Wow .... I've Become Middle-Of-The-Road??!!
My good buddy Dave, who hosts a far more diverse blog than this one, posted a comment to last night's rant that really got me thinking (thanks Dave!). He noted that "...these Republicans are not your father's Republicans..." -- and damned if he isn't right (just for the record my father is 85, so we'll have to go back a bit to find "his" politicians). In fact, one can't help but notice that if our political system is evolving (or devolving, as the case may be), it is most definitely toward the extremes and away from the middle. As a long-suffering Libertarian, this really confuses me, because in many ways I think that my political philosophy - long dismissed by the mainstream as being either "too ideological" or "too radical" - is actually fast becoming middle-of-the-road by default.
Who were my father's republicrats?? Well, there was Calvin Cooledge (still my choice for best president of the 20th century -- 2 terms, did virtually nothing). More recently, they were defined by guys like Barry Goldwater (and to a lesser extent Ronald Reagan). Sadly, compared to today's christo-fascist warmongering variety, these republicrats seemed pretty moderate and level-headed. For the most part they liked free markets and distrusted government, they believed individuals should be held responsible for their actions, and they occasionally had some reverence for the Constitution. True, they used the cold war as an excuse to posture and saber-rattle and spend lots of stolen taxpayer loot driving the old USSR into bankruptcy, but at some level they seemed to understand that using overt military force halfway around the world had its limitations.
But - to be fair - who were my father's demopublicans? The names that spring to my mind are people like FDR, Harry Truman, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. While these guys were indeed intent on growing the welfare state in a manner that I would argue blatantly ignored the founders' vision for our republic, they were also very different from the demopublicans of today. For one thing, they believed that the US was (and should remain) a sovereign nation. These guys were proud to be Americans. They didn't automatically blame the US for every wrong in the world, nor did they place the UN over the US and international law over constitutional law. They were also more friendly to free markets than their political descendants. They may have wanted to give a lot away, but they understood that you can only bleed a patient so far before they die (note that Kennedy also instituted a series of tax cuts, and - surprise, surprise - they worked). I suspect that they'd be appalled if they could actually see how their attempts to give people a hand and create equality in society has morphed into our current politically correct, reverse discriminating, dependency creating, excuse generating nanny state.
Nowadays, all I see are extremes, with the christo-fascists of the right locked in perpetual war with the socialist one-worlders on the left. It's just getting weird. Republicrats are growing the welfare state in new and inventive ways, while demopublicans have suddenly gotten concerned about state's rights and the Constitution. It's Rick Santorum versus Howard Dean; the Christian Coalition versus Moveon.org.
In the current political climate, I think a political philosophy advocating individual responsibility, constitutional government and a non-interventionist foreign policy IS a "mainstream" philosophy. I just can't believe that there isn't a consensus to be found out there among people who can see that domestically we've become far too hypersensitive and socialist, and that internationally we're pouring huge amounts of money (not to mention far too many lives) down a bottomless pit without ever seriously answering the question "What's in it for us?" Even if we disagree on the particulars, there's got to be enough common ground to do something.
The economist Thomas Sowell once noted that "Too many people today act as if no one can honestly disagree with them. If you have a difference of opinion with them, you are considered to be not merely in error but in sin." That's the problem in a nutshell. Civil discourse has been replaced by the ghost of late Weimar Germany, where the Nazis and Communists beat each other's brains out and the middle sat around with a thumb in a personal place.
Since this right/left, good/evil situation has become the status quo (and most people, regrettably, seem only be able to comprehend politics in such terms), I guess I've become middle-of-the-road. Want to reduce how much the government steals from us? Let's talk. Want to reduce government intrusion into your personal life? We can find a compromise. Want to practice your religion to its illogical extreme? Fine .... just do it on your own time and property, and don't try to force-feed it to your neighbors. Instead of pretending we love each other, let's take a reasoned step backward and just accept that different values can't occupy the same space -- ergo we should start respecting each others' spaces instead of charging into each others' business. I know I'm not going to get everything I want, but could we at least talk about ideas and solutions rather than just sticking our tongues out and calling it a political system?
Sounds pretty mainstream to me.
Who were my father's republicrats?? Well, there was Calvin Cooledge (still my choice for best president of the 20th century -- 2 terms, did virtually nothing). More recently, they were defined by guys like Barry Goldwater (and to a lesser extent Ronald Reagan). Sadly, compared to today's christo-fascist warmongering variety, these republicrats seemed pretty moderate and level-headed. For the most part they liked free markets and distrusted government, they believed individuals should be held responsible for their actions, and they occasionally had some reverence for the Constitution. True, they used the cold war as an excuse to posture and saber-rattle and spend lots of stolen taxpayer loot driving the old USSR into bankruptcy, but at some level they seemed to understand that using overt military force halfway around the world had its limitations.
But - to be fair - who were my father's demopublicans? The names that spring to my mind are people like FDR, Harry Truman, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. While these guys were indeed intent on growing the welfare state in a manner that I would argue blatantly ignored the founders' vision for our republic, they were also very different from the demopublicans of today. For one thing, they believed that the US was (and should remain) a sovereign nation. These guys were proud to be Americans. They didn't automatically blame the US for every wrong in the world, nor did they place the UN over the US and international law over constitutional law. They were also more friendly to free markets than their political descendants. They may have wanted to give a lot away, but they understood that you can only bleed a patient so far before they die (note that Kennedy also instituted a series of tax cuts, and - surprise, surprise - they worked). I suspect that they'd be appalled if they could actually see how their attempts to give people a hand and create equality in society has morphed into our current politically correct, reverse discriminating, dependency creating, excuse generating nanny state.
Nowadays, all I see are extremes, with the christo-fascists of the right locked in perpetual war with the socialist one-worlders on the left. It's just getting weird. Republicrats are growing the welfare state in new and inventive ways, while demopublicans have suddenly gotten concerned about state's rights and the Constitution. It's Rick Santorum versus Howard Dean; the Christian Coalition versus Moveon.org.
In the current political climate, I think a political philosophy advocating individual responsibility, constitutional government and a non-interventionist foreign policy IS a "mainstream" philosophy. I just can't believe that there isn't a consensus to be found out there among people who can see that domestically we've become far too hypersensitive and socialist, and that internationally we're pouring huge amounts of money (not to mention far too many lives) down a bottomless pit without ever seriously answering the question "What's in it for us?" Even if we disagree on the particulars, there's got to be enough common ground to do something.
The economist Thomas Sowell once noted that "Too many people today act as if no one can honestly disagree with them. If you have a difference of opinion with them, you are considered to be not merely in error but in sin." That's the problem in a nutshell. Civil discourse has been replaced by the ghost of late Weimar Germany, where the Nazis and Communists beat each other's brains out and the middle sat around with a thumb in a personal place.
Since this right/left, good/evil situation has become the status quo (and most people, regrettably, seem only be able to comprehend politics in such terms), I guess I've become middle-of-the-road. Want to reduce how much the government steals from us? Let's talk. Want to reduce government intrusion into your personal life? We can find a compromise. Want to practice your religion to its illogical extreme? Fine .... just do it on your own time and property, and don't try to force-feed it to your neighbors. Instead of pretending we love each other, let's take a reasoned step backward and just accept that different values can't occupy the same space -- ergo we should start respecting each others' spaces instead of charging into each others' business. I know I'm not going to get everything I want, but could we at least talk about ideas and solutions rather than just sticking our tongues out and calling it a political system?
Sounds pretty mainstream to me.
posted by DrJDG @ 00:14
1 Comments:
At 5/8/05 00:05,
Anonymous said…
Well, thank you kindly. And I have to heartily agree with you -- in terms of economic policy, by today's standards, Nixon would fall in nicely with senate democrats. And as you point out, there seems to have been actual debate (and fillibusters, when necessary), rather than the CNN-ified mutual raspberry-blowing that passes for political discourse these days. I find myself wishing for kinder, gentler elitist plutocrats, and bleeding hearts with balls -- not the mix of bible thumpers and PC ass-kissers that currently sit in Congress. And don't even get me started on Shrub; anyone who makes Lyndon Johnson look like an intellectual shouldn't be allowed within 500 miles of the White House.
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