I have an idea. Let’s see how many different groups of people I can alienate with one column.
As you know I am on something of a mission to change the way we do things and the way we see ourselves as people and as a society. I decided to begin that enormous task by first focusing on understanding and reforming the Republican Party (if possible). And I began that task by first focusing on local government and local issues. It has been quite a learning curve, but I am beginning to understand a great deal about how things work.
Republicans, like Democrats, represent a broad range of views. Groups come together and form a sometimes tenuous coalition to achieve common goals. The Democrats somehow bring together unions, environmental groups, feminists, socialists, and various minority groups. Republicans bring together business groups and Tea Partiers and libertarians and conservatives and the so-called Religious Right.
Both parties also have their establishment wing. These are the mostly career politicians and party insiders who are committed above all to the status quo. They defend the structures and procedures that are in place to keep those in power where they are and to prevent any radical change from occurring. And both parties have their team players; the haters and cheerleaders that simply hate the other team and love their side regardless of who is on their side or what they are trying to do.
And let’s not forget the ignorant. Both sides benefit from a large segment who are not paying any attention to the issues or people and will just go into a voting booth and vote for whatever the shiny flyer or negative attack ad tells them is the right thing to do. At least they vote; most people do not even cast a vote and many can tell you exactly nothing about their government. They are tuned out.
Let’s take a look at the groups that make up the Republican Party. The Tea Party started out as a diverse group of people who were upset with the massive size and scope of government and they came together to make a specific statement. We are Taxed Enough Already. Government is too big and too intrusive on all of our lives. I agree with that.
But, as you are aware, the movement got a little sidetracked. Instead of remaining grassroots and diverse and having a single narrow focus, they were hijacked by career politicians. They tried to win elections and wield power. Their mission and message expanded to include social issues and their image was tarnished, partly on purpose. They became associated with birthers and tin foil hats. Much of this was very unfair, and an insult to the original purpose and message.
The function of government is to create a level playing field and fair free markets. But politicians defend these rules in the name of jobs and stimulating the economy. They feel it is their duty to bring home the bacon for the people and businesses in their state or district in support of whatever plant or business employs the largest number of their constituents. It is not their job. They need to defend free markets and competition.
The various conservative faith-based organizations that align with the Republican Party believe that they must defend the traditional values that they believe in. They see these values being eroded away by a society that is ever-changing and not in the direction they want to see. As a result they have formed lobbying groups to try to obtain legislation favorable to their values.
Joe also spoke about the right of kids to pray in school. Again, I agree kids should have the right to practice their religion at school. Joe then began discussing their attempts to oppose gay marriage with legislation. He and others feel that gay marriage is wrong and erodes the family. I don’t believe government has any right to be involved in marriage in the first place. We disagree there.
After the meeting I spoke with Joe and asked him a few questions. I wondered how he felt about legislation regarding gambling, legalizing pot, etc. He clarified that his group did not address those areas but that he would favor legislation forbidding those things, because he sees them as immoral. My last question was about the death penalty. He favors it because he says the Bible says it is ok. I oppose the death penalty because I think life is sacred, and government should not kill people unless they are an immediate threat to others.
I respect people like Joe who stick up for their values but we cannot and should not legislate morality. Government should defend individual rights like freedom of speech and religion and the right to life, but what individual adults do in the privacy of their own home is nobody else’s business. Morality should be defended in the home and from the pulpit. We should speak out about the difference between right and wrong, between wise and unwise; but we have no business trying to legislate individual behaviors.
Libertarians may be considered the other end of the spectrum. Here again, the term has come to take on a negative meaning for many. Chris Christie is worried about the “libertarian streak” in the Republican Party. The libertarians believe that we need to roll back the police state and the abuse of liberties that comes with it. From the NSA to the Patriot Act to the militarization of the police they see an erosion of our civil liberties and they not only fear tyranny they see actual cases of government overreach happening all around us.
The libertarians share a Republican Party with the “law and order” crowd. Peter King and others see government’s top role as keeping everyone safe from the terrorists and bad guys and see no danger whatsoever from what they see as a few reasonable and necessary rules to give law enforcement at all levels the tools they need to keep control. Certainly there is a balance to be struck here, but my bias is clearly on the libertarian side. We should never trade liberty for security.
Anyone running for office as a Republican will call themselves a conservative. I am not sure I know what the term means anymore. To me it means traditionalist. To me it means defender of the status quo. It could mean you support big business or law and order or legislating morality. The people who use the term often mean that they are for limited government and individual liberty and free markets, but unless you ask specific questions the term has little meaning.
At the last meeting of the St. Charles County Republican Central Committee the new chairman Joe Brazil had each member stand and describe who they were and why they were there and what they hoped to accomplish. It took a while but was well worth it. There was a consensus that they wanted to restore the Republican brand and to let people know what it really stands for. It is the party of limited government and fiscal responsibility and free markets. It is the party of individual liberty and personal responsibility. And there was also a recurring theme that it is the party of “conservative values”.
Nobody listed support of big business or crony capitalism or preserving the establishment.
This brings us to the thorny issue of the upcoming election. Ann Coulter recently wrote a piece where she threatened to drown any Republican who did not vote for the party’s candidate. She wrote of the need for “us” to win the election against “them” (Democrats). This leads me to two groups I have not discussed yet – the establishment and the team players.
Ann Coulter is a hater. She hates everyone on the “other side”, and expects everyone on “our side” to be a team player, or she will hate you too. She is one of the law-and-order Republicans, an authoritarian who hates libertarians. She also supports the establishment. Ann wants the team to win at all costs, because that is apparently more important than any sort of principle.
She is not the only hater. Even a brief look online at political discussions will show that haters are not in short supply. Democrats hated George Bush and Dick Cheney and Republicans hate Barack Obama and Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. Many folks will oppose anything the other party does and/or support anything their party does without the slightest bit of critical thinking. It is the politics of hatred.
Recently, for obvious reasons, there is a lot of talk about how “all Muslims” are bad, or need to die. We need to make the entire Middle East a parking lot, or purge America of Islam. There has been similar hatred of “all Mexicans”, or “all gays”, or even “all liberals” or all Democrats. Liberals are described as all being brain-dead libtards. Similarly, the people of Ferguson are described as all being “a bunch of animals”. When a piece of news comes along that fits the narrative, it reinforces the hatred and group-think. The same thing happens on the left; where everyone on the right is…fill in the blank.
The hatred coming from the Ann Coulters of the world is counter-productive and misguided. As long as we are all enemies and there are two teams that are at war with each other, there is going to be the same gridlock and division and mistrust that we have now. Congress has an approval rating of about 15%.
We should not be doing battle with the other side, trying to defeat and destroy them and “win” at all costs. We need to reach out to them and convince them of the value in our ideas. We need to reach out to the people who have tuned out and convince them that our brand has integrity. Voting for someone just because they have an “R” by their name will not win over anyone. It does not show integrity. We need to vote for and support people who share our values.
This week Bill Hennessy wrote a column where he abandoned his support for Republican Ann Wagner and pledged to vote for the Libertarian candidate, Bill Slantz. Bill Hennessy is one of the founders of the Tea Party movement here in St. Louis. For a Tea Party founder to come out and support a Libertarian over a Republican is noteworthy.
Ann Wagner is a US congresswoman who represents much of St. Louis County where I grew up, and part of St. Charles County where I now live. I like Ann Wagner. I have heard her speak and she and I agree on a number of things. On the other hand, Ann is part of the Republican establishment in the US House, and she tends to be a little more “big business” than “free market”. She supports the Import-Export Bank, which benefits a number of large businesses such as Boeing, which just happens to be in her district. I think it needs to be done away with, as it is a perfect example of Cronyism, a handout to big business, which does not need it.
On the other hand, Bill Slantz lines up with all of my views very well. Hennessy provided a list of those positions in his piece, which I will link to below. I do not live in Ann Wagner’s district, and so I will not have the opportunity to vote for either of them. But this is one of those moments which test the flowery rhetoric. Should a voter cast their vote for the person who represents their values, or hold your nose and vote for the team?
Of one thing I am sure – voting for the team, for the establishment, is a vote for the status quo. Re-electing the same people that have a 15% approval rating is not going to change anything. It is a vote to continue special favors for huge corporations like Boeing.
Do me a favor. Read Hennessy’s column. Check out Bill Slantz and Ann Wagner. See who lines up with your views better and then vote for them. Either way, ignore Ann Coulter and the rest of the haters. Change is Coming.
http://hennessysview.com/2014/09/23/will-vote-libertarian-bill-slantz-congress/
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