The extreme Republican Party

-Allmusic- · 09-12-2009, 08:25 AM

One of the best lines:

Even so, while Nixon talked like an extremist, he governed like a centrist. His health care initiative was far more liberal than anything Congress is currently considering.

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We have one party that is severely compromised by its ties to big money, and another party that is just plain nuts. There is no other way to parse it. According to recent polls, a majority of its followers either believe that President Obama was born in Kenya or aren’t sure, believe there is no such thing as global warming, believe that the House health care bill calls for death panels to euthanize senior citizens, and believe that Obama is responsible for our economic woes (61 percent!). The only bright side is that according to a recent Pew poll, only 23 percent of Americans identify themselves as Republicans, which makes them not only a fringe in beliefs but also, thankfully, in numbers.

Republicans haven’t always been like this. For most of our history, America was pretty much like our European allies. We had two sensible parties with different traditions, constituencies, and orientations.

...

How the GOP went from a right-center party that joined Democrats in supporting civil rights to an extreme right-wing party that has its own leaders declaring Obama wants to kill old people is a long, sad story that has been told brilliantly by the political historian Rick Perlstein in his books “Before the Storm,’’ which describes Barry Goldwater’s hijacking of the party for being too moderate, and “Nixonland,’’ which describes how Richard Nixon settled on the electoral strategy of “positive polarization’’ - shattering the longstanding consensus by pitting Americans against one another for his own political gain. Even so, while Nixon talked like an extremist, he governed like a centrist. His health care initiative was far more liberal than anything Congress is currently considering.

But all that was above the radar. Even Republicans would happily concede that they had taken a turn to the far right, justifying the change from moderation not only on the grounds of ideological purity but also on the grounds that the Democrats had turned to the far left - a patently false accusation. What is under the radar is something more recent and more terrifying for the health of our political system: The Republican Party has become a small minority of out-of-mainstream people (think Representative Joseph Wilson’s outburst to the president this week) but, by virtue of its history, of the media attention it receives, and, frankly, by default, it still occupies a central place in our political life. In any other Western democracy it might have become a far-right splinter party. In America, we don’t really have splinter parties. When one of our parties goes crazy, it doesn’t slide to the margins.

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Conservative intellectuals like former Bush speechwriter David Frum and Sam Tanenhaus realize that this is an untenable situation. (Even some rank-and-file conservatives realize it; only 41 percent of conservatives now identify themselves as Republicans.) The country needs a serious right-of-center party - one that has real ideas, one that can engage in a serious debate with the Democrats, one that has a sense of a larger national purpose beyond winning the next election, and one that can actually attract more Americans to its banner because it has earned their trust, not because it knows how to polarize.

The extreme Republican Party - The Boston Globe

poetgrl · 09-12-2009, 08:51 AM

Good post. thanks. I would argue that the country needs a serious moderate, actual middle ground party, slightly right or left....The problem, imho, comes from the primary system which creates a situation where the parties offer up their least moderate candidates, based on the primary voting of hardcore left or right-wingers, to a country which is a lot more moderate than it's purported leaders. In the end, we are not really choosing from an endless array of positions but from two relatively polarized positions. There is room for something a little less extreme. But, the way the laws have been written and the funding and whatnot, I wonder if a new party could even ever become feasible or realistic?

blankmind · 09-12-2009, 09:13 AM

What I dislike about articles like these is the insistence that it's all the other guy's fault. They make a valid point, but then ruin it by pretending that their party is somehow different.

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...justifying the change from moderation not only on the grounds of ideological purity but also on the grounds that the Democrats had turned to the far left - a patently false accusation. What is under the radar is something more recent and more terrifying for the health of our political system: The Republican Party has become a small minority of out-of-mainstream people (think Representative Joseph Wilson’s outburst to the president this week)...

If the Democrats expect moderate Americans to support them, then maybe they need to understand what moderate means to we, the people. It doesn't mean Van Jones.

What we need is for both the Republican and the Democratic Parties to return to the middle ground. Most people in this country are moderates; they may lean left or they may lean right, but few are actually out there on the edges.

vicariousparent · 09-12-2009, 10:10 AM

I think there will be more blue dog Democrats in the future, and eventually they may break off and form their own party. The Republicans may either become extinct, break up into smaller fragments, or remain a 20% minority dominated (as it is now) by the Hannity/Limbaugh listeners.

-Allmusic- · 09-12-2009, 10:39 AM

I contend that a truly fiscally more conservative, socially more liberal way of thinking appeals to the majority of the country. Unfortunately, we do not have a party that speaks to that ideology at the moment.

collegealum314 · 09-12-2009, 11:34 AM

^^Isn't that basically Libertarian?

member · 09-12-2009, 01:14 PM

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I think there will be more blue dog Democrats in the future, and eventually they may break off and form their own party. The Republicans may either become extinct, break up into smaller fragments, or remain a 20% minority dominated (as it is now) by the Hannity/Limbaugh listeners.

The same thing is said at the beginning of every democratic presidential run. Once the American people see what Democrats really do, they end up voting for a election. After Obama's very liberal run, we will be garmented to have a republican in office afterwards.

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^^Isn't that basically Libertarian?

no, social liberal and libertarian are on the opposite side of the spectrum.

nbachris2788 · 09-12-2009, 01:22 PM

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Sure we do, the neo-cons.

The neo-cons are fiscally conservative? Not from what we've seen.

The worst thing about American politics is that it's polarized in terms of civility but not in terms of actual ideology. Obama's not that radical. He's ratcheting it up in Afghanistan, letting the Bushies get away with torture, willing to drop the public option, etc.

member · 09-12-2009, 04:06 PM

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The neo-cons are fiscally conservative? Not from what we've seen.

I made an edit because you are right by definition, but at least in my opinion in comparison Bush and other neo-cons Obama makes these guys look fiscally conservative. Obama in 9 months has already spent more than all president's from George Washington too GWB combined. That's a lot of money.

Hindoo · 09-12-2009, 04:09 PM

Another interesting article.

GOP 'cranks' dominating debate - Andie Coller - POLITICO.com

-Allmusic- · 09-12-2009, 04:13 PM

Obama is doing quite the spending, but at least let's have some honestly, please.

Mercatus Center at George Mason University - Spending Under President George W. Bush

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President Bush increased government spending more than any of the six presidents preceding him, including LBJ.

In his last term in office, President Bush increased discretionary outlays by an estimated 48.6 percent. The largest increase took place in his last year and included, among other things, the $700 billion financial industry bailout bill (TARP) and the federal takeover of Government-Sponsored Enterprises Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

Figure 1 illustrates that during his eight years in office, President Bush spent almost twice as much as his predecessor, President Clinton.

Adjusted for inflation, in eight years, President Clinton increased the federal budget by 11 percent. In eight years, President Bush increased it by a whopping 104 percent.

Obama was handed a failing economy and was forced to take drastic action in order to prevent either a complete meltdown, or a decade or more of stagflation - no growth - according to most economists and experts. Japan is often cited as an example of what can happen if the government responds too slowly or with too little stimulus, when responding to a crisis. Their economy went flat for more than a decade.

Bush was handed a relatively thriving economy that nearly collapsed by the time he left.

DocT · 09-12-2009, 04:22 PM

"Bush was handed a relatively thriving economy that nearly collapsed by the time he left. "

Gee I lost a lot of money during the last recession but then again I guess when the recession started in March of 2001, Bush acted real fast to start it just like Obama has so corrected this one.

"The NBER's Business Cycle Dating Committee has determined that a peak in business activity occurred in the U.S. economy in March 2001. A peak marks the end of an expansion and the beginning of a recession. The determination of a peak date in March is thus a determination that the expansion that began in March 1991 ended in March 2001 and a recession began."

member · 09-12-2009, 05:24 PM

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Obama was handed a failing economy and was forced to take drastic action in order to prevent either a complete meltdown, or a decade or more of stagflation - no growth - according to most economists and experts. Japan is often cited as an example of what can happen if the government responds too slowly or with too little stimulus, when responding to a crisis. Their economy went flat for more than a decade.

I dont care how bad the economy is, the federal govt has no constitutional ability to spend more than it has. It can borrow, but the idea that it can spend this much money, solely by selling off its citizens as collateral in terms of treasury bills is ridiculous.

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Bush was handed a relatively thriving economy that nearly collapsed by the time he left.

Im sure you forgot about the recession we had in 2001. But of course a Democrat with crazy spending could never cause such a thing.

-Allmusic- · 09-12-2009, 06:01 PM

May I remind you?

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President Bush increased government spending more than any of the six presidents preceding him, including LBJ.

In his last term in office, President Bush increased discretionary outlays by an estimated 48.6 percent. The largest increase took place in his last year and included, among other things, the $700 billion financial industry bailout bill (TARP) and the federal takeover of Government-Sponsored Enterprises Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

Figure 1 illustrates that during his eight years in office, President Bush spent almost twice as much as his predecessor, President Clinton.

Adjusted for inflation, in eight years, President Clinton increased the federal budget by 11 percent. In eight years, President Bush increased it by a whopping 104 percent.

They all spend like a bunch of drunken sailors, and Bush was king among the spenders. Clinton was benign in comparison.

DocT · 09-12-2009, 06:07 PM

So would you have preferred that he didn't spend 700 billion on TARP and perhaps collapse the financial system which is what those so called expert economists who are so frequently quoted here suggested would have happened? Or not spend to stimulate the economy out of the last recession like we are doing now?