The current Democratic Party and Republican Party drama was predicted in 2012 in a column. Here are the parts of it:
The Republican Party of Teddy Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon is dead. Thomas Wolfe had it right – “You Can’t Go Home Again.” Those expecting the GOP to shift more towards the center if polls this fall show a backlash against its 2012 conservative orientation will be disappointed. And if Romney loses, hardline conservatives won’t just hand Jeb Bush the keys to the party in 2016. The Tea Party movement and conservative talk show hosts will have “won” the battle for the Republican Party.
Centrists are being weeded out in both parties. Uh, oh, here come tiresome accusations of “false equivalency,” a phrase as grating as chalk on a blackboard. Several factors (including his residency) played a role in Indiana Republican Senator Dick Lugar’s political demise, but a big one was his being targeted by Tea Partiers for being too moderate. Utah’s Sen. Orrin Hatch will face a primary challenge due to his (gasp!) reaching across the aisle.
The Daily Beast’s John Avlon correctly points out that while hunting RINOs (Republicans in Name Only) is a popular GOP sport, “DINO hunting is starting to catch on in Democratic circles,” and two Democratic centrists were defeated in the recent primary in Pennsylvania. The trending is NOT towards moderation or non-lockstep partisans in Congress or in the country.
This was written by someone very close to me.
Many thanks to the Thomas Wolfe Was Wrong blog for pointing it and sending me this link. In the email, it said:
“This is our blog: http://thomaswolfewaswrong.tumblr.com/
It’s an ongoing blog for people who write the sentences: “Thomas Wolfe Was Wrong. You can go home again.”
But every now and then, we come across someone who says Thomas Wolfe Was Right. That was you my friend. And when people do that, we send them a Thommie.
photo credit: Three Card Monte via photopin (license)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.