6/07/2004

why I am not a Republican

The Texas GOP is not the Party of Reagan.

It is, however, the Party of Tom Delay. Those who register and vote Republican are fellow travelers of the ideology above, and their refusal to denounce it and take their political party back from teh extremists - including the party leader - is a failure of priorities. As Kevin Drum observes with an equivalent hypothetical:

Consider this. Suppose that very serious, very miltant communists took over the New York State Democratic party and wrote a platform advocating, say, nationalization of key industries and confiscatory taxation of all income over $50,000. And suppose that one of these New York Democrats had enough support in the party to become House majority leader. And then, finally, suppose that as communist influence spread throughout New England and beyond, Democrats pretended that nothing was amiss. A few communists here and there are harmless. Most of them don't really believe that stuff anyway, and we're just compromising with them on a few minor issues. Honest.

Republicans would � rightly � be aghast and would refuse to accept bland assurances that nothing serious was going on. And what I want is for the vast majority of decent mainstream Republicans to understand that something very similar is happening to them, and to insist that their party marginalize and repudiate the Texas strain of social destruction currently growing like a cancer on their right wing.


Bottom Line: America cannot eradicate oppression and tyranny abroad, and be a beacon of liberty to the world for our sake and theirs, if at home we lose those same freedoms.

1 comment:

Aziz P. said...

It's really just a matter of a systematic and coordinated effort. They take the long view. God is on their side, after all.