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The rigor mortis is setting in the Republican Party

 
 
 
ideologyhunter said:
'Staunch'? The word 'rabid' comes to mind. Read Gerald Ford's assessment of the G.O.P. in Write It When I'm Gone --he was speaking in the 90's and noting that the party was so radicalized that he could have no part in it, if he was still an office seeker. Reagan took positions against assault weapons and for tax increases (not to mention preserving a safety net, to the extent he meant it) that I don't hear any of today's loud, angry conservative candidates espousing. (Granted, Reagan's tax increases were all payroll taxes & not marginal rate hikes.)
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There's not a lot of intellectualism in the Republican Party today, and that may be the understatement of understatements. It's react to this and react to that and god bless America and look out for gays and look out for terrorists and look out for liberals and go home immigrants. It's sad. It's sport and cheerleading and one-liners. Where the hell is Barry Goldwater when you need him?
 
Jason Harvestdancer said:
lpetrich said:
That's what it has become, despite the denials of certain yellow-dog Republicans.
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Does that mean the party of Davis is now the party of Lincoln?
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If that's what you want to call the Democratic Party, yes.

In fact, by present-day standards, Abe Lincoln would in some ways be a good Democrat.
  • Easily-affordable housing: the Homestead Act
  • Higher education: land-grant colleges
  • Infrastructure: the Transcontinental Railroad
  • Progressive taxation
  • Civil rights
  • Federal power (at least that's the right-wing stereotype of a Democrat)
 
Actually mold and rot have already progressed rather far and we are really just looking at bones here. The Repuglicans are weird mix of fundamentalist religionists, billionaires, and fossilized fossil fuel executives who think they ought to be allowed to keep ruling the world and feel they have the right to DEFINE THE TRUTH to suit their purposes. They are a sorry lot trying to make the rest of us an even sorrier lot. To put it bluntly they utterly lack the imagination to even make their lies interesting and just keep buying their TRUTH with their money. Somehow just enough of our poor frightened citizenry vote for these bastards even though they promise their constituencies the government will do nothing. That's one hell of a campaign promise, but it is what you get from a Repuglican.:eeka:
 
lpetrich said:
Jason Harvestdancer said:
Does that mean the party of Davis is now the party of Lincoln?
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If that's what you want to call the Democratic Party, yes.

In fact, by present-day standards, Abe Lincoln would in some ways be a good Democrat.
  • Easily-affordable housing: the Homestead Act
  • Higher education: land-grant colleges
  • Infrastructure: the Transcontinental Railroad
  • Progressive taxation
  • Civil rights
  • Federal power (at least that's the right-wing stereotype of a Democrat)
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So Lincoln was big government. Nice. And I honestly believe the Republicans haven't changed much from that.

  • Militarism and police state
  • Government support of corporations
  • Spying on the population
  • Stripping dissidents of citizenship
  • Easy money policies
  • Federal power
 
Complain about "government support of corporations" takes away from libertarians' perpetual grumbling about how governments do just about nothing but persecute businesses.

As to "easy money policies", what might those be?
 
The Republican party of Lincoln was the least conservative, most radical party ever to elect a president from it in the history of the US. And it was able to do that only because the Democrats split in two, and the existence of a sizable third party, the Constitutional Union.
 
I think trump is the most electable guy the Republicans are running. I don't see why that should be shocking. He is both a breath of fresh air, will say things others won't, and has some degree of cross-over appeal to Democrats. His persona alone will win him more than anybody else on his side of the fence. If he goes up against Hillary, it could be a lot closer than people think too, if she is painted as the establishment candidate and he as the outsider, and if enough anti-Hillary venom is brought to focus. Yes. Trump could win. Scary but I really think its possible. Yes, despite what he has said about immigrants, women, etc.
 
I have often said on these pages that I believe that the current Republican party isn't so much a party of conservatives anymore than they are a party of reactionaries. It is the difference between being conservative in the sense of opposing change, the fear of change, the maintenance of the status quo, the existing social order and the existing power structure, to a party that wants to return to the way that things were in the past, to a better time.

But now with especially Trump but also to a lesser degree with Cruz, Dr. Dull and Rubio, they seem to be moving to full fascism.

Consider the 14 defining characteristics of fascism from here.

1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism

2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights

3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause

4. Supremacy of the Military

5. Rampant Sexism

6. Controlled Mass Media

7. Obsession with National Security

8. Religion and Government are Intertwined

9. Corporate Power is Protected

10. Labor Power is Suppressed

11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts

12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment

13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption

14. Fraudulent Elections
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Also here, with a slightly different list of characteristics of fascism.

... As of August, Trump had most of the ingredients for a fascist movement: the victim complex, the fervent nationalism, the obsession with national purity and cleansing purges, and the cult of personality. He was missing the organized violence, a left-wing challenge strong enough to push traditional conservative elites into his camp, support for wars of aggression, and a full-bore attack on democracy itself. He's made much progress on all but the last one.
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And also here.

... Since launching his campaign this summer, the billionaire real estate magnate has regularly deployed inflammatory rhetoric about immigrants -- particularly regarding Latinos -- and repeatedly raised the alarm about foreigners entering the country. That has escalated following the series of shooting rampages and explosions in Paris this month allegedly perpetrated by ISIS and amid a national debate over accepting Syrian refugees.

Most striking has been Trump's aim at Muslims in the United States. He's been widely denounced for claiming that people in New Jersey — a state with "large Arab populations," he said — cheered after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. That, coupled with his seeming endorsement of a national registry to track Muslims in the country, has sparked a new level of condemnation from conservatives already on edge about Trump's endurance.

"Trump is a fascist. And that's not a term I use loosely or often. But he's earned it," tweeted Max Boot, a conservative fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who is advising Marco Rubio.

... former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore said Trump's immigration policies, including the idea of creating a "deportation force" to remove undocumented immigrants from the country, amounted to "fascist talk."

The fresh accusations of fascist behavior are extraordinarily charged -- the term is often equated with Nazism. The use of such a loaded word marks one more step in the evolution of the establishment's view of Trump, from a political clown to something much more malevolent and dangerous.

And it also reflects an increasingly visible and acute level of frustration and disbelief about Trump within the GOP, as Republicans view Trump's candidacy as an explosive mixture of economic populism with strongman personality politics. While it's unclear whether Trump is motivated by any coherent political philosophy, it's hard to recall another recent presidential candidate who has campaigned so openly on solving problems by sheer personal will. ...

Jindal: Trump is a madman who must be stopped
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lpetrich said:
Complain about "government support of corporations" takes away from libertarians' perpetual grumbling about how governments do just about nothing but persecute businesses.

As to "easy money policies", what might those be?
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Generally anything short of a bi-metal standard for money, that is gold and silver, as I understand the libertarian economics, Austrian economics.

The Republican party has endorsed a return to the gold standard in each of the last two presidential elections and it is once again in the party platform for 2016.

It is worth noting that the only time that the world's major economies were on the gold standard was ~1875 to 1914. During this period the countries had a declining amount of gold to back their currencies in circulation from about 50% in the beginning to about 10% when most abandoned it going into world war one. In other words, at the end it was nothing more than an extremely cumbersome fiat currency.
 
lpetrich said:
Complain about "government support of corporations" takes away from libertarians' perpetual grumbling about how governments do just about nothing but persecute businesses.
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Fascinating. Truly fascinating.

lpetrich said:
As to "easy money policies", what might those be?
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Probably too advanced a topic.

But at least you are on the same page with the other respondant to your post. Neither of you are on the same page as I am, but whatever.
 
I am waiting for Trump or perhaps Fiorina to suggest that criminals could be released from prison branded and pressed into corporate servitude as an alternative to paying anybody minimum wage. That would give them a one two punch...gold standard and the return of slavery.;)
 
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