Partisan Hypocrisy

There is nothing new about the extreme right wing and its connection with the Republican Party. The Republican Party went along with Joe McCarthy and his paranoid witch hunts. It did not do much to discourage the lunatics in John Birch society either. This is really remarkable considering the fact that the idiot Birchers even accused President Eisenhower of being a communist sympathizer. In spite of its connection to the extreme right, however, the Republicans of the nineteen-forties, nineteen-fifties and nineteen-sixties were smart enough to read the polls. Most Americans identified themselves as being moderates, and the majority of the legislators from both parties acted accordingly. Containment of the Soviet Union was a bipartisan effort, and we did not pull out of the United Nations in spite of the right wing’s paranoia about that organization becoming a world government that would usurp the sovereignty of the United States. Politicians from both parties also worked out reasonable compromises that allowed the passage of much needed legislation. Members of both parties knew that being a good politician went beyond getting elected; it also meant governing. The minority party (whether Democratic or Republican) continued to compete, but it also accepted some responsibility for the government and for furthering the interests of this nation.

That has now changed. The fear mongering tactics of Rove and Cheney fed the paranoia of the right wing and empowered those nihilistic lunatics. The result is a major party that is incapable of compromising. It now resorts to partisanship for the mere sake of opposing the party in power. It does this regardless of the harm it is doing to the country and regardless of how obviously hypocritical it must be in its criticisms. Even George W. Bush said the prison at Guantanamo had become a liability and should be closed. Yet the Republicans are now saying that closing it is dangerous for the nation, and are accusing President Obama of being soft on terrorists because he is closing it. There were no complaints from the Republican Party when the Bush administration successfully tried three terrorists in Federal Court. Yet they are now screaming that Obama is putting the nation in peril by trying terrorists in Federal Court. Furthermore, the Republicans are taking absolutely no role in trying to govern. Instead, they are using the filibuster in the senate in an effort to prevent the Democratic Party from passing any legislation. They are ignoring the will of the electorate and are metaphorically telling the nation that the Democratic Party will only govern over the dead body of the Republican Party. I cannot recall a time in history when a major party behaved so irresponsibly and survived.

I consider the upcoming elections of this year to be an IQ test. I believe that the vast majority of the people of this nation are still pragmatic moderates rather than mindless ideologues. The only real question in my mind is whether the electorate will be smart enough to prove the pollsters wrong and punish the Republican Party for behaving so irresponsibly. There is no way I can overstate how dangerous of a precedent the Republicans are now setting.