more a civilized inclination than a point-by-point program to be outlined in some party newsletter or elaborated to death in one of Rand Paul's 12-hour filibusters. It is a belief in the kind of positive change that, because it is based on the past, will endure in the future.
These neo-Birchers aren't conservatives. They're the opposite: radicals who believe they've got the true faith and all the rest of us are infidels.
Unless the Republican Party’s leaders -- and its grass roots, too -- get a grip on this slithering danger and proceed to rise up and root it out, someday Americans may wonder what ever happened to the party of Lincoln, who spoke of charity for all and malice toward none. That forgotten party will have gone like the Whigs, torn apart.
At that point, Republicans will have become like the old man in a dark shop that Whittaker Chambers warned his party about as the original Birchers proliferated. The old man in his dark shop wasn't really interested in selling anything, just sitting there and stroking his merchandise.
Both the Birchers and now these neo-Birchers represent the greatest obstacle to a Republican comeback in American politics, which is Republicans themselves. Or at least the kind who fall for this load of ideology, or who think they can safely ignore these fanatics out to hijack their party. Remember: Silence gives consent.
Republicans out to save their country might consider saving their party first.
Paul Greenberg should go have a good cry with John Boenher.
Lol
Answer: Absolutely nothing
There are a few paranoid notions making the rounds among the right. I will refrain from naming what they are.
The Birchers have been proven correct in many instances.
And to use statements that liken them to muhamadean terrorists by saying they thought of non-Birchers as ‘infidels’ is highly slanderous.
Where was the ‘barf alert’ on this trash article?
Mark Levin To: perfect_rovian_storm
I was alerted to this monster thread this morning and had to stop reading it after a while. I’ll leave this one post and then move along. These flame wars are vicious. They contribute nothing. If you love other hosts wonderful. If you don’t like my show wonderful. If you love other recent books, cool. If you hate my book, so what? But I will comment here as a long-time Freeper, on my show, and anywhere else about my views, whether you agree with them or not. I’ve worked too long and too hard in the conservative trenches to be chased or pushed here or there. I’ve seen great leaders up close and personal, like Reagan, and I’ve seen great talent up close and personal, like Rush. I fear for this nation. And I know the enemy. I have for 40 years. And I have fought them- at the polls, within the GOP, in Court, on TV, and in radio. I do not seek praise for it. I do it out of commitment to this society. And I did it when I didn’t have two dimes to rub together. It’s impossible to address all the poison here nor is it productive. But I can and do back up all I believe and say on the air and in my writings. They are the “links” some of the malcontents here demand. If you want to honestly know where I am coming from, how I get there, then listen and read about it. I explain myself in great detail all the time. Now let’s take our country back. Good day. (please excuse any typos as this iPhone keypad is murder.)
1,038 posted on Monday, February 22, 2010 9:16:42 AM by holdonnow
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2456317/posts?page=1038#1038
We conservative Constitutionalists are NOT the radical loonies . . . the leftist Rats are, and there is not shortage of legitimate reasons to question their goals, motives and honesty.
12 posts before someone nails it
Yet another term to demonize anyone willing to buck the leftward dash of the GOP
Anti Semite
Neo Butcher
Neo Confederate
Gun nut
Racist. Nativist
Homophobe
Militia type tax resister
Pro life zealot
There will be another pejorative term next week for those for whom culture matters more than identity redress
Sadly some freepers on wrong side of this
In fact, the JBS never seemed to have all that much interest in the GOP. In the late 1960's and early 1970's, many Birchers supported George Wallace's American Independent Party, and pro-Wallace articles appeared in their journal, American Opinion. According to its house organ, the Bulletin of the John Birch Society, George McGovern's presidential campaign sent a letter to the JBS in 1972 asking for its support for his presidential campaign--but he was turned down on the grounds that the society is nonpartisan.
Nonetheless, at the time, many Birchers were supporting George Wallace in his bid to capture the Democratic Party's presidential nomination. After Wallace was shot, most Birchers supported Rep. John Schmitz (R-Calif.), in his bid for the presidency as the nominee of the American Party.
Although the JBS is nonpartisan, the American Party seemed to be a Birch front--its officials always turned out to be Birchers. In 1976, it ran as its presidential standard bearer Tom Anderson, editor of Farm and Ranch magazine and a prominent, long-time Bircher. By 1980, this group seems to have faded away
The JBS has continued to go its own way. For some reason, the organization opposed Proposition 13, Howard Jarvis's historic property tax limitation initiative in California and was extremely cool to Ronald Reagan. And although the JBS still exists, its influence in the conservative movement, especially in California, is almost nonexistent.
Then years later as I became more interested in politics and joined FR, I saw the names of various groups come up one of which was JBS. I asked myself, “What are they all about? I checked them out on their website and other ways and found that they are a patriotic, God fearing, traditional values, family oriented, hate group. (sarc on the hate group part)
I just went there again and could find no principle or position that I don't agree with. I think this group has been unjustly maligned for years. See for yourself.
I am not a member and am not affiliated with JBS in any way.
The left became unhinged in the early sixties too, when “None Dare Call It Treason” was published. The far left and the Rockefeller Republicans ganged up on everybody that wasn’t with the New Frontier or Great Society. They so wanted Oswald to be a redneck or Bircher.
The left and the Rino’s run the show, so now they pause from the fabulous police state and tax collector’s paradise they are creating to howl at the moon because somebody out there somewhere doesn’t agree with them. Boolah boolah boo.
Mankind's greatest hope for individual liberty was forged by the courage and blood of but 20% of the populace, while Greenberg's ilk was hiding behind the curtains, waiting to see who'd come out on top.
It’s people like this author and his publication which actively censors debate about the ‘natural born citizen’ clause embedded in the Constitution itself that chased me out of the Republican party. His ilk can keep their party; he sounds just like a loyalist apologist would have sounded back when patriots were needed.
>>The Birchers that used to hang out here always had an underlying paranoia about the Jews. They just hid it a little better.<<
You use the word Jews as if all Jews are of the same cloth. There’s socialist Jews, conservative Jews and four or five other flavors. The ones that I have a paranoia about are the Clinton loving Jews. Does that make me a Bircher?
You wrote: “’I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!’ ~Barry Goldwater 1964”
Speaking of Barry Goldwater:
02/22/2010:
Mark Levin: “I was invited to be the opening speaker at Saturday’s CPAC session. I had accepted but then, to my amazement, I learned that the John Birch Society would be one of many co-sponsors. This takes the big-tent idea many steps too far for me. So, I withdrew. Apparently, others were not so moved. That’s fine. But it wasn’t for me. Bill Buckley and Barry Goldwater, among others, chased the Birchers from the movement decades ago. And they’re not a part of the movement. So, to give them a booth at CPAC was boneheaded. ...”
[snip] HERE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2456317/posts
Gosh Mr Greenberg, please tell me on just which points the John Birch society was wrong.
Crickets!
Paul paints with a rather broad brush. I’m surprised to see such trash on townhall.com.
There is no reason to suddenly turn on him and bash him.
Please don't
The JBS leader spiraled into anti-semitic paranoia and conspiracy crazy land, that is why WFB worked so hard at ejecting them from the Rep. Party. He was right to do so.
And the Tea Party needs to do the same with the functionally mentally ill 911 truthers and Sandy Hook hoaxers.
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