GOP Power Struggle:
Sixteen candidates are running in the republican presidential primaries bidding
for being the party’s nominated candidate following next summer’s convention.
Sixteen. There are more but they dropped out. Others may still enter the
contest before this is all over.
So the party is struggling to find its voice. Its leader. A
front runner that somehow personifies what the party stands for. That is a
difficult task. It has been a difficult task for many years. This is so because
the party includes several ideological camps that are ill at ease with one
another. This condition, too, has been with the party for a long time. I
personally observed it in the 1980’s. That internal struggle of the party is
the reason I left the republican fold. And they only got worse from there in my opinion.
The party simply doesn’t know how to accommodate different
mindsets. Conservative? Progressive or liberal? Middle of the road? Tea Party
starkly drawn, or Tea Party casually defined? How about Hate Government of all
kinds? Or libertarian republicanism. Or anarchists?
You see there are all sorts of republicans. I have friends
and family members who are republican and they wonder how I can be so harshly
critical of the party when they don’t feel they represent the harsh elements
I’m uncomfortable with.
Well it is easy for me to be critical of republicans because
they have not lifted a finger to organize, sort out, or in any way structure
the party so it can embrace diversity of thought. Republicans have always
tended to the position that ‘if you don’t agree with them, get out of the
party’. And I did. I did not feel at home. Meanwhile, which ideology are you
supposed to agree with in their party? It is pure chaos. Anarchy really.
The party is anti-intellectual, anti-academic, anti-historical,
anti-science and anti-government. In short republicans fall into that class of
debaters who don’t believe in facts. And when they feel facts are important to
make a point, they make up the facts so they don’t have to do the research and
provide the proof of their arguments. It has become the party of the Big Fib.
Don’t know something? Make something up. I guess they figure no one will check
it out! But we do.
I think it is pretty clear the party cannot govern itself
let alone the nation.
They have power of criticism. Attack, too. They love to make
fun of other people, bully them, and use sound bites to represent their
beliefs. It is easy for them to do this. And because far too many Americans
don’t vote, or don’t pay attention to the issues, they let republicans win
elections without fighting them.
Thirty two states have republican governors. The House of
Representatives have more than 247 republican seats of the House total of 435,
and 54 senate seats of 100. Clearly they have grass roots power. And they
enforce party policy and voting records strictly. This is the secret behind
their power to obstruct congressional progress. So they stop progress from
others without offering their own programs. They are the party of NO.
Republicans generally agree that they don’t like or trust
government. Of any kind. And that is an easy position to make and defend
against all others. The strategy wins elections.
Today, however, things have become messy. The party has
become unmanageable. There are too many ideologies included in the party for
there to be much harmony among the leaders. Winning an election by blaming the
sitting President is not a leadership coup. Blaming the president for
everything your own party engineered from day one also does not represent a
winning strategy let alone a leadership development objective.
The world is a dangerous place with many opportunities to
pursue for the good of all mankind. To do that leaders have to lead by defining
problems, focusing on the really important ones, and then working towards
solutions. The solutions have to be talked about enough so masses of people can
get behind the ideas and solutions. The solutions have to be decided and then
implemented. They cannot work if this work isn’t done.
Blaming other people for problems real or imagined is not
leadership. It is complaining. We get enough of that at home! Its time to take
the republican party out into the fresh air and demonstrate what it can do. We
know they can start wars. We know they can misread intelligence reports. We
know they don’t understand how the economy works and thus how to manage it.
They have deficit spent the nation into massive debt while crippling the
economic engine that makes it all work.
And no, cutting taxes and ramping up expenses for unbudgeted
wars and benefit programs is not leadership or economic management. It is
disaster. It is the recession we experienced from 2007 to present. The
recession is payment for two wars ($3 trillion dollars of expense and debt) and
massive tax cuts ($1 trillion annually). Is it no wonder the economy has been
struggling?
That’s what we got from republican leadership. They know it.
But now they have to do something about it. When do you suppose they will do
so? If not in present campaigns, one
wonders if they even understand these issues? Maybe that’s their secret. They
don’t make suggestions about fixing things because they don’t know how to.
Well, well, well.
November 12, 2015
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