Where is the heart and soul of the Republican Party? Is the fringe actually the fringe or the real G.O.P? To win the allegiance of independents, party officials declare that comments from fringe elements are not representative of most Republicans. Yet those espousing “extreme views” remain in good standing in the party.
The reason for the G.O.P.’s reluctance to discipline these supposed “outliers” is perhaps because they are not truly outliers, no matter how much party apologists try to make it seem so. There is a large body of support in the party for these so-called extreme elements. And many of the “fringe” statements come from elected officials and strike a responsive chord in party members.
The comments by Congressman Todd Akin running for the Senate in Missouri, about legitimate rape not resulting in pregnancy, was rebuffed by a number of prominent Republicans and campaign funding was withdrawn. However, many social conservatives in the party came to his defense and supporters rallied behind him in Missouri. Some polls still show him almost even with his opponent, Claire McCaskill.
Several weeks ago, the top elected official in Lubbock, Texas, Republican Judge Tom Head, on a local television station stated that if Obama were re-elected, civil unrest would result, with the president sending United Nations troops into Lubbock to put down the uprising. Head said Obama “is going to try to hand over the sovereignty of the United States to the U.N.” And that could cause “civil unrest, civil disobedience, civil war, maybe.” Perhaps Head was inspired by Republican Governor Rick Perry’s past statement about the right of Texas to secede from the Union if things were bad. The sound of silence by Republicans criticizing these statements has been deafening.
There have been numerous comments by other Republicans that strain credulity, such as Nevada Senate candidate Sharon Angle in 2010 speaking of the need to “take out” Senate Leader Harry Reid and possible armed insurrection in interviews. There has also been the birther movement among Republicans claiming that Obama was not born in the U.S. and was not a legitimate president. Though this was most prevalent around the 2008 election, Mitt Romney reignited it again with a recent speech that he said afterwards was misunderstood.
There has also been insistence by many Republicans that the 12 million undocumented immigrants in America all be deported, which would be impossible from a logistical standpoint and an economic nightmare. Yet a reasonable compromise on the immigration issue with the Democrats has been unachievable.
Global warming is a problem that Republicans refuse to admit, with a majority ignoring the scientific facts and claiming that human activity is not causing climate change. Of course, many Republicans also will not acknowledge the validity of evolution and want creationism taught in the schools.
Over the last half century, the Republican Party has slowly shifted further to the right, the process accelerating in the last twenty years. The mainstream now would have been considered the fringe fifty years ago, when moderates and pragmatists like Eisenhower, Rockefeller, Charles Percy and George Romney, along with the New England wing, dominated the party. Fiscally conservative and socially moderate, these Republicans also followed the tradition of Theodore Roosevelt and revered the environment. The G.O.P. tent even had room then for members who were pro-choice, though the 2012 Republican platform favors a Constitutional amendment banning abortion, with no exceptions for incest, rape, or to save the life of the mother. Some Republican officials in the past were also willing to raise taxes when necessary, as Ronald Reagan did. (All of these people would now be considered RINOs, Republicans In Name Only, by most party members.)
The idea of raising taxes is an anathema to current Republicans, with the vast majority of those in Washington, or those running for office, having signed a pledge not to do so, including presidential candidate Mitt Romney. It means the hands of these officials are tied if there are unforeseen circumstances and in terms of addressing the budget deficits, with only government spending cuts on the table.
The Republican Party today is not your father’s Republican Party. Whether or not it wins the 2012 elections, the question the Party needs to answer is whether its tilt to the right will cause it to sink as the future demographic waters wash over America?
A VietNam vet and a Columbia history major who became a medical doctor, Bob Levine has watched the evolution of American politics over the past 40 years with increasing alarm. He knows he’s not alone. Partisan grid-lock, massive cash contributions and even more massive expenditures on lobbyists have undermined real democracy, and there is more than just a whiff of corruption emanating from Washington. If the nation is to overcome lockstep partisanship, restore growth to the economy and bring its debt under control, Levine argues that it will require a strong centrist third party to bring about the necessary reforms. Levine’s previous book, Shock Therapy For the American Health Care System took a realist approach to health care from a physician’s informed point of view; Resurrecting Democracy takes a similar pragmatic approach, putting aside ideology and taking a hard look at facts on the ground. In his latest book, Levine shines a light that cuts through the miasma of party propaganda and reactionary thinking, and reveals a new path for American politics. This post is cross posted from his blog.
Political junkie, Vietnam vet, neurologist- three books on aging and dementia. Book on health care reform in 2009- Shock Therapy for the American Health Care System. Book on the need for a centrist third party- Resurrecting Democracy- A Citizen’s Call for a Centrist Third Party published in 2011. Aging Wisely, published in August 2014 by Rowman and Littlefield. Latest book- The Uninformed Voter published May 2020