I understand that many Republicans, at least the ordinary Republicans, have reasons for their conservative views and some of those views are even reasonable. I also know that many of their views show they are uninformed about what is going on in the world and even in their own country.
However, Republicans and even religious conservatives must finally accept that it is very likely same-sex marriage is going to be legal eventually everywhere. It is also unlikely that abortion is going to become illegal and if it did, they eventually would regret because of all the many more children that would grow up in impoverished homes and the desperation it brings to so many children. They do not even want to take care of all the children now, at least by some of the budget cuts that have been introduced by Republicans in the last few years.
They also must accept the fact that no matter how they feel about a number of things, our society will grow more liberal and more progressive. As the generations gradually change hands, and our kids grow up and take an interest in changing the country with a more enlightened view of the world, they will also change politics and those politics will be much more tolerant overall, even drug policy. Marijuana is already on its way to becoming legal. How long will it take before it does become legal nationwide is the question? I will give it ten years or it might even be sooner. Watch the tax dollars pour in from the sale of legal pot in Colorado and Washington State and watch the other states get desperate for some of that money.
I know from visiting conservative blogs that many conservatives are living in a pipe dream that somehow their party will take back the White House, take over the Senate and increase their numbers in the House; I just do not see that happening. What I see instead is a political party falling apart at the seams because it is trying not to let its right hand, know what its left hand is doing. In other words; trying to please one side of their party, the Tea Party crowd and keeping happy the wealthy and corporate interests because without them, their campaigns will sink, in need of cash.
Our nation faces many crises; jobless rates still way to high at 7.5 percent and the Baby Boomers are starting to retire. Social Security and Medicare both need to be fixed, and that does not mean make poor seniors live on even less than they already do, or have to choose to either have their medicine or food. If the GOP continues to try cutting these services back, or turning Medicare into some sort of voucher program that makes poor seniors pay more for their own health care, they will find the biggest group in the U.S. no longer supports them, the seniors.
The immigration issue is not going away either, there are 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country and the number keeps growing. This issue has not even gotten past the Senate let alone its necessary path to the Republican-controlled House, where it will surely face Tea Party Republicans who will try their best to kill it. Perhaps the Republicans now in Congress think they can just play along with this one and then eventually it will end up in the House where it can die an agonizing death by the hands of its enemies. Then Republicans in the Senate can claim that at least they really tried. I predict the bill will never make it to Obama's desk to sign.
The GOP is strangling itself by its own bow tie, thanks to its consistent small-tent-minded idea that somehow, gays will suddenly become despised and hated again, just like the good old days. The Republican faithful dream of the day the courts will be so conservative that abortion will again be illegal and driven to the back alleys, to the profits of the Black Market and to less-than-safe circumstances, just like the good old days.
If the Republican Party cannot get a handle on civil rights for everyone, including gay people and people of all colors and religions, and it continues to present its platform to be more of the same far-to-the-right politics, it will eventually see its own demise and its existence a thing of the past. In its place will be a wiser party, who knows the importance of compromise.
The nation and even the world will grow more enlightened and everything will change, some for the better and some for the worse. The Republican Party must come to realize that it is much more than just its message but its whole platform. America is changing and the Party of Lincoln seems stuck in the past, unable to get past the extremist in their party and their stranglehold on its elected leaders.
The GOP either can get on board this train into a more broad-minded and enlightened future, or find itself sitting on the side of the road without a ticket to anywhere.
This is a republish from my website: Fidlerten Place