Which Side Of The Barricade Are You On?
We posted a piece earlier today regarding Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell’s desire to engage in an internecine war with the Tea Partiers and conservatives in his own party and how Mr McConnell felt that the activist (read principled) wing of the Republican party was destroying the brand .
This comprehensive article from Politico Magazine covers in great detail the tectonic shift that is taking place in the politics of America and how the old “two party” system just does not suit anyone’s , except the incumbents , needs and desires . While the article is particularly harsh on the right side of the aisle it does cover the lack of moral authority on both sides of the aisle and stands as a primer on what we see as a resurgence of the American spirit in the form of a desire for a more limited , effective government .
Below is one excerpt that very clearly identifies why Senator McConnell and his Establishment cronies are wrong on the issue of who’s to blame for the record decline in the Republican party . The entire piece is well worth your time and offers the hope , shared here at YouViewed , that the future could very well be one of a libertarian , back to our Founder’s roots bent .
The author Doug Sosnik , while a Democratic strategist , pulls no punches and though he sees the trend as one of “populist” sentiment , we feel that is wishful thinking , as his idea of populism is more in tune with an activist government than a laissez-faire , invisible hand polity . We view the trend with the youth of America as having grown tired of the State and it’s failed policies both foreign and domestic , exhibiting a desire for more self-determination and less dependence .
The Sorry State Of The Republican Party
” It is difficult to add much to the current piling on about all of the challenges facing the Republican Party. The party has become narrowly defined as a congressional party controlled by the Tea Party movement. And Republicans continue to have enormous problems with women, young people, Hispanics, Asians and African Americans. It is clear that they will never become a majority party in an increasing multiracial society until they deal with their positions on the issues that have alienated these broad groups of voters.
Any effort the party makes going forward should factor in the following:
1. The lack of a leader. The Republican Party is leaderless and will continue to be until it has a 2016 nominee. This nominee will either be the next president or the party will go back to being leaderless for four more years after losing its third presidential election in a row.
2. The repudiation of the party elders. There is no longer an establishment wing of the Republican Party. The failed leadership under President George W. Bush and the Republican Congress led to the enormous expansion of government spending and got the country into two wars that taxpayers are still funding. These actions alienated a majority of Americans and pushed the activist wing of the party to repudiate what used to be the establishment wing. The party should stop waiting for the ‘grownups’ to come to its rescue since there are no longer party elders that the activist wing is willing to listen to, much less follow.
3. The demise of right-leaning think tanks. The political contamination of right-leaning think tanks has stripped away the party’s ability to develop a series of substantive ideas and policies to rebuild the party for the future. The intellectual foundation of Ronald Reagan’s election in 1980 began forming in the early 1960s through the ideas of National Review and other right-of-center organizations.
4. The likelihood that the next Republican president will come from the states. The Republican Party is now perceived nationally as a congressional party, which is poisonous given how much most of America hates Washington. There’s a chance that the party might nominate a member of Congress, but it is highly unlikely that a nominee from the congressional wing of the party could be elected president in 2016.
5. The party’s congressional wing cannot fix the image of the Republican Party. There’s little that Republicans at the federal level can do to help their party except to do no further harm. All of the burdens for redefining the party will fall on state leaders until Republicans nominate a presidential candidate in 2016.
6. The lack of consensus on the reasons for Mitt Romney’s defeat continues to divide the party. Romney was the worst possible candidate to put up against Obama last year, particularly given Obama’s relative popularity in 2012, the bruising Republican primary in what is now widely considered one of the weakest fields in presidential history and the public’s perception that the economy was on the rebound. On top of all this, there’s the fact that Obama simply ran a vastly superior campaign.
Given the vacuous nature of Romney’s campaign, there continues to be an ongoing debate within the GOP about the lessons learned from his defeat. Romney’s inauthentic efforts to position himself as a conservative led many to conclude that he ended up standing for nothing. The ascendant wing of the party concluded that Romney wasn’t conservative enough to win.
The worst thing for Democrats would have been for former senator Rick Santorum to have won the nomination. If he had, Obama would likely have won the presidency in one of the largest landslides in history. This would have settled the open question about the viability of a Republican candidate from the right wing of the party. For now, the debate will continue to paralyze the party until 2016. If Republicans lose the next presidential election, this intra-party debate will continue for the rest of the decade.
7. The Republican Party’s continued failure to adapt to the electorate’s views on social issues. It’s not hard to conclude that America has changed and that the Republican litmus test on social issues is out of step with the majority of voters. The party’s failure to change with the times is the principle reason that it has performed so poorly among younger voters for the past decade. Despite the party’s talk about becoming more tolerant and inclusive, it hasn’t done anything in the past year to deal with these issues.
8. Angry, partisan and negative aren’t what the country is looking for right now. One of the core strengths of Ronald Reagan, the last successful Republican president, was his uplifting message of optimism and hope for the country and its people. He also conveyed a sense of mission and a willingness to work with the other side to get things done for the American people. Today’s Republican Party is seen as an angry force that is solely focused on scoring political points against the president rather than focusing on what’s right for the country.
The Democratic Party At A Crossroads With Challenges Of Its Own
Compared with the Republicans, the Democrats are a vibrant party with favorable demographics and an edge when it comes to the Electoral College map. But the comparison masks several big challenges the Democratic Party faces in next year’s midterm elections, as well as a post-Obama future: “
The author’s politics do show themselves to a reasonable degree . While he is considerably less harsh on the state of the Democratic party , there is no denying that he has identified a great deal of the problems associated with the lack of leadership and principles that is turning the GOP into the party of also-rans , at least at the national level . If only he offered such a rousing critique of his own Democratic party .
Regardless of the less than even-handedness of the author’s treatment of the state of the American political parties there is wisdom in his words and the right should ignore him at their peril , just as ignoring the likes of Ted Cruz , Mike Lee and Rand Paul will cause the GOP no end of grief and doom them to a generation in the wilderness .
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