Party like it’s 1860
We haven’t seen this in awhile. In fact, unless someone has unlocked the key to immortality, no one has seen this. The Republican party is dead. So, this is an important time in our country just like the last time this happened. Abraham Lincoln created a new party that was desperately needed at that point in American history. The Whigs went the way of the doodoo bird.
The two-party system is unique in the world. Most democracies around the world operate under a kind of coalition government. So, parties are pure and they have to reach across the aisle to multiple groups to get things done. In that world, it is easy to operate as a party. Your views can be more narrow and your orthodoxy can be consistent.
The Democratic and Republican parties have been coalition parties amidst themselves. They appeal to groups and those groups shift. As groups shift then believes and planks shift. So, to say the GOP is dead is not an ideological critique. Someone somewhere will appeal to those groups. There will be an uncomfortable period where allegiances will shift, but it is ultimately something that has to happen.
Why has the GOP died? Simply put, they have abandoned democracy. Their standard bearer has gone full on Nazi. Full stop. When you start including the term “vermin” in your campaign stump speech you are flat out giving a nod to Hitler. Whatever you feel about that kind of acknowledgment, the brand is now about full on election denialism. The GOP in Ohio wants to deny their recent results. Imagine a sports team that never acknowledged defeat and sued the league every time they lost. At a certain point, the league would have to expel them so that normalcy could return.
In that vain, people like Joe Mancin are touring the country to see if they can forge a new way forward. For the time being, we will assume he is on the up and up. There are a number of things that make me question that, but we will leave that aside for now. When there is a Nazi on the ballot you do anything you can to defeat the Nazi. That is of course unless you are a Nazi yourself.
So, there will be time for a new center-right party to form. It absolutely needs to happen and it will happen. One party government is not real democracy. I’m a Democrat and have always been a Democrat but more than anything else I am an American. I am a progressive. I will ultimately be wherever those folks end up going. Many of my friends and family are conservative. They aren’t crazy. They aren’t Nazis. They aren’t white supremacists. They are just conservative.
So, I salute any group that wants to forge a new way forward. They need to wait until we defeat the Nazi. A large part of the issue is that the GOP is dead. They are incapable of policing themselves. That is one of the signs you know they are dead. Trump will likely go to prison and it won’t matter. They have had numerous opportunities to police themselves. They haven’t.
So, the American people will have to do that for them. They will need to overwhelmingly vote Democratic until that menace goes away. They will need to serve on juries and vote guilty. Judges will need to have the courage to send him to prison. Everyone say goodbye to the GOP. They had a good run. It’s time for a new conservative party to take its place. However, we need to save our democracy first.
There’s plenty of doodoo birds around. No more Dodos though.
1When Abe lead the Republicans, it was the progressive party. Anti-slavery, anti poll tax, pro homestead acts.
2Appreciate your optimism Nick, but, there seems to be sufficient nuts about to keep the GOP running full steam. I do not understand. However, a simple perusal of history (and current events) reveals that the despots never have trouble finding willing supporters to carry out the most inhumane deeds. Hitler, Pol Pot, Hamas, the Iranian non humans, the Taliban – I could go on for a long time. Never in my wildest imaginations would I have believed it could possibly happen here. Yet, here we are!
3The Republican Party started in 1854, not 1860. It was a reorganization of the ‘conscience Whig’ wing of the broken Whig party, also sweeping up various disaffected splinters.
The non-conscience Whig part of the Whigs either quit politics or was absorbed by the Southern wing of the Democrats.
But it was simpler then. There were no national parties, and the state and local parties and political clubs had few assets.
The trump Republicans control the party’s vast assets, including mailing lists, foundations, organizations, etc.
A new conservative party has to start from srcatch. There is a source of funds to finance that, but very little indication that the people controlling that money are prepared to do so.
4What always flummoxes me is that the people who think we need a third party all run somebody for President. (Jill Stein, anybody?) Not for Congress first. How do they imagine that a third-party President could govern? He/She would have no power base at all.
5BarbinDC, a couple cycles back Samantha Bee spent 2 programs at the Libertarian Party national convention. It was eyeopening. Anybody who ever considered their candidate for POTUS could see had he won, no way in hell they could have governed.
6Any thought of a 3rd party in 2024 needs to be tabled until Trump and his cult are gone forever.
For even a solitary minute, forget the guys like Bobbie Jr. etc. in regards to a Third Party. And find a niche in that male line-up for Jill Stein. But not Liz Cheney. She is gutsy to the max and I would at least like to hear what she has to say re: 3rd party.
And BarbinDC: you are spot on re: power base. It is absolutely necessary and I have always wondered if folks like previous third party afficfianados had ever given it a thought.
7Perhaps dip into US history and rebrand the R party as the “Know Nothing Party” and replace “conservative” with the word “reactionary” when referring to the members?
https://www.tekportal.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/reactionary.jpg
8Just looking at our political history, what I expect to happen is that the current GOP will keep on losing and only then will they change. It costs too much money these to elect somebody and only the two major parties have access to that kind of $$$. (See the Reform Party once H. Ross Perot stopped personally funding it.)
For starters, they will have to abandon any plans to ban abortion anywhere. Also, assuming that the White, rural, working classes wise up (not a bet I’m willing to take), they will also have to abandon their preference for shoving more $$$ up to the already-haves–which they have done since 1981 and Reaganomics.
Then, there is the issue of Race. Once Richard Nixon decided to go after George Wallace’s constituency, the GOP has been the party of bigots. Demographics will eventually take care of that particular fallacy.
9In countries that have various coalition parties, I’m curious about how their voting districts are formed. With our extreme gerrymandered districts here in Texas, our politicians pick their voters. And the GOP voters seem to have lost their minds!
10Considering that the GOP and right-wing propagandist “news” outlets have convinced tens of millions of voters that Democrats are all sorts of things that they’re very definitely NOT and never would be, the idea that we are likely to have an overwhelming Democratic vote any time slim is futile.
11Oh, this isn’t about optimism. It is more like the zombie apocalypse. The GOP is not a functioning political parties. Political parties are organized to win elections and act as a governing coalition. The GOP is neither of those. They want to hold power and impose their will through undemocratic means.
The best way I have seen to use governing coalitions is to have people vote for party and not individuals. Then, the party would select their reps from an allotted number of slots based on the percentage of voters that chose them. So, if the say flat earth party had ten percent of the vote then they would get approximately 43 members in the House and ten in the Senate.
Obviously, that is fantasy. In the real world we have the uncomfortable period of time between when the GOP died and when the people are able to vanquish it officially through whatever means that has to happen. It is not dissimilar to when the GOP supplanted the Whigs. As Harry pointed out, they were formed in 1854 but really didn’t win until Lincoln led them in 1860. I think we might be looking at a similar timeline. We could mark 2020 as the death of the GOP, but there might be two or three presidential cycles for that to completely go away. As others have pointed out, they have built in advantages through gerrymandering and fundraising.
Still, they are dead. They have no governing ideas. They have no desire to govern as a democratic party (small d), and they can’t acknowledge election results. That’s not a functioning party in a democratic country. So, either they go away or we cease to be a democracy.
12BarbinDV @ 5
Exactly. In 1980, I was working at The Des Moines Register, and the idiots running the editorial page endorsed John Anderson. He had a 300-page policy platform. Wow!
It isn’t only down-ballot electoral positions. A president has to appoint 3,000-4,000 more or less competent people to manage the gummint. Does anyone suppose Kennedy knows 3,000 competent people? 300? 30? 3?
13Slavery upset the balance of power in 1860. The Republican stance on abortion could be their downfall in 2024 if they cling tight to the issue. It’s a balancing act as they might lose Evangelicals if they don’t give them something.
On the other hand, Fox News sufficiently distracted Republican voters with the magic of misdirection when the party quietly dropped their position on marriage only between one man and one woman, gay rights, etc. Fox just pounds on anther issue (Woke everything!) so viewers forget how important they said their previous stances were, or they let them simmer in the background.
14If you’re a Trump supporter, no matter how half-assedly, you are a neo-nazi. Period. I don’t want to think that about my GQP relatives, but it’s true. If you stand with Trump, you are a neo-nazi, anti-democracy fascist. Period. I don’t like that fact, but yes, if you would consider voting for Trump you are a fascist, whether or not you comprehend the definition.
15Grandma Ada: In Australia we have a fiercely (one might also say notoriously) independent and neutral Electoral Commission that draws electoral boundaries on the basis of equal population (only) and administers elections. State and Union elections are also administered by the AEC
16Harry Eagar, good comments.
Unfortunately, it will take about $8 billion to start a new party (yes, billion)!
However, with a different form of campaign finance regulation every qualified (as defined by state and federal laws) candidate can, no matter how minor the party get equal footing with the richest of the Big Boys. Do a Reddit search for campaign finance reform and prepare for some heavy but eye-opening reading…
17Its a mess a big mess, will you get up & go vote Trump out.
18That’s the starting place.
Democrats need to vote in droves. People sitting on the fence need to vote for the Democrats. Young people who aren’t happy with Biden as the candidate need to vote for him. Sane Republicans need to vote for him. The idea that Trump could be reelected is positively terrifying.
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