The modern Republican Party's plight can be compared, I think, to the experience of American Protestantism in the last half of the 19th century. I'll explain in a minute.
Today, many moderates, Democrats, Independents, as well as liberals, have difficulty comprehending what looks like an obvious and ongoing denial of reality by the modern Republican Party. The creation of faux-narratives about virtually any event by movement conservatives, and the insistence that those faux-narratives actually define truth, a kind of twisted political post-modernism, has been the leading source of frustration for those who insist on empirical and scientific data.
This dynamic has led to even more division in the country where namecalling, mockery, and demonizing the other side has, so far, prevailed. The Reverend confesses that he has participated in this dynamic, often with vigor.
That being said…..The Renaissance, from the 14th through the 17th centuries, with it's emphasis on a humanist method of study rather than a spiritual one, presented challenges for religion. The Enlightenment period of history in the 18th century carried this challenge to religion even further with it's focus on reason, rather than faith, as the basis for establishing truth. Our American Founding Fathers, it can be said, were motivated by Enlightenment principles. The Industrial Revolution was a welcome byproduct of these two preceding "ages."
Although organized Christianity had what were called "Great Awakening" periods throughout these previously mentioned "ages", periods in which religious thinking experienced reform and change…..it is also true that many fringe Christian groups also came into existence during this time.
The Jehovah's Witnesses group was founded in the late 19th century in America. So too, the Seventh-Day Adventists and Christian Scientists. The Latter Day Saints (Mormons) sprouted during the early 19th century.
My purpose here is not to disparage any particular denomination or sect of Christianity, or any adherents to the dogma those denominations set forth. My point is that when traditional religious systems are challenged by science, education in general, and secular reasoning…..adherents to the "old way" often respond to those challenges with their own "new" interpretations.
Rather than considering or embracing new, emerging scientific and rational explanations for reality, made possible by Renaissance and Enlightenment progress, the aforementioned sects resorted to their own newfangled, and often bizarre, interpretations of reality.
Which sets up a segway to the Republican Party in America today.
I don't think there is any question, especially in light of the last 10-15 years, that modern Republican doctrine is experiencing serious challenges. While the traditional conservative values of self-determination and financial responsibility will always maintain their rightful place in our political discourse……recent conservative "values" are being rejected by mainstream Americans as misguided, contradictory, hypocritical, or in some cases, like the new Christian cults of the 19th century, radical and even bizarre.
The Republican Party's deal with the devil in hitching it's wagon to modern evangelical Christianity has given birth to today's active denial, or censoring, of scientific evidence. This odd-bedfellows combination produced the bizarre frenzy of GOP politicians and religious "right to lifers" that America witnessed in the Terri Schiavo ordeal. Newt Gingrich, in his most recent speech, said that college professors and high school teachers needed "removed." Modern conservatives want college professors actively "challenged", "alternative" religion-based concepts offered up equally with science-based ones, "secularists removed."
The GOP's embrace of discrimination in the gay rights issue, using as it's basis, "traditional moral values", or "defense of traditional marriage" is belied by a steady parade of Republican politicians (Gingrich, Livingston, Foley, Craig, Giuliani, Ensign) acting immorally and destructively in their own marriages. Pragmatic immigration reform has often been replaced with hateful screeds directed towards Hispanics, a stiff-necked approach to realism, a demonization of those who are considered in favor of "amnesty", a senseless and warped attack on a highly qualified Supreme Court nominee.
The recent blowup in the financial world, a direct result of the conservative doctrine of deregulation which relies on almost divine powers of an alleged "free market, combined with an almost crazed focus on tax cutting and benefit-giving to the most wealthy, has left conservatives reeling…..yet there is no admission by Republicans that their traditional doctrines have proven to be a total failure.
A political party once proud of their allegiance to liberty, freedom, and the rule of law….has now morphed into a party defending just the opposite. Torture, gulags, the denial of rights, the retraction of American freedoms, the promotion of lawlessness, the justification of government secrecy, pre-emptive wars, unaccountability…..are all now defended by the Republican Party.
In other words…..in the face of modern challenges to what conservatives have traditionally believed in……the Republican Party has responded with self-radicalization, a response so extreme and radical that facts and empirical evidence are now replaced daily with the most bizarre narratives imaginable. Moderate conservatives who insist on pragmatism and scientific fact are purged and demonized much like any religious cult would do.
If you are like me, and think that the Republican Party has gotten even more extreme over the last 6 months, to the point of bizarro….I suggest that the reason is that the GOP is afraid of the modern challenges which they have no answer for. The GOP either has no rational alternatives to offer to the voters who have rejected them or those new ideas can't be offered for fear they will be an acknowledgment of past errors. The GOP has been in the process of establishing a new political cult, cocooning itself as it were, in self-defense mode against a changing world it's members cannot face up to.
It's sad to witness.
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
What I've noticed is that dem bloggers and politicians talk less and less about The One's job performance and more and more about the minority party as time goes on.
It's understandable–no one likes to admit they've been snookered by a charlatan–but increasingly transparent.
Many left bloggers, including myself, have criticized Obama harshly for continuing anti-American, anti-law, Bush/Cheney policies.
Interesting to note is that conservatives never criticized the criminal Bush gang…..ever. I wonder why that was?
I also wonder why FOX won't report on Senator Ensign's Promise Keeping…..you know, that lofty morality passion play called Focusing on Your Neighbor's Wife…..kind of like Dobson's stuff, only kinkier. Cuckolding for Christ.
The republican party has become more bizarro which in my mind happened when Bush the 2nd totally lost his way. This was well before 9/11 although many on the right point to that attack and claim he was right because we have been safe since. Being bizzare is not only a trait the right deserves, the left is also very deserving. JFK would not recognize his party today, we need a 3rd choice but there is no way current election laws would allow it. Bring back the Whigs! Give us a true alternatve. We need to get politics out of government, sure wish I knew how.
I'll second what Steve said, though I'd like to elevate the Libertarians instead of bringing back the Whigs.
The Democrats seem extremely radical to me, even more than the Republicans. I consider the religious fundamentalists to be pretty much of a fringe element within the Republican party. Gingrich sure ain't one of them, and I don't get why it's worse when a Republican cheats on his wife than it is when a Democrat does it. It's the exact same human weakness, and they all take the exact same marital vows.
I just can't believe what I see happening in this country right now. It's like the federal government has taken a stupid pill and is driving the country down the drain on purpose. It seems purposeful, anyway. I can't believe anybody is really this stupid.
We need domestic energy, and the Dems take oil and nuclear out of the equation. They even resist natural gas. That is very radical, and very stupid.
We bailed out GM and Chrysler with $90 billion to prevent them from going into bankruptcy….and then they went BANKRUPT.
We have a president who talks about fiscal responsibility at the same time he's increasing federal spending and deficits to unprecedented levels.
We have a president who talks about what a great success his stimulus plan is (even though he didn't read it), when most of the money hasn't even been spent and 1.6 million jobs have been lost since it passed. That same president creates the idea of the unmeasurable "saved" job for the first time ever.
We have new financial rules that don't address Fannie/Freddie or subprime mortgages, and they give the Federal Reserve tons more power, when the Fed was a big part of the problem in the first place.
We have ACORN, who attempted to pass off hundreds of thousands of phony voter registration forms and is being investigated in 14 states, getting money to conduct the U.S. Census. Again, the stupidity seems purposeful.
We have environmental extremists in the federal government at the EPA, who do things like tell 80,000 farmers in California, who sit on the best growing land in the country, that they can't have access to ANY water, because it will interfere with with the habitat of a smelt. A SMELT !!! The farmers are all going broke and the land is arid. Beyond stupid.
We have nutjobs at the FDA who call Cheerios a drug and say it will have to be regulated as such because the Cheerios box says Cheerios can help lower cholesterol.
We have the same nutjobs at the FDA banning flavored nicotine, but then making an exception for MENTHOL (because people actually SMOKE menthol, as opposed to the things the FDA banned). Duh.
We have Democrats who want to eliminate the secret ballot from union voting. That's unamerican and very transparent.
We have liberals who think Judge Sotomayor saying Latina judges reach better conclusions than white male judges is perfectly acceptable, but who demonized Senator George Allen for saying the word "macaca," when nobody even knew what that word meant (and I can't even remember now what it means). Allen lost his re-election bid over it.
We have liberals blaming the actions of lunatic murderers on Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly. Stupid doesn't even begin to cover that moronic idea.
We have a president who spends every day blaming the previous administration for absolutely everything, but when Bush speaks ONE TIME to defend himself, the liberal media acts like Bush is the worst person in the world.
We have a news media that is 80-90% in the Democrats' corner, but somehow the one conservative leaning station, Fox News, is a problem. Insane. It should be REQUIRED that we have a Fox News to offset all the others.
We have a president who, in only 5 months on the jobs, has gone back on his word so often that you can't even count them all, but he's popular (because the media doesn't let you know about all his broken promises).
We have a Speaker of the House who said the CIA lies to her all the time, but NOBODY in the Democratic party thinks that statement should be either a) retracted, or b) investigated. This comes after the Dems screamed bloody murder about Valerie Plame being outed by Bob Novak and there was a 2 1/2 year investigation. I guess national security only matters if there is some partisan gain to be had by the Democrats.
Needless to say, I could come up with a hundred more examples of the lunacy of the Democrats, but hopefully you get my point. Radical is as radical does.
btw, I never have been able to understand what "post-modernism" means. If modern means "current, up-to-date," what does post-modern mean ? It seems like it should mean "the future."
Conservatives criticized the "Bush gang" all the time, Reverend. I haven't heard a politician on the right say a nice thing about Bush in the last two or three years.
Even though his Iraq "boondoggle" looks like it might be paying off a decade before anyone had a right to expect.
Why is it that the anti-Obamas seemingly always insufficiently research their rhetoric? I always get the impression they do not read to the punchline before they start stating their case. That said I can often see the same with anti-conservatives That tells me they are defending their preconceived positions and not really interested in improving our situation. Americans are sick of lousy and corrupt government — period. How do you fix that if all you do is bitch about what the other side is doing?
The only way our government can be fixed is through public campaign financing laws.
The only way conservatives can be "fixed" is for them to quit lying and start accepting reality.
Both seem like impossible tasks to me.
I think the republicans thought they had to appeal to their radical right wing religious base. By doing so they lost many in the middle. Christians fundamentalists who believe the worlds coming to a end and the future of our planet is irrelevant, because it has no future is wacko and most people know that. Some might have thought Obama was a radical lefftie at first , but now I think we can see he's taking the party more to the middle.
Da King when in history have we ever had a out going president or VICE president criticize the new President so soon?
I cant remember Clinton doing so . And the news media is not in the democratic corner. The news media reports the news ..but the republicans want half truths. They want to hear spin that FOX noise gives. So they say it is a liberal media. Listen to the radio how many are speaking to the left ?
It is like having real wrestling and wrestlemania and people complaining , when they just dont get that wrestlemania is fake and they think it is real. You want a tabloid you got it on the right wing radio and FOX ..they are your fake news channels.
They are your noise.
Excellent post.
I was raised in a very traditional Christian and Republican home. For the first 35 years of my life I was a Republican. I agree that the GOP has morphed itself into something unrecognizable to the party it once was. I left the GOP for a variety of reasons. The primary one was the fact that as a gay man I was demonized by the GOP. I also have issue with a party that seems to base its platform on hate and negativity. Isn’t it interesting that his attitude is paired with alliances to “Christian” beliefs and values. If only they could see that these values are far from the intent of the Word as it is given in the Bible.
It is time for those in the GOP who adhere to the fundamental principles of conservative to take control of the party and restore it to the party it once was. I doubt I will ever return to the GOP but I have hope that they will return to the point of playing a constructive and not destructive role in government.
Andrea,
Thanks for proving my point. You think it's perfectly fine for Obama to criticize Bush every single day, but then you have a problem when the Bush administration responds to the criticism. That's nuts, and is not consistent with free speech.
Please tell me about all the times Bush criticized the Clinton administration, because I don't remember that happening, and if it did happen, it was nowhere near to what Obama is doing.
Then you pick out radio as your example of the media. I wonder why you didn't use television or newspapers as your examples, which are the places most people get their news. Never mind. I already know why, and so do you. It's because they are mouthpieces for the Democratic party.
Good luck convincing me that the NY Times, NBC, MSNBC, or CBS is just "reporting the news." Is it even possible that anyone in the country still believes that ? They aren't paying much attention if they do.
And I can tell by your comments that you don't watch Fox News. You're just regurgitating the liberal spin.
Thank you Andrea, and also Tom B, for your insightful comments.
Like Steven Colbert says…."facts are known to have a liberal bias."
and a statement about Republicans I read this am. "One thing about being lost in the wilderness, you lose your sense of direction."
Good one. Sounds like something Yogi Berra would say.