It’s been comments like this one that have got me wondering about the fate of the republican party. With so many loser ideas (virtually on the wrong side of every issues from domestic to foreign policy) what’s it gotta take to stick a fork into this dead elephant?
We have had a political party go belly up in the past, I’m talking about the Whigs. In the early 1800’s the ascendant political party was the Democrats. The Whigs were the ‘opposition’ party and the republicans were not on the radar. The Whigs got hammered by the democrats in the 1850s because they were wishy washy on slavery. They opposed strong support in the south which pissed off the south and drove pro-slavery folks there to the Democrats.
Although the Whigs opposed strong unilateral support for slavery they still caved into the compromise of 1850 which gave us the horrible fugitive slave law, requiring any lawman to arrest a fugitive or face a $1,000 fine. This pissed off northern whigs, which deserted into the arms of the republican party.
Some links on the whigs:
http://www.jmisc.net/...
http://ap.grolier.com/...
The current situation, I am arguing is worse for Republicans than it was for Whigs. Whigs were on the wrong side on one huge issue and got annihilated for it. Republicans are on the wrong side of every issue that matters to Americans: the economy, housing, health care, terrorism, energy issues, global warming.
Republicans, once the champion of commerce, industrial progress and emancipation, are increasingly marginalized. Their apologists in the media have become increasingly marginalized by their failed policies and autocratic behavior, as well as the ascendancy of netroots.
Blogging will continue to increase in importance as the American people have realized they do prefer to hear the truth over stupid lies. We are tired of the stupidity and wrongheadedness of the republicans and their MSM.
What’s it going to take for the elephant to finally roll over? I believe it will be a number of crises which will occur in the next ten years. As the housing and mortgage industries continue to tank financial markets, peak oil will have huge repercussions causing crises with transportation, food production, medicines and virtually every aspect of post-industrial consumer society.
Throw in a few natural disasters encouraged by global warming and a war or two over energy and we will be ripe for major political change. While we are as an American people an ideological bunch, we are at heart pragmatic and will junk conservative ideology as a completely ineffective means of solving these problems.
I believe we will go back to seeing the Democrats as the dominant party and a new party will emerge to replace republicans. The party will either be centrist or left of the current democratic party. This new party will present pragmatic solutions to real problems which will attract republicans who can’t bring themselves to vote democratic. Republicans will become synonymous with fascism and as popular as Mussolini was at the end of WWII.