Any Republican who is pragmatic runs the risk of being labeled a RINO. That is the lesson coming from the Zealots in the GOP, who act as if they have the authority to dictate who is and isn’t a Republican. Their use of the “RINO” slur is indicative of their mentality.
Right now, Democrats are feeling gleeful as they watch the Republican Party fight off the Zealots.
The Republicans of the U.S. Senate openly rebuked Ted Cruz after he called Mitch McConnell a liar while speaking on the floor of the Senate.
House Republicans rallied around John Boehner when Mark Meadows tried to get Boehner removed from his position as House Speaker. CNN’s Deirdre Walsh writes, “Meadows faced his own blowback on Wednesday. Fellow members of the House Freedom Caucus, a group he founded with other conservatives to push leaders to adopt their agenda, tried to kick him out of the group on Wednesday, according to two House GOP sources familiar with the discussion. There wasn’t enough consensus among the members to force him out entirely, but members discussed forcing him to resign from the board.”
Mike Huckabee’s claim that President Obama “will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven” caused Republican-leaning commentators to grimace. PowerLine’s Paul Mirengoff describes Huckabee’s claim as being overblown rhetoric. On the Fox News program The Five, Geraldo Rivera scolded Huckabee with the following response:
As a Jew, and I have to tell you, with people who work in the anti-defamation league and relatives on sides, the Levis, and the Riveras and the trademans (ph), it was inappropriate. There are some places you cannot go. You cannot compare the slaughter of 6 million Jews to anything other than — maybe the slaughter of the Armenians or something else in history. You cannot compare it to a negotiation over a deal like this, governor. There are some things you have offended, many, many people in the Jewish community, not only the organized Jewish community, but the rank and file. It is inappropriate to compare the holocaust to anything. And if you start using that as a sloppily rhetorical phrase, you’re going to get in trouble.
Rivera is correct. Jonathan A. Greenblatt, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, issued a press release in which he states, “Whatever one’s views of the nuclear agreement with Iran – and we have been critical of it, noting that there are serious unanswered questions that need to be addressed – comments such as those by Mike Huckabee suggesting the president is leading Israel to another Holocaust are completely out of line and unacceptable.”
In a commentary published by The Daily Beast, P.J. O’Rourke writes an open letter to Huckabee in which O’Rourke says to Huckabee, “Mike, national opinion is flowing so fast against your brand of conservatism that you look — even to God-fearing Republicans — like a man trying to row up Class 5 rapids on a standing paddleboard.”
O’Rourke is wrong about one thing. Huckabee’s (and Cruz’s) brand of conservatism isn’t conservatism at all. Instead, it is a modern-day version of the ideology of the Zealots of First-Century Judea. The Wikipedia entry about the original Zealots states, “In the Talmud, the Zealots are the non-religious (not following the religious leaders), and are also called the Biryonim meaning “boorish”, “wild”, or “ruffians”, and are condemned for their aggression, their unwillingness to compromise to save the survivors of besieged Jerusalem, and their blind militarism against the Rabbis’ opinion to seek treaties for peace.”
The above-quoted description fits the Zealots of the GOP, who go for the jugular vein of anyone who dares to disagree with them, including Republican Party leaders.
If the GOP wants to win the 2016 presidential contest, then it is going to have to prevent itself from being taken over by the Zealots. The GOP succeeds by keeping its tent the size of a circus tent. The Zealots are trying to turn it into a pup tent. The latter is just too small for an adult elephant.
By the way, Zealots aren’t beyond redemption. After all, according to the New Testament, Jesus selected a Zealot to be one of his disciples.
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Side Note: The Democratic Party has its own Zealots, and this author has written about them in the past. However, they haven’t been in the U.S. news lately as GOP Zealots have been.
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Featured Image created by this post’s author, with the use of an elephant drawing from Shutterstock.
The “Wanted” posters say the following about David: “Wanted: A refugee from planet Melmac masquerading as a human. Loves cats. If seen, contact the Alien Task Force.”