What's Next for the Republican Party?

An openly gay Senator is elected in Wisconsin; States vote in favour of gay marriage, the legalised use of marijuana...voters have rejected Akin and Mourdock...

It seems to me that extremists tend not to get elected, that many Republicans are as liberal on social policy as Democrats, but that the tight score on the popular vote suggests that this election has not marked a significant change in anything other than the Hispanic vote, which in proportion is now more Democrat than it was in 2004; but I am saying this without a minute analysis of the figures.

Am I right in thinking that John Boehner is now the senior elected Republican, and that he is, in effect, the 'leader' -or the public voice- of this Party? I don't know if this means he will run for President in 2016, but I think it does mean that in the medium term, how his Band of Brothers in Congress work with the President, if they work at all, will be worth watching.

Do Republicans reinforce their conservative economics? Do they 'confess' that it is not what the people want, and find some new way of addressing economic policy? Do they realise that taking conservative positions on social policy is unpopular?

Some how or other, they have to find a way of getting voted in to the White House in 2016, and they need a charismatic, credible candidate. I would be interested to know how people see the next 18 months or so in the life of the GOP.

No matter who gets in they're all the same! Promise everything and deliver nothing!

Except for equal pay for equal work, affordable healthcare and Bin Laden on a platter:D

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Originally Posted by trish

Except for equal pay for equal work, affordable healthcare and Bin Laden on a platter:D

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And don't forget about the $600 billion spending cuts coming up

:party::party::party::party::party:

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Originally Posted by trish

:party::party::party::party::party:

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What's next..mmmm.. they join the 12.3 million unemployed lol

Who's they? Calm down now. Take a breath. Now blow.:party::party::party::party::party:

This is the view of the editor of the Daily Telegraph, Britain's premier Conservative newspaper.
The Religious Right is dead


By Damian Thompson US politics Last updated: November 7th, 2012



http://1.2.3.12/bmi/blogs.telegraph....an_citizen.jpgHe won't be electing a President any time soon

Guys – have a quick puff of your joint before heading down the aisle with your boyfriend. In addition to re-electing Obama, various American states voted to legalise dope and gay marriage. OK, so they weren't necessarily the same states, but you get the picture. Last night was a victory for secular liberal America – or, to put it another way, America's emerging secular liberal majority. The United States is still pious by European standards, but the gap is narrowing every year. You cannot visit American bookshops without being struck by the popularity of atheist cheerleaders or agnostic self-help gurus; when I meet a young New Yorker or Californian I assume – as I would in Britain – that they don't go to church, have liberal positions on abortion and homosexuality and generally despise the conservative religious activism that, until so recently, had the power to elect presidents.
Two points worth noting about this election. First, the Religious Right – and how dated that phrase already sounds – united around a candidate who, by most standards, is not even a Christian. The lack of an anti-Mormon backlash among orthodox Catholics and Protestants who were brought up to regard Latter-day Saints as sinister cultists tells its own story. Also, and here I'm going out on a limb, America has just re-elected its first post-Christian president (unless you count Jefferson). I've never thought that Barack Obama's churchgoing was anything more than Chicago politics: why else would a sophisticated Harvard-educated lawyer sit through years of incoherent ranting by the Rev Jeremiah Wright?
I'll return to this theme, but even the Tea Party wasn't the Religious Right – at least, not at first. When Christian fundamentalists jumped on board, that's when public support began to bleed away.
Americans: welcome to Europe. You may miss the City on the Hill but, hey – no one's going to give you a hard time if you stay in bed on Sunday morning.

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/da...right-is-dead/

They need to realize there are other cultures and lifestyles out there. Focusing on one parameter of the population will NOT get anything done to put this country on the right track...especially when it's their policies that got us in this trouble in the first place.

Instead of working separately they need to work with everyone; the audience of the DNC was a more realistic view of how this country is than what was seen at the RNC. Celebrate diversity instead of condemning it...those other races/cultures are NOT going anywhere anytime soon.

AND KEEP RELIGION OUT OF IT! And I was raised Catholic.

Boehner has a rule that nothing gets brought to the floor of the house unless it can be passed without any help from democrats. He wants the GOP to own all legislation. This has got to end or the Congress will remain gridlocked.

The republican half of the Senate through filibusters have effectively required all legislation pass with a two thirds majority rather than a simple majority. This practice has to end. The Senate could require filibusters be attended or fail, or the republicans could just behave rationally and stop abusing the filibuster. In any case it is a source of gridlock.

This time the republicans can accept the president as their president and work with him and the democrats in good faith. Last term the bipartisan panel on Heath care hammered out an agreement that wound up looking more like what the republicans wanted (Romneycare) than what the Dems wanted (single payer) and the republican panel members still didn't vote for their own proposal!

Wllie Escalade is right, the GOP has got to grow a lot more inclusive. They have alienated women, blacks, Hispanics, gays, anyone with a modicum of education in science. Their governors have gone on a firing rampage getting rid of hundreds of thousands of teachers, firemen, policemen etc. They've attacked social security and Medicare, programs that are extremely popular. The U.S. is a huge country and a world power. As long as that is true it will have a correspondingly large government. The GOP knows that. It's time they end their small government rant. It's bringing all kind of clowns into the power structure of their party who simply are too naive to run or comprehend a nation as complex as the US; witness the clown car of GOP primary candidates.

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Originally Posted by Stavros

An openly gay Senator is elected in Wisconsin; States vote in favour of gay marriage, the legalised use of marijuana...voters have rejected Akin and Mourdock...

It seems to me that extremists tend not to get elected, that many Republicans are as liberal on social policy as Democrats, but that the tight score on the popular vote suggests that this election has not marked a significant change in anything other than the Hispanic vote, which in proportion is now more Democrat than it was in 2004; but I am saying this without a minute analysis of the figures.

Am I right in thinking that John Boehner is now the senior elected Republican, and that he is, in effect, the 'leader' -or the public voice- of this Party? I don't know if this means he will run for President in 2016, but I think it does mean that in the medium term, how his Band of Brothers in Congress work with the President, if they work at all, will be worth watching.

Do Republicans reinforce their conservative economics? Do they 'confess' that it is not what the people want, and find some new way of addressing economic policy? Do they realise that taking conservative positions on social policy is unpopular?

Some how or other, they have to find a way of getting voted in to the White House in 2016, and they need a charismatic, credible candidate. I would be interested to know how people see the next 18 months or so in the life of the GOP.

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Yes, John 'Tanning Bed' Boehner, is the senior Republican. And 2nd in line to be President, God forbid both the President and the Vice President were killed or became incapacitated. It's President Obama then V.P. Biden, then Boehner, then Senator Harry Reid.

As you said Obama didn't win with much of a mandate. Obama won 49.9% and Romney won 49.3% of the popular vote.

In the 2010 election, the 'Tea Party' election, In the House of Representatives, the Republicans won 51.38% and the Democrats won 44.77% of the popular vote. (Every member of the House stands election every 2 years, so that may have been the temperature of the electorate that year). In the Senate, where only 1/3 of the members faced election that year, the Republicans won 49.37% of the vote and the Democrats won 43.98%. Much greater margins that Obama vs. Romney 2012. The Republicans also won the vast majority of the Governor races. (The Governor is the executive in charge of each State.)

Do they reinforce their conservative economics? Well, it seems that's what the electorate wanted in 2010. Romney was not a Tea Party favorite. Republicans did very well in the 2010 election. Very well. If Obama had been up for re-election in 2010, he probably would have lost.

So, did the electorate change that much from 2008 to 2010, and then again from 2010 to 2012?

Maybe it was the candidate. And the way he explained his positions to the masses. There are a lot of similarities in the economic situation of the USA when it was Jimmy Carter vs. Ronald Reagan in 1976 and as it is this year with Barack Obama vs. Mitt Romney. Romney was an unpopular candidate who was quite stiff. Ronald Reagan, on the other hand, wasn't stiff. He seemed more 'approachable', and Reagan was able to get a large amount of 'traditional' Democratic voters to switch sides and vote for him.

So, I'm not sure the answer is that simple. With only .6% difference in the popular vote and slim margins of victories in the 'Swing States', it may have been Hurricane Sandy that made the difference. MSNBC host and Obama supporter Chris Matthews said "I'm so glad we had that storm last week." It took the focus off the economy and gave Obama the chance to fly to the storm on Air Force One and 'look Presidential' and 'concerned'. If the Hurricane had hit 3 weeks ago, perhaps FEMA's poor response and allowing Romney to refocus on the economy would have tipped the results in Romney's favor.

Just some thoughts.

I sincerely hope the President is successful as he faces the challenges of his 2nd term.

The swing states were close, and the popular vote was close, but the whole question of "the mandate" that a President wins with his election to office is overblown. There a several ways to protect the minority vote, and they are indeed protected in the house and senate votes for legislators. However our executive power is more concentrated. I remember when the 2004 election came down to Ohio, President Bush won and said he had earned political capital and planned to spend it. He also said something about a mandate.

The election itself was in some ways a referendum on Obama's first term as the re-election of any incumbent is. This incumbent had to deal with an obstructionist senate who blocked various initiatives for stimulus spending and then blamed him for the state of the economy. I don't see anything in the Constitution or elsewhere that says his power as the Chief Executive is diluted because he won by a narrow margin. What sort of mandate did Bush win with his non-existent margin of victory in 2000? Did President Bush not have the authority vested in him to invade Iraq, against the will of nearly half of the electorate?

I understand and respect what you're saying Queensguy, but I must disagree. The President's results over the last four years were very much at issue, in the face of a united political party whose sole goal was to prevent him from obtaining a second term. And all the while they blamed him for the fallout from the previous disaster administration while thwarting his attempts to take corrective action. They did this not because of ideological differences but because they were committed to his failure and with it policy failures that threatened everyone. By overcoming those sinister attempts and winning the electoral college, he won his mandate to lead to the full extent that his office lawfully permits.

As for the Republican Party? Come back to Planet Earth. Understand that in the 21st Century gay-bashing, corporate cronyism, thinly veiled racism, greed, religious fundamentalism and militarism are becoming less popular and will be further stigmatized with each electoral cycle. Lick you wounds and return four years from now as decent people and you stand a chance.

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...he (Obama) won his mandate to lead to the full extent that his office lawfully permits.

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:claps:claps:claps

"The White Establishment Is Now The Minority" - Bill O'Reilly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZZt3jPDvNQ

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Originally Posted by Ben

"The White Establishment Is Now The Minority" - Bill O'Reilly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZZt3jPDvNQ

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And the minority of Bill O'Reilly's white vibrator is not in his ass.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_O'...ssment_lawsuit

http://politicalhumor.about.com/libr...bratorzone.htm

Sorry I forgot to source my last post:dancing:

http://www.c-span.org/Events/Conserv...P/10737435639/

I saw the short vid above on CSPAN today and nearly choked laughing. A handful of very angry CONs representing various extreme REICHwing groups blame Romney, repub leaders in the House and Senate and even Karl Rove for the election thumping because they were NOT CONSERVATIVE ENOUGH.

These warthogs doubled down on their hatred of PBS, NPR, Planned parenthood, government regulation, taxes, abortion, gay marriage and anything else they could think of. They said that repubs who don't get on board must be replaced. No more 'RINOS', lol. All future repub candidates must be carefully coached on how to present themselves, what to say and how to react to questions. Damn, these poor freaks are angry.

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Originally Posted by Cuchulain

http://www.c-span.org/Events/Conserv...P/10737435639/

I saw the short vid above on CSPAN today and nearly choked laughing. A handful of very angry CONs representing various extreme REICHwing groups blame Romney, repub leaders in the House and Senate and even Karl Rove for the election thumping because they were NOT CONSERVATIVE ENOUGH.

These warthogs doubled down on their hatred of PBS, NPR, Planned parenthood, government regulation, taxes, abortion, gay marriage and anything else they could think of. They said that repubs who don't get on board must be replaced. No more 'RINOS', lol. All future repub candidates must be carefully coached on how to present themselves, what to say and how to react to questions. Damn, these poor freaks are angry.

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They do face a dilemma in that they want to implement all of these hateful policies but can't afford to alienate their constituents. If they move to the center they have a chance of winning but then they don't really get their way. So we see this reactionary shift to the right, which hurts their chances electorally, but what's the point of being Republican if you're going to be reasonable?

Yes, yes of course they lost the election because there were too many fraudulent liberals posing as Republicans not because the world is changing and people don't like their wedge issues, where they selectively represent a very small minority but turn enough people against each other to squeak out elections. They are walking a tight rope because to win they have to convince some decent people they have a social conscience so this play to their hardcore base is the opposite of good politics. If they are so uncompromising how do they convince one issue voters to vote for them; the person who doesn't want to pay taxes, who thinks gay marriage is a bridge too far, or who thinks government doesn't belong in the bedroom (for a meaningless cliche).

I second the recommendation to click on Cuchulain's video. Once you open the link you are treated to all of these dour faces blaming their loss on all the wrong causes. I sincerely hope this introductory speaker Richard Viguerie gets a foothold in the party.:D This is honestly self-mockery at its finest.

LMAO- Brent Bozell to the press- "nothing personal but your profession was atrocious."

Then he discusses why so many Republican pundits thought Romney was going to win despite the fact that the polls universally favored Obama. He says why were Noonan and Hannity so wrong? His reason: it's because they couldn't believe America would go down the path to destruction.

No dipshit. Why did they ignore polling data? Because they're Republican shills posing as journalists doing what they've done for over a decade; letting their political biases overrule any logical faculty they may have. They ignored polls by independent organizations that had Obama winning because they didn't want to believe they wouldn't get their way and it was easier for them to pretend non-partisan agencies were in the pockets of liberals.

Is OMK on sabbatical or did he spontaneously combust at the result?

There was a short, but brutal remark by an Hispanic American on the BBC last night -he argued most Hispanics are 'family values' people, they are religious, they often run their own small business and don't like paying taxes or filling in forms, their children go into the military -we are natural Republicans, he said. The problem with the Republican Party when asked? They don't want us here.

How long will it be before an American President is chosen from among its Hispanic communities?

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Originally Posted by Queens Guy

Yes, John 'Tanning Bed' Boehner, is the senior Republican. And 2nd in line to be President, God forbid both the President and the Vice President were killed or became incapacitated. It's President Obama then V.P. Biden, then Boehner, then Senator Harry Reid.

As you said Obama didn't win with much of a mandate. Obama won 49.9% and Romney won 49.3% of the popular vote.

In the 2010 election, the 'Tea Party' election, In the House of Representatives, the Republicans won 51.38% and the Democrats won 44.77% of the popular vote. (Every member of the House stands election every 2 years, so that may have been the temperature of the electorate that year). In the Senate, where only 1/3 of the members faced election that year, the Republicans won 49.37% of the vote and the Democrats won 43.98%. Much greater margins that Obama vs. Romney 2012. The Republicans also won the vast majority of the Governor races. (The Governor is the executive in charge of each State.)

Do they reinforce their conservative economics? Well, it seems that's what the electorate wanted in 2010. Romney was not a Tea Party favorite. Republicans did very well in the 2010 election. Very well. If Obama had been up for re-election in 2010, he probably would have lost.

So, did the electorate change that much from 2008 to 2010, and then again from 2010 to 2012?

Maybe it was the candidate. And the way he explained his positions to the masses. There are a lot of similarities in the economic situation of the USA when it was Jimmy Carter vs. Ronald Reagan in 1976 and as it is this year with Barack Obama vs. Mitt Romney. Romney was an unpopular candidate who was quite stiff. Ronald Reagan, on the other hand, wasn't stiff. He seemed more 'approachable', and Reagan was able to get a large amount of 'traditional' Democratic voters to switch sides and vote for him.

So, I'm not sure the answer is that simple. With only .6% difference in the popular vote and slim margins of victories in the 'Swing States', it may have been Hurricane Sandy that made the difference. MSNBC host and Obama supporter Chris Matthews said "I'm so glad we had that storm last week." It took the focus off the economy and gave Obama the chance to fly to the storm on Air Force One and 'look Presidential' and 'concerned'. If the Hurricane had hit 3 weeks ago, perhaps FEMA's poor response and allowing Romney to refocus on the economy would have tipped the results in Romney's favor.

Just some thoughts.

I sincerely hope the President is successful as he faces the challenges of his 2nd term.

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Which is why I think that had this election been as 'radical' as some pundits believe -that hideous loud-mouth Andrew Sullivan was on the BBC last night making inflated statements one of which was that the Democrats could be in power for years because of the implosion in the GOP- then the House would be Democrat; certainly there was no haemorrhage of the Republican vote comparable to the Conservative defeat by Blair in 1997.

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Originally Posted by Stavros

There was a short, but brutal remark by an Hispanic American on the BBC last night -he argued most Hispanics are 'family values' people, they are religious, they often run their own small business and don't like paying taxes or filling in forms, their children go into the military -we are natural Republicans, he said. The problem with the Republican Party when asked? They don't want us here.

How long will it be before an American President is chosen from among its Hispanic communities?

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2016...maybe 2020.

It won't be that long I suspect. Perhaps a Republican if they wake up to reality.
The Republicans for the short term are likely to continue to be opposed to anything and everything that President obama proposes. The tea party in Congress really didn't suffer any reverses.

I would suspect that on a longer term basis there will be a battle for the soul of the party. Will the economy improve? if it does then the tea party will begin to wither. if not then it will fight to gain greater control of the Republicans. The religious right on the other hand seem to have been fired a warning shot or two. Those fools with their remarks about rape have been ushered into the darkness. The social conservatives are not the wave of the future and I think that this election might be the point at which the Republicans realise a need to embrace a wider America.

But for the next election? Hilary? But she'll be 69. Biden. He has hinted he might run. Cuomo?

Ryan? Or Jeb Bush? Rubio?

Off the cuff remarks.

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Originally Posted by Stavros

There was a short, but brutal remark by an Hispanic American on the BBC last night -he argued most Hispanics are 'family values' people, they are religious, they often run their own small business and don't like paying taxes or filling in forms, their children go into the military -we are natural Republicans, he said. The problem with the Republican Party when asked? They don't want us here.

How long will it be before an American President is chosen from among its Hispanic communities?

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But they are Catholics, Stavros. Not sure you can make Catholics swallow that God wants them to make money and couldn’t care less about the miserable. The fundamentalist Christian religious ideology at the basis of today’s Republicanism is something totally alien to my catholic background, I can tell you that. It rather sounds like the opposite of Christianity. I’m far from sure this will all mix with the Hispanics culture…

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Originally Posted by danthepoetman

But they are Catholics, Stavros. Not sure you can make Catholics swallow that God wants them to make money and couldn’t care less about the miserable. The fundamentalist Christian religious ideology at the basis of today’s Republicanism is something totally alien to my catholic background, I can tell you that. It rather sounds like the opposite of Christianity. I’m far from sure this will all mix with the Hispanics culture…

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This is interesting Dan as I have a lot of friends who come from a Catholic background and are flexible in terms of their politics. On the other hand I have talked to some devout Catholics who simply could not vote for a Democrat because the party is deemed to favor abortion (a wholly judicial issue outside the political realm now). In fact, a number of these Catholics are Hispanic and perhaps you are right that it is a mix of culture blended with religion.

It's another point that while Democrats pick up voters who are attracted to its core values, liberalizing social policy, making economic burdens more equitable, Republicans often have to morph their values to win over segments of the population. They have pursued an unforgiving immigration policy that promotes the use of invasive investigatory techniques to challenge the citizenship of Hispanics in border states. They even had several pundits such as Pat Buchanan who have taken to discussing why immigrants coming from our Southern border are different and harmful to our culture whereas the European immigrants of the first part of the 20th century were not. Many of the Speak English campaigns seeking to ban non-English dialects in the workplace were promoted by right wing groups, yet everything Stavros says is true. Many small business owners with conservative social values. This is an emerging issue.

How will the GOP contort to capture their votes? They have already bent over backwards to accommodate the racists who want to purge the southwest of Hispanics. Can they simultaneously capture the vote of conservative Hispanics and develop a very dependable part of their base? The video on the previous page shows an identity crisis of sorts. They have become such a hodge podge of competing interests. Some woman saying she wants the pro-life voice of the party to have a fair hearing. Sure, but might that not alienate younger voters and women? I think with outreach efforts they can win the Hispanic vote without too much hemorrhage but they will have to be less vitriolic on immigration issues.

Afterall, the people who want to purge Hispanics from the Southwest aren't going to vote Democrat anyway. But they are their own worst enemies because if they are more reasonable on the immigration front we will hear more of this RINO (republican in name only) talk from the extreme wing of the base and this will be a turnoff to Hispanics with conservative values.

Very deep analysis, Broncofan. I was just speaking out of my mind on the moment “it” was coming out of it. lol. You right: it’s much more complicated than what I was talking about.
I must admit to you though, that I always have a hard time thinking “republican”; it’s like trying to fit my liberal mind in some alien geometry…
Hey! when I read the thread topic, this is pretty much what came to my mind:

Broncofan wrote: "Republicans often have to morph their values to win over segments of the population. They have pursued an unforgiving immigration policy that promotes the use of invasive investigatory techniques to challenge the citizenship of Hispanics in border states. They even had several pundits such as Pat Buchanan who have taken to discussing why immigrants coming from our Southern border are different and harmful to our culture whereas the European immigrants of the first part of the 20th century were not. Many of the Speak English campaigns seeking to ban non-English dialects in the workplace were promoted by right wing groups, "

Do you think that the first element of this is to do rather simply with short term electoral politics rather than any deeper issues?

Buchanan on the other hand is reflecting a concern I've seen widely discussed and reported over a much longer time period - namely about the shifting nature of the US and a fear among many primarily white Americans of a northern european background that the nation will over coming decades be one where their long cultural domination will be eclipsed. The rise of the asian, black but particularly Hispanic population, has provoked serious debate about the demographics of late 21st century America and onwards.

I've certainly seen some pundits talk of a white rebellion - characterised as being an underscore to the growth of the tea party - having its last gasp at this election.

After an attempt at one strategy, http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--GcowID395...g-a-donkey.jpg you wander if there is not quite a bit of fatigue... http://images.smh.com.au/2012/02/02/...hant-420x0.jpg

Aren't you affraid that in the end something like this comes out of it all?

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Originally Posted by Prospero

It won't be that long I suspect. Perhaps a Republican if they wake up to reality.
The Republicans for the short term are likely to continue to be opposed to anything and everything that President obama proposes. The tea party in Congress really didn't suffer any reverses.

I would suspect that on a longer term basis there will be a battle for the soul of the party. Will the economy improve? if it does then the tea party will begin to wither. if not then it will fight to gain greater control of the Republicans. The religious right on the other hand seem to have been fired a warning shot or two. Those fools with their remarks about rape have been ushered into the darkness. The social conservatives are not the wave of the future and I think that this election might be the point at which the Republicans realise a need to embrace a wider America.

But for the next election? Hilary? But she'll be 69. Biden. He has hinted he might run. Cuomo?

Ryan? Or Jeb Bush? Rubio?

Off the cuff remarks.

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Biden? He really is a stupid man. I think I've owned furniture that is smarter than he is. This really akes some doing, but I think he's even dumber than Dan Quayle. Biden miscounted the number of letters in the word 'Jobs'. Chris Rock used to joke that if he was the first Black President he would appoint a Black Vice President to avoid a racist assassinating him, because they'd still wind up with a Black President. Obama has Biden.

I sincerely hope that Obama can handle the financial problems I think face America, with our deficits and debt. Europe, especially Germany, can bail out Greece, but nobody can bail out America. I think we will need some reforms that won't be popular.

If the economy continues to do poorly, I think the Democrats will not run somebody who promises to be Obama's 3rd term. It will have to be somebody that has no connection to Obama. So Hillary and Biden will be out. Cuomo has connections to Bill Clinton's Administration, and many Americans would like to return to the economic climate of the Clinton years.

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Originally Posted by Prospero

Broncofan wrote: "Republicans often have to morph their values to win over segments of the population.

Do you think that the first element of this is to do rather simply with short term electoral politics rather than any deeper issues?

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I had written a long post on what makes a policy conservative, but I had difficulty settling on an ideological underpinning for their ideology. But perhaps they are a big tent party not because they are ideologically unprincipled and they make overtures to these various single issue voters but rather because very few people are conservative across the board. If the guidepost for conservatism is maintaining status quo in legal and institutional structures regardless of any pressing needs for reform, they will always have constituents who think this should not be the measuring stick for certain policies. When someone wants to hold onto an antiquated practice for traditional reasons, it may be specific to that practice. Let's say the immigration policy is driven by an unstated concern about a shifting demographic balance. Such a concern may be both very pressing for an individual (they vote on the basis of it) and not define their other views. That's the only reason I can think of other than ideological inconsistency in the GOP platform that they have attracted such a culturally and politically diverse group of characters.

But I'm curious to hear everyone else's view on this as well because it is mind-boggling. First, what are their principles? How are their policy choices tied to these principles? And is their mix of constituents the result of them having an inconsistent mix of policy initiatives or these constituents not being wholly "conservative"?

Some of the Repubtards are unspeakably stupid. An improvement in basic world knowledge would make a good start.

Exhibit #1

Hey, Rush Limbaugh: 'Starting an Abortion Industry' Won't Win You Female Voters:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics...oters-20121108

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Originally Posted by Ben

Hey, Rush Limbaugh: 'Starting an Abortion Industry' Won't Win You Female Voters:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics...oters-20121108

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Fabulous article, Ben. Well-spotted.

Essentially, where there's no regret nor introspection, there's neither learning nor redemption. Asshole.

A Republican?

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Originally Posted by danthepoetman

A Republican?

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Probably a member of the Tee Partay....

This is what veteran right winger pat Buchanan had to say in an article posted today.
A rather obvioulsy racist proposal.

http://www.eurasiareview.com/0911201...asia+Review%29

Is The GOP Headed For The Boneyard?
By: Patrick J Buchanan

November 9, 2012


After its second defeat at the hands of Barack Obama, under whom unemployment has never been lower than the day George W. Bush left office, the Republican Party has at last awakened to its existential crisis.

Eighteen states have voted Democratic in six straight elections. Among the six are four of our most populous: New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois and California. And Obama has now won two of the three remaining mega-states, Ohio and Florida, twice.

Only Texas remains secure–for now.

At the presidential level, the Republican Party is at death’s door.

Yet one already sees the same physicians writing prescriptions for the same drugs that have been killing the GOP since W’s dad got the smallest share of the vote by a Republican candidate since William Howard Taft in 1912.

In ascertaining the cause of the GOP’s critical condition, let us use Occam’s razor–the principle that the simplest explanation is often the right one.

Would the GOP wipeout in those heavily Catholic, ethnic, socially conservative, blue-collar bastions of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio and Illinois, which Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan swept, have anything to do with the fact that the United States since 2000 has lost 6 million manufacturing jobs and 55,000 factories?

Where did all those jobs and factories go? We know where.

They were outsourced. And in the deindustrialization of America, the Republican Party has been a culpable co-conspirator.

Unlike family patriarch Sen. Prescott Bush, who voted with Barry Goldwater and Strom Thurmond against JFK’s free-trade deal, Bush I and II pumped for NAFTA, GATT, the WTO and opening America’s borders to all goods made by our new friends in the People’s Republic of China.

Swiftly, U.S. multinationals shut factories here, laid off workers, outsourced production to Asia and China, and brought their finished goods back, tax-free, to sell in the U.S.A.

Profits soared, as did the salaries of the outsourcing executives.

And their former workers? They headed for the service sector, along with their wives, to keep up on the mortgage payment, keep the kids in Catholic school and pay for the health insurance the family had lost.

Tuesday, these ex-Reagan Democrats came out to vote against some guy from Bain Capital they had been told in ads all summer was a big-time outsourcer who wrote in 2008, “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt!”

Yes, the simplest explanation is often the right one.

Republicans are also falling all over one another to express a love of Hispanics, after Mitt won only 27 percent of a Hispanic vote that is now 10 percent of the national vote.

We face demographic disaster, they are wailing. We must win a larger share of the Hispanic vote or we are doomed.

And what is the proposed solution to the GOP’s Hispanic problem, coming even from those supposedly on the realistic right?

Amnesty for the illegals! Stop talking about a border fence and self-deportation. Drop the employer sanctions. Make the GOP a welcoming party.

And what might be problematic about following this advice?

First, it will enrage populist conservatives who supported the GOP because they believed the party’s pledges to oppose amnesty, secure the border and stop illegals from taking jobs from Americans.

And in return for double-crossing these folks and losing their votes, what would be gained by amnesty for, say, 10 million illegal aliens?

Assume in a decade all 10 million became citizens and voted like the Hispanics, black folks and Asians already here. The best the GOP could expect–the Bush share in 2004–would be 40 percent, or 4 million of those votes.

But if Tuesday’s percentages held, Democrats would get not just 6 million, but 7 million new votes to the GOP’s less than 3 million.

Thus, if we assume the percentages of the last three elections hold, the Democratic Party would eventually gain from an amnesty a net of between 2 and 4 million new voters.

Easy to understand why Democrats are for this. But why would a Republican Party that is not suicidally inclined favor it?

Still, the GOP crisis is not so much illegal as legal immigration. Forty million legal immigrants have arrived in recent decades. Some 85 percent come from Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East. Most arrived lacking the academic, language and labor skills to compete for high-paying jobs.

What does government do for them?

Subsidizes their housing and provides free education for their kids from Head Start through K-12, plus food stamps and school lunches, Pell Grants and student loans for college, Medicaid if they are sick, earned income tax credits if they work and 99 weeks of unemployment checks if they lose their job.

These are people who depend upon government.

Why would they vote for a party that is going to cut taxes they do not pay, but take away government benefits they do receive?

Again it needs be said. When the country looks like California demographically, it will look like California politically. Republicans are not whistling past the graveyard. They are right at the entrance.

And this from Robert Reich, professor of public policy in California.

What now for the tea party?

Why John Boehner May Have More Leverage Over Tea Partiers In Congess
By: Robert Reich

November 9, 2012


“If there’s a mandate in yesterday’s results,” said House Speaker John Boehner on Wednesday, “it’s a mandate to find a way for us to work together.” Republicans, he said, were willing to accept “new revenue under the right conditions,” to get a bipartisan agreement over the budget.

We’ve heard this before. The Speaker came close to agreeing to an increase in tax revenues in his talks with the President in the summer of 2011, but relented when Tea Partiers in the House made a ruckus.


But Tea Partiers may be more amenable to an agreement now that the electorate has signaled it doesn’t especially like what the Tea Party has been up to.

Consider Indiana, where the Tea Party had pushed out veteran GOP Senator Richard Lugar in favor of Richard (rape is “something God intended”) Mourdock. Mourdouk was soundly defeated Tuesday by Rep. Joe Donnelly.

In Missouri, the Tea Party was responsible for Todd (some rapes are “legitimate”) Akin winning the Republican Senate nomination – which gave Sen. Claire McCaskill a landslide victory.

And in Montana, Tea Party nominee Denny Rehberg was no match for Senator Jon Tester.

Of the sixty incumbent members of the House’s Tea Party Caucus, 47 were reelected, while 6 lost big, two ended up in races far too close for comfort, and one is still hanging by a thread (the rest either retired or sought higher office). Overall, those are bad odds for House incumbents.

As of Thursday morning, Tea Party icon Florida’s Rep. Allen West — who made a name for himself calling several of his Democratic colleagues communists — was still trailing his Democratic opponent Patrick Murphy by more than the 0.5 percent margin that would trigger an automatic recount. Nonetheless, West is charging “disturbing irregularities” in the balloting process, and his lawyers have asked that ballots and voting equipment be impounded in St. Lucie and Palm Beach counties in expectation of a recount.

Another Tea Party icon, Minnesota’s Rep. Michele Bachmann, beat challenger Jim Graves by just over 3,000 votes out of nearly 350,000 votes cast — even though she outspent Graves by more than 12-to-one. Not a good omen for Bachmann in 2014.

Tuesday wasn’t exactly a repudiation of the Tea Party, and the public’s rejection of Tea Party extremism on social issues doesn’t automatically translate into rejection of its doctrinaire economics. But the election may have been enough of a slap in the face to cause Tea Partiers to rethink their overall strategy of intransigence. And to give Boehner and whatever moderate voices are left in the GOP some leverage over the crazies in their midst.


About the author:
Robert Reich



Robert Reich is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Bill Clinton. He has written thirteen books, including The Work of Nations, Locked in the Cabinet, Supercapitalism, and his most recent book, Aftershock. His "Marketplace" commentaries can be found on publicradio.com and iTunes. He is also Common Cause's board chairman. His website is: http://robertreich.org

It is quite unbelievable that Patrick Buchanan has been a mainstream commentator in American politics for as long as he has. His focus on the right kind of Americans and his obvious consideration of blacks, hispanics, jews et al over the years as the wrong kind has lost all of its subtlety.

I think Buchanan does not really take into account the potential for Hispanics not to vote in their existing patterns if Republicans stopped taking such a persecutory tone with them. I recall very well Proposition 187 in California during the 1990's when Republicans were trying to turn Hispanics into suspects for deportation. If I remember this I can only imagine that Mexican-American voters in the Southwest will take a while to forgive them.

I also think Robert Reich has it right. If the Republicans play to their base any more, they will not provide enough cover for those who want to present themselves as respectable Republicans.