The Future of the Republican Party after 2013

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The Republican Party as we have known it since the end of the last Century is an uneasy alliance of libertarians (who aren’t familiar with the term), fiscal conservatives (who disapprove of “government run wild,” and unbalanced budgets), Christian conservatives (who oppose abortion, and various medical practices they deem contrary to their religious principles, and, in some extreme cases, teaching Evolution in schools as an accepted theory), and neo-conservatives (a term which has come to stand for those who are eager to establish the USA as the primary military power on the planet).  All of  these groups have forgotten that the only reason they have banded together is because they oppose some principle for which the Democrats have stood.  Of late, the so-called Tea Partyers have received a lot of attention, but they are really people of a poorer economic class than traditional Republicans (who, it seems to me, have traditionally come from the educated upper-middle class), but who have been persuaded that taxes go towards helping poor minorities rather than poor white Americans (which, incidentally, is very far from the truth).  So being a supporter of the Tea Party (which is probably only a party in the loosest sense of the word) is actually more a matter of posturing than philosophical congruency, because it appears to suggest that individual in that group make enough money for their tax bill to be a great burden.

A photograph published in the British tabloid
The Daily Mail

But as the Republican Party regards the extremes to which it is being driven with horror, things are going to change.  Not everyone in the GOP is anxious to win every election at any cost.  In the excitement of election season it might briefly appear that crushing the Democrats, responding to their rhetoric with vicious lies, and smearing their bleeding-heart candidates is an excellent idea.  But Republicans of a more moderate hue, who depend on the Democrats to look after the interests of the poor and indigent, widows and orphans, and the lonely and the unloved, (whose interests are boring, at best, and a nuisance most times,) do not, I believe, have their hearts behind crushing the Democrat Party utterly and setting up the structure of Congress, the Supreme Court, and the White House in such a way as to allow the GOP to do anything it wants.  (Allowing the GOP to do anything it wants very likely looks more unpleasant by the minute, even to them.)

John McCain is only the most visible Republican to reject the party strategy, dictated by the extreme Right, as unacceptable, and not useful.  As someone said, the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) regulates the Insurance Industry, not Health Care.  The Health Insurance Industry is being viewed more as a national utility, rather than a lightly-regulated business.  Why would anyone be opposed to this move?  Merely to oppose the Democrats.

While I’m not absolutely confident about the prospects of seeing the Republican Party come apart at the seams, it is quite possible.  If the much-talked-about Default comes to be, and if it cannot be successfully pinned on President Obama, then the GOP will have a great deal of mud on its face, and they’re furiously applying detergent to forestall or minimize this mudpack.  Poisoning the well never worked for anyone who wanted to take leadership.

We have to wait and see.

[Added later:

it has just come to light that late at night on September 3oth, the House moved to remove the privilege of any House member to call for a Senate amendment to a House bill to be opened for debate.  In other words, the GOP changed the House rules so that only Eddie Cantor or his designee can bring the Senate amended spending Bill to a vote.  So, once again, the GOP has tricked the Democrats into being helpless to move the spending bill forward.

It will take a Democrat majority in the House to restore the House Rules to their former level of reasonability (or unreasonability), and the Democrats will have their work cut out for them to ensure that this happens.  Gerrymandering is a terrible thing.]

[Added yet later:

Apparently the Senate and the House have come to an agreement over a compromise spending bill on which a vote will be taken around 7:00 P.M. today.  We are told that the bill contains most of what was originally in the Senate spending bill.  Texas senator Ted Cruz has promised not to filibuster the vote, but he is unreliable and not to be trusted.]

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