Right now, the smart money is on a Hillary presidency, 57 Democrats in the Senate, and a very healthy Democratic majority in the House.
So what happened to the Republicans? Speculation is rife. David Brooks thinks it's because the Republicans abandoned something called Burkean "dispositional" conservatism for "creedal conservativism."
But suburban, Midwestern and many business voters are dispositional conservatives more than creedal conservatives. They care about order, prudence and balanced budgets more than transformational leadership and perpetual tax cuts. It is among these groups that G.O.P. support is collapsing.
But that doesn't make sense. A lot of "suburban, Midwestern, and business voters" are no longer conservative at all on social issues like gay rights, women's rights, race relations, and abortion. That's much of the reason why suburban voters in the North went for Gore by 20 points and why the inner suburbs around cities like Philadelphia have become Democratic enclaves.
The current "progress" of conservativism hasn't helped the Republican Party either. With conservatives becoming "anti-science" on evolution, and global warming, "anti-medicine" in cases like Terry Schiavo, and generally "anti-competence," the Democrats are looking like the party of knowledge, progress, and sanity to suburban voters.
This is what former Republican John Cole of Balloon Juice (via Glenn Greenwald) is picking up on.
Seriously- what does the current Republican party stand for? Permanent war, fear, the nanny state, big spending, torture, execution on demand, complete paranoia regarding the media, control over your body, denial of evolution and outright rejection of science, AND ZOMG THEY ARE GONNA MAKE US WEAR BURKHAS, all the while demanding that in order to be a good American I have to spend most of
every damned day condemning half my fellow Americans as terrorist appeasers.
But Cole ignores the failure of the war in Iraq. As long as the right-wing could use the war in Iraq to promote an image of themselves as the party of masculinity and toughness, they could trick voters into forgiving them for their many peculiarities and vote Republican.
With the failure of the war, the Republicans also lost the benefit of the doubt on social and economic issues. Where swing voters, independents, and moderates might once have tolerated the social bigotries, hypocrisies, corruption, and general weirdness of the right, now these kinds of voters are openly contemptuous of conservatives and conservatism.
How contemptuous?
John Cole gives us a good idea.
The threat of higher taxes in the short term isn’t enough to keep me from voting out crazy people and voting for sane people with whom I merely disagree regarding policy. Hillarycare doesn’t scare me as much as Frank Gaffney having a line to the person with the nuclear football or Dobson and company crafting domestic policy.Cole's comment on taxes is the flip side of the old line where somone says that "I'd pay to see them play" in relation to sports teams and bands. In the case of the Republicans, Cole and other moderates and swing voters are willing to pay higher taxes if that means getting the Republicans out of office.
In other words, many moderates and swing voters are willing to "pay their own money" to not see the Republicans any more.
Is there a higher form of insult?
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It makes all the sense in the world that ordinary registered Republican voters would finally tire of the schizophrenic actions of their party leaders and begin to reject it. People often accuse voters of being stupid. The movement away from the irrational, erratic, insane policies of the current leaders of the GOP.
The radical Republican right pursued an agenda and used every weapon at their disposal to enforce their will upon the American people. The radical Republican, for some time, has sought to dictate what a woman can and cannot do with her body.
They tried hard to violate the environment and to some extent have been successful in that endeavor. They spent the past six years stacking the courts so their corporate money people are shielded from liability, protected from acting responsibly, and given the right to foul the air, pollute the water, dump toxins on the ground, and spew carcinogens in the atmosphere.
They have attempted to subvert democracy with religious idolatry. They want to replace the Constitution with the Bible.
Two days after the President declared October 1st Child Health Day and recognized the important role President Clinton’s S-CHIP program has played in helping poor children stay healthy, he decided to turn his back on the health of millions of kids. The S-CHIP program has been working since its creation as part of The Balanced Budget Act of 1997. First the Republican leadership destroyed the Clinton budget surpluses and replaced them with “trickle-down” deficits. Now Bush is trying to destroy another part of that act, the S-CHIP program, and destroy that as well. So the President vetoed the reauthorization of that program because the bill would have extended health insurance to more children.
Taken in totality, the Bush budget for FY 2008 slashes resources for exactly the priorities we should be supporting: medical research, health care for our seniors, and education.
This budget calls for hundreds of billions in unaffordable millionaire tax cuts. And it calls for deep cuts to programs that our most vulnerable citizens depend on for their very survival.
And then there is the war. In the presidential campaign of 2004, Republicans managed to portray theirs as the party of patriotism that fights for the United States and supports our brave men and women of the armed forces, while somehow stereotyping Democrats as unpatriotic and cowardly. Yet we know better than that as well. It is a matter of public record that John Kerry is a legitimate, decorated officer of the Vietnam War whereas George W. Bush opted for a six-year tour in the National Guard that no one can prove he completed. Now I do not mean to suggest that one need be a veteran to be President. What I am saying is, at least in the case of Bush, Cheney, et.all, the architects of the Iraq war and occupation, were very reckless in the way they proceeded to get us into this mess. Perhaps this is so because today's Republican leadership don't understand the hellish nature of war, they've never experienced war and they have no intention of their children or grandchildren experiencing war.
Put all this together and we see a Republican party facing a deep crisis. There's a new Republican scandal in the news every single week it seems. Yet Republican leaders continue to tell us how we do not measure up to the family values they espouse, yet do not follow, and then make laws to force us to submit to those values. When any person or organization places themselves on a pedestal as the guardians of “morality, they should make sure their house is in order. We are all human. Democrats do not pretend otherwise; Republican party leaders do.
Like I said, it is no surprise to me that the GOP is losing ground. I’m only surprised it took this long.
"With the failure of the war, the Republicans also lost the benefit of the doubt on social and economic issues."
Can you explain that in a little more depth, maybe?
Michael--I hope you understand the idea that "the war failed." It's obvious to most people.
By "benefit of the doubt," I mean that many independents were willing to vote for Bush despite disagreeing with him on abortion, social security privatization, the environment, health care, gay rights, and the Republican war on science. With the failure of the Iraq war, the Republicans lost "the benefit of the doubt" and those same independents are focusing more on their DISAGREEMENTS with the Republicans. A lot of independents and moderates who voted for Bush were 51-49 in their own heads when in 2004. Now it's more like they're 60-40 Democratic.
No, caric, it is not obvious. The only people that think we lost the war are suffering from end stage BDS. Since you are apparently a military expert along with womyns studies, it should be easy to point out one military confrontation that we have lost.
The one in Iraq, JD.
And, Ric's point is valid, the people, like my mother in law, who thought the terrorists were going to kill them no matter where they lived, now see that the things they were prepared to give up because John Kerry was gonna get us all killed, weren't worth it. Independents voted Democratic at a 20 point margin in the midterms and that polling hasn't changed.
It's why B Moe will be living in a much different Athens come January 2009, although apparently the ability to be snarky, sarcastic, and wrong will still be there in spades.
We have not lost one military confrontation, anywhere. Period.
The only battle that is being lost is the PR battle at home.
Just like 'Nam? Just like the Germans in World War One? Just like the French in Algeria?
I'm no military expert, but when you attack a place and the next day your soldiers are killed by IED's in the same place, I'm not sure you've done "won."
The Russians never lost a battle in Afghanistan either.
Hmmmm, maybe an insurgency has a different sort of metrics than a fixed point, main force battle?
My comment had to many grammatical/compositional errors to make sense. Here it is, ammended:
It makes all the sense in the world that ordinary registered Republican voters would finally tire of the schizophrenic actions of their party leaders and begin to reject those leaders and the party itself. People often accuse voters of being stupid. Perhaps not. The movement of reasonable registered Republican voters away from the irrational, erratic, insane policies of the current leaders of the GOP tells me that at least some people are thinking.
The radical Republican right has, for years, to enforce their will upon the American people. The radical Republicans have sought to dictate what a woman can and cannot do with her body.
They have been trying hard to violate the environment and to some extent have been successful in that endeavor. They have spent the past six years stacking the courts so their corporate money people are shielded from liability, so that their Congressional district gerrymandering schemes would be upheld, so tolerence would become an exception rather than a rule.
They have attempted to subvert democracy with religious idolatry. They want to replace the Constitution with the Bible.
A recent example of their duplicitousness was recently displayed by their President. Two days after the President declared October 1st Child Health Day and recognized the important role President Clinton’s S-CHIP program has played in helping poor children stay healthy, he decided to turn his back on the health of millions of kids. The S-CHIP program has been working, and working well since its creation as part of The Balanced Budget Act of 1997. First the Republican leadership destroyed the Clinton budget surpluses and replaced them with “trickle-down” deficits. Now Bush is trying to destroy another part of that act, the S-CHIP program. He vetoed the reauthorization of that program because the bill would have extended health insurance to more children. He cited extra costs as his reason. He had no problem piling up huge deficits and a new mountain of debt in his relentless pursuit of millionaire-tax-cuts and corporate welfare but more money for the health of our children? No way. Not from this guy. Not from their zero-sum ideology.
Taken in totality, the Bush budget for FY 2008 slashes resources for exactly the priorities we should be supporting: medical research, health care for our seniors, and education.
This budget along with previous GW Bush budgets has doled out hundreds of billions in unaffordable tax cuts while deeply cutting programs that our most vulnerable citizens depend on for their very survival.
And then there is the war. In the presidential campaign of 2004, Republicans managed to portray their's as the party of patriotism that fights for the United States and supports our brave men and women of the armed forces, while somehow stereotyping Democrats as unpatriotic and cowardly. Yet we know better than that as well. It is a matter of public record that John Kerry is a legitimate, decorated officer of the Vietnam War whereas George W. Bush opted for a six-year tour in the National Guard that no one can prove he completed. Now I do not mean to suggest that one need be a veteran to be President. What I am saying is, at least in the case of Bush, Cheney, et.all, the architects of the Iraq war and occupation, were very reckless in the way they proceeded to get us into this mess. Perhaps this is so because today's Republican leadership do not understand the hellish nature of war, they've never experienced war and they have no intention of their children or grandchildren experiencing war.
Put all this together and we see a Republican party facing a deep crisis. There's a new Republican scandal in the news every single week it seems. Yet Republican leaders continue to tell us how we do not measure up to the family values they espouse, yet do not follow, and then make laws to force us to submit to those values. When any person or organization places themselves on a pedestal as the guardians of “morality, they should make sure their house is in order. We are all human. Democrats do not pretend otherwise; Republican party leaders do.
Like I said, it is no surprise to me that the GOP is losing ground. I’m only surprised it took this long.
tim - We did not lose in Viet Nam. We quit. There is a substantial difference, with the latter being even worse than the former.
Might want to check your scorecard. We lost.
But, it highlights the vacuity of your position. We have normal relations with Vietnam, they are a valuable trading partner, and the world did not end when we left. We killed 2 million people, lost 58,000 of our own people and 30 years later....what's the terrible result?
Didn't we have to fight the commies over there so we wouldn't have to fight them here?
The definition of insanity is....you know....doing the same thing and expecting a different result. You expect the insurgency to end, because RTO told you it would? It hasn't and it won't.
Oh, and f*** Bob White. I can't stand that moron.
No, timmah, we did not lose Viet Nam. We quit. If you do not understand the distinction, then we will agree to disagree.
We killed 2 million people, lost 58,000 of our own people and 30 years later....what's the terrible result?
We killed 2,000,000 in the sense that they were slaughtered in the wake of our departure? I guess that by better half's family should be somehow consoled that their dead family members resulted in good trading partners 30 years down the road. I doubt that it makes up for their loss.
I do not need RTO to think for me. I have boots on the ground experience in these areas, and my immediate family is serving/served in this conflict. So, I draw upon my experience, and the shared experience of others in forming my opinions.
Who is Bob White ?
We killed, personally and with B-52's, 2 million Vietmamese, Laotians, and Cambodians. If you want to throw that bullshit from Jeff about the Khmer Rouge being our fault, then the tally rises to 4 million or so. Wow, look what can do to a region when we get into something for the wrong reason and then stay for a decade after we know we lost.
I have eyewitness reports of anarchy in Southern Iraq and stories of Haditha, post-massacre.
I also know your rhetoric would have fit really well in 1920 Wiemar Germany, where the right wing talked about quiting and "the stab in the back". It was stupid to say then, it was stupid to say in 1975, and it's stupid now. There are things that are not possible.
Ask the English about their American colonies.
It is not possible for Iraqis to govern themselves? It is not possible for Arabs to not blow things up? What is impossible, tim?
Anarchy in southern Iraq does not square with my friends who are there currently, but situations do vary.
Post-Haditha was quite a while ago, no?
So, our departure from Viet Nam was just a coincidence to the massacre of millions across the region?
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