Now here's what that means. Republicans have replaced the Whigs in fact, our old British Loyalists. They look to the authority of some king-like thing to handle matters for them and to protect them. They are also big on majority rule, since they hope to be the majority with their king-like thing protecting them from what they call minorities. And they believe in democracy because simple democracy means simply that the majority rules. What they do not like, ironically, is the republican form of government our founders set up to protect us all from majority rule and to give nobody enough power to do much harm. Or good if one thinks in terms of a philosopher prince, something our founders were too sophisticated to buy into. They understood human nature better than most because they were well read. And they understood political theory and practice since mankind came out of the trees. They followed no model because they felt nothing had worked all that well so far. Instead they came up with a new principle, the evolutionist notion that chaos beats order but with just enough order to get us by. In short, they were distrustful of government, fearing bad people would take charge if only because good people would not care enough to be alert. While Republicans claim to be distrustful of government, they really rely on government to enrich themselves and to protect themselves from the people they are using and abusing. The ideal government for them would be much like the Third Reich, which was the product of free elections and well managed democracy.
This also explains the panic among these majority worshipping monarchists as their hold on being a majority slips away from them. And their paranoia about Hispanics. When you have a history of beating up minorities and the helpless, it is pretty scary to think you might just become a powerless minority. What must really scare them --- and they are probably just smart enough to see this --- is that they are already a minority. As they define people.
So here is my proposal. Let us exchange the names of the parties to better suit their nature and intention. The New Democrats will want raw democracy, at least so long as they can command a majority and elect somebody to help them use and abuse the rest. And the New Republicans will want to hear from everyone with nobody being in charge and usually nobody listening.
Then, since I would be a New Republican, I would urge, probably to no avail, that we take the tactics of the Old Republicans, and actually win elections. The New Democrats, despite their savagery, would be safe because the New Republicans would be too busy arguing among themselves to win any election not driven by the horror of a New Democratic Administration. The New Republicans' main job would be simple and short, to clean up the messes created by the New Democrats, who will win more often because they really do care and are driven to win because they live in fear of just about everyone and everything. Fear is a great motivator, that and greed, which also define what we now call the Republican Party.
This is pretty simple stuff, but something only an Old Republican strategist would figure out. It is way too simple for Old Democrats to grasp. Speaking of which, I would take a page out of Karl Rove's play book, the page on which he decided to start the rumor that Texas Governor Ann Richards was a Lesbian, a page he toyed with once with Hillary Clinton, and one you will surely see again. It is a great page. Not a good idea to come out and say I am not a Lesbian. The man is gifted. How else to make a traitor of a quadruple amputee vet and a coward of the thrice wounded and decorated war veteran? That is one serious play book.
So if it is Rudy we face, I suggest we make up a something completely off the wall like that, his connections with the Sicilian mob, perhaps, or his being a papist running dog. He is, after all, a self confessed Italian. And wife-beating, stuff like that. Trouble is we don't have the likes of Russ Limbaugh to carry the message. Nor the total absence of all decency to do it. Reminds me of my brother, Billy, walking into a tough bar in Golts, on the savage Maryland/Delaware line to celebrate his 21st birthday. He no sooner crossed over the threshold when he was struck on the forehead by a flying beer bottle. After that he went into a lot of tough bars, but never again had to be carried out.
There may be some sort of lesson there.
