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politics and politicians Title: Fix the GOP, Don’t Abandon It Last week, to much fanfare, Glenn Beck declared that he was leaving the Republican party and becoming an independent. During a Tuesday night appearance on the O’Reilly Factor, Beck explained his decision thusly: Beck has a point here. Granted, he’s overstating the case to some degree -- political constraints are such that the GOP can’t do a lot of what he demands. But there are indeed issues where the politics favor the Republicans -- the insurer bailout in Obamacare, farm subsidies, highway spending, and the Export-Import Bank -- where the party is not doing much of anything. Far too often, the GOP seems more inclined to go-along-to-get-along then do the hard work needed to reform government. As I argued here, and in my new book, the Republican party has been aligned with big business for almost 150 years. In many respects, this is a good thing for conservatism. People who are employed by a business, after all, do not need the government to prosper. And big business employs a lot of people, so conservatives have common cause. But businesses are profit-maximizing agents, and insofar as they believe the government can assist them, they will go rent seeking. Corporate and professional interests have many friends in the Republican party, who, always in the guise of promoting “economic growth,” pay off their patrons with corporate welfare, favorable regulations, conciliatory tax policy, and the like. Republicans have been doing this for big business since the 1870s, and they continue to do so to this day. So Beck is right: a lot of what the Republicans do is not conservatism. It’s more akin to interest-group liberalism. However, leaving the GOP is a bad idea, for two reasons. First, the Republican party is not going to let conservatives go anywhere else. There has never been a viable third party in the country, at least not one that has persisted over the long run. This has to do with the nature of our elections. Political theorist Maurice Duverger demonstrated fifty years ago that winner-take-all contests centered around discrete geographical areas typically produce a two-party system. There are exceptions, but they’re rare. Moreover, third parties that do thrive temporarily are co-opted by one of the two major parties -- usually to the detriment of the ideological movement that spawned the third party in the first place. For instance, the Populist party was captured by the Democrats in 1896, and did not see traction on any of its issues for nearly 20 more years. The Progressive party ended up getting split between the two major parties after 1916. Similarly, the Perot movement ended up fueling the “Republican Revolution” of 1994, but the deficit-cutting zeal of the GOP in the mid-1990s soon gave way to the gross profligacy of Congress during the George W. Bush years. As if all that isn’t enough, even the seemingly easy task of forming a third party is a challenge. The two parties can be thought of as opponents in most respects, but they can also be understood to operate a cartel that restricts entry by competitors. A third party will thus have to jump through all sorts of hoops to get itself listed on the ballot, and even more to be included in presidential debates. None of this is coincidental. The two parties want us to have a choice … between the two parties! Second, the Republican party can be reformed. It may be very hard to do so, but the GOP is not a political machine. It is not a closed system, impervious to change. It’s open, and grassroots reformers have recourse -- in the form of party primaries. They may be seriously out-financed in those contests. Still, it is one thing to be an underdog, and another to have no hope of change at all. And there is hope. In fact, I’d argue that there has been an extraordinary amount of change within the GOP over the last generation. Reformers have made some real gains. In the wake of the 2014 wave, I noted this about the incoming Senate: The House has shown similar signs of improvement. The “insurgent” class of House reformers is now large enough to make real noise. Did such a group really exist a decade ago? Certainly not with the same numbers. There is no denying that conservative reformers have won some big elections in the last few cycles, and that the reformist right is on the rise within the GOP, if not yet dominant. Maybe part of the frustration is that there has been change, but no breakthroughs. That’s because breakthroughs are hard in our system of government -- by design. That is one of Madison’s big points in Federalist #10 and #51; he wants our system to be responsive to changes in public mood, but -- fearful of fractious majorities -- he also promotes a system of checks and balances to slow change down. Moreover, the powers that be in the Republican party have been doing things a certain way for a century and a half. They are not going to give up just because conservatives have won a handful of elections. Still, given the heartening results of the last few elections, rather than giving up on the GOP, conservative reformers should take careful note of their successes and failures, and refine their strategies. For instance, in 2014, there was a lot of emphasis on defeating incumbent Republican senators. This was largely unsuccessful. Meanwhile, Dave Brat came out of nowhere to defeat Eric Cantor. Therefore, perhaps the point of attack in the next cycle should be the many go-along-to-get-along Republican House members, who may be more vulnerable. The point is that the Republican party is no doubt in need of reform, but still -- it can be reformed. That won’t come easy. Reform never does because the powers that be always prefer the status quo to change, but it can be done. Glenn Beck should stay in the party and lend a hand. Jay Cost is a staff writer at The Weekly Standard. His new book, A Republic No More: Big Government and the Rise of American Political Corruption, is now available. Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 12.
#3. To: TooConservative (#0)
Man up and leave the GOP. Don't pretend it is fixable. Accountability. When people have power and refuse to use it to do what they said they were going to do, they are liars. The first few times, you may think that they didn't understand, but once the same pattern of behavior is repeated for 43 consecutive years, it's time to be honest with yourselves and man up and do what must be done. Consider one issue - one single issue. You could make it any issue you please: crony capitalism, overseas empire, open borders. I'm going to pick abortion, because abortion is an issue that Republicans pretend they own. Well, they DO own it. Literally. Roe v. Wade was put into place, 7-2, by a Republican Supreme Court. And its reach was extended and entrenched during Reagan's Presidency, 5-4, by a Republican Supreme Court. Fact is, the Supreme Court has been dominated continuously by Republicans every day of every year since 1969. Fact is, the Republicans can and do impose discipline on their party, and the Supreme Court has been very reliable on Republican issue after issue. In 1973, the Republicans did not have to impose Roe. And every day since they could strike it down. In the 42 years since 1973, Republicans have controlled the White House for 24 years, and Democrats have controlled it for 18. During that time, the entire Supreme Court has been replaced, to the last man. Republicans have appointed 7 Justices since then. Democrats have appointed four. All Democrat justices are always pro-abortion, anti-gun, pro-this, anti-that. Democrats appoint justices who are very reliably Democrat, who uphold Democrat ideals. Of the seven justices that the Republicans have appointed since Roe, four have voted for abortion, either directly or tacitly. The majority of Republican justices appointed since Roe v. Wade have been pro-choice. As many pro-choice Republicans have been appointed to the bench since Roe as pro-choice Democrats. So, the Republican party GAVE us Roe v. Wade, via their Supreme Court, and they have upheld and entrenched Roe v. Wade via their Supreme Court. As the court has turned over, the majority of justices they have appointed have voted pro- choice. The Republican position that they are the "pro-life party" is a lie. It's a well-told lie, and people desperate to end the scourge of abortion have bought it hook like and sinker. But consider the Republican Presidents and nominees since Roe. After Nixon there was Reagan. He stated he was pro-life, and may have been personally. But he appointed two pro-abortion justices to the Supreme Court, who were the deciding margin for Casey. He only appointed one putatively pro-life justice. Bush 41 was pro-choice. He appointed Souter. And then of course Bush 43. Bush gave us Alito, who seems pro-life, but he also gave us Roberts, who switched his vote at the last minute to support Obamacare, with its abortion mandate. And he tried to give us Harriet Miers. McCain was always "moderate" on abortion. He talks the game but never fights. Romney was pro-choice. Democrats appoint people who reflect their ideology. AND SO DO REPUBLICANS. They just PRETEND that they don't, to keep the duped rube pro-lifers in ranks. It's time for pro-lifers to stop being dupes, grow a pair and walk out of the Republican Party en masse. It cannot be fixed, and the party of Roe SHOULD not be fixed. It should be destroyed. Destroy the GOP, and you destroy the entrenched power of the crony capitalists. Can the pro-lifers on their own overturn Roe? Maybe, over time, with the Hispanic vote. Maybe not. But if they stay as neutered eunuchs in Republican ranks, they'll NEVER overturn it. The Republicans Party gave us Roe, and has carefully maintained the power structure on the court to keep Roe. It's a cinch that as long as pro-lifers stay Republican, abortion will be progressively strengthened by the decisions of Republicans in power. They gave us Roe, they extended Roe, and they gave Roe public funding. The Republican Party is, by its acts, more pro-abortion than the Democrats. Democrats talk about abortion, but Republicans put it into the Constitution. Pro-lifers have to choose between their belief in life and the Republican Party. To stay in the GOP is to be a Jewish Nazi. It's foolish, and it doesn't influence the bad guys.
I could not agree more, you could write a novel describing the back-stabbing and double dealing of OUR PARTY, or should I say ex-party.
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