 |
||
|
|
||
Republican Slight of Hand
I
recently heard Michael Steel and Gov. Tim Pawlenty discussing
the future of the Republican Party. They announced that they were looking
for new ways to articulate the conservative message in order to reverse
the present shift away from their Republican ideology. In other words,
they want to sell the same old principles under a new marketing scheme.
This goes to prove that conservatives are so locked
into a particular way of thinking that they can’t waver from it,
no matter how unsound it is. They can only reshape the delivery to sound
different (i.e., misleading).
While their foundation remains limited to smaller government
and lower taxes, the rest is open to the highest bidder. We can’t
be sure if the religious right will be the winner this time, in their
attempt to transform the United States into a theocracy. Since Sarah
Palin, Republican strategists now seem to be focusing on a carricature
of the lower middle class, “Joe Six-packs” as they call
them, once again fomenting distrust of “elites,” people who
are educated. They will, of course, target anyone who doggedly supports
their cause – people who would rather the nation go bankrupt than
in any way discomfort the rich.
No doubt they will still play the “gun card,”
as usual. Strange how that one works so well. We never hear liberals demonstrating
on the streets to take people’s guns away, but conservatives have
successfully stoked the paranoia of their followers, in effect making
an emotional issue out of nothing.
Republicans do not want to forego bread and butter
issues like abortion, even though their actual commitment remains tepid.
They know that there are people who will support the anti-abortion movement
no matter what major side effects come with it, including a broken economy,
preemptive wars, political corruption, sexual hypocrisy, anti-rationalism,
a divided nation, the propagation of hate, obvious threats to our tripartite
system of government, and the wholesale desecration of the separation
of church and state that our nation was founded on. They will embrace
and even defend all this to support a party that “says” it is
against abortion – a party that would be crippled if the abortion
laws were suddenly reversed. They would be better off with liberals who
at least try to realistically reduce the amount of abortions, rather than
thrive on their proclivity. Unfortunately, they seem to prefer talk to
action.
As wedge issue proponents come to realize how they
have been exploited by the Republican Party, they will drift away and
new wedge issues will have to be adopted. The religious right, for instance,
figured out how they had been exploited about halfway through President
Bush’s second term. Their discontent has now made them expendable.
Whatever new causes will be courted, Republicans will do their best to
attend rallies, generate anger and blame liberals. When it comes to changing
things, however, their default priority remains the same: enrich the coffers
of the wealthy, and offer emotion-laden platitudes to all the rest.
It will be interesting to see what wedge issues they
promote. Erasing the wall of separation between church and state only
went so far. Forced pregnancies appealed to only so many. Trading science
in the classroom for creationism had its backlash as well.
They say they want to reform Washington – this
after spreading more division and corruption than anyone thought possible.
As usual, they point to liberals as the culprits, hoping no one looks
beyond their accusatory rhetoric. As Abraham Lincoln warned, however,
“you can’t fool all of the people, all of the time.”
Sooner or later the words seem hollow, especially when delivering
the opposite of what they promise.
It is only natural for the promise to lower taxes to
have certain appeal, but the words have become a vehicle for extremism
of the worst kind. Militant. Separatist. Religious. Hate-filled. Greedy.
Anti-rational. Condemning the very government of the people that our founders
so carefully built, and then calling it patriotism.
I wish that well meaning advocates like Michael Steel
and Gov. Tim Pawlenty could hear their own rhetoric as those of us who
are not already converted hear it. Empty. Frightening. Monolithic. Full
of complaints, but no vision. Always two steps behind the needs of the
time. Anti-intellectual. Un-American, in the sense of our founders’
Age of Enlightenment intent.
Let’s say that diehard conservatives actually
did manage to lower taxes and shrink the federal government (instead of
expanding government and multiplying our debt).
Would we be a better people because of it?
Would we become more honorable or compassionate?
More honest?
Would we somehow bring peace into the world?
Reduce poverty?
Enrich the rights of others?
Safeguard our shores?
Unite our divided people because conservatives finally
won?
Would Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity finally
shut up and do something constructive with their lives?
No. We are dealing with something that only disguises
itself as a movement or ideology. Conservatism is far too limited in scope
and vision, and leaves no room for inclusiveness, which is a prerequisite
of social freedom. It is a negation of ideology, of liberal philosophy
more specifically, which is what our nation was founded on, as the founders
freely admitted. Conservatives in their day resisted independence, just
as conservatives in the 1960 and 70s resisted equal rights for minorities
and women, and protest against gay rights today. It appears that they
always need some group of citizens to oppress, while claiming that they
are the victims.
Here we find the monster in our midst. In the past,
conservatives felt that their myopic view of freedom allowed them to deny
other people’s rights, even enforce their religious views on the
entire population. All this while claiming to be patriots at the same
time! This combination of patriotic fervor and un-American attitudes,
policies and tactics is a serious threat to everything we stand for. It
undercuts the entire idea of freedom and the social contract that supports
it.
To make matters worse, their idea of trench warfare
is finally causing liberals to fight back. Liberal television talk shows
are finding their voices, and using conservative tactics of nitpicking
and spin to counter the decades long assault. This can only have a negative
impact on the liberal foundations of our society, dragging liberalism
down to the level of conservative political tactics. This is not to say
that liberals have never played dirty politics before, but it was never
the mainstay and centerpiece of their ideology. They do have vision for
the future, and a desire to make the world a better place for everyone.
I hate to think of how many of our elderly citizens
would live without liberal programs like Social Security and civil rights
initiatives. I would hate to see the world conservatives would give our
children, without protection of the environment, and with pre-emptive
wars escalating around the world, and decimation of the planet's oil reserves.
Class divisions might eventually result in a world where poor workers
lived only for the pleasure of the rich.
Is
this what we want? It's time for people to look carefully at conservatism
and see it for what it is.
