Obama Highlights a Vote for McCain: George Bush's

posted by John Nichols on 10/26/2008 @ 12:00am

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Barack Obama has gotten plenty of help from Republicans over the course of the past week.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell jumped party lines to endorse the Democrat for president.

So did former Minnesota Governor Arne Carlson.

So did former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld.

But the biggest boost for Obama came from the unlikeliest Republican: George W. Bush.

After Republican presidential candidate John McCain went out of his way in recent days to distance himself from his party's extraordinarily unpopular incumbent president, what did Bush do? Announce that he had voted early -- for McCain.

Bush traditionally travels to Texas to vote on election day. But on Friday the White House announced that the Republican president had gone out of his way to cast that early ballot for his party's nominee.

Obama did not neglect the news.

Speaking in Nevada Saturday, the Democratic nominee noted somewhat gleefully:

Senator McCain has been throwing everything he's got at us, hoping something will stick. He's even called me a socialist for suggesting that we focus on tax cuts, not for corporations and the wealthy, but for the middle class.

Then, the other day, he took it to a whole new level. He said that I was like George W. Bush. You can't make this stuff up, folks. In what may be the strangest twist of all, Senator McCain said that I would somehow continue the Bush economic policies – and that he, John McCain, would change them.

He actually denounced the President for letting things – and I quote – "get completely out of hand."

That's right, John McCain has been really angry about George Bush's economic policies – except during the primaries, when he said we've made "great progress economically" under George Bush. Or just last month, when he said that the "fundamentals of our economy are strong." In fact, John McCain is so opposed to George Bush's policies, that he voted with him 90 percent of the time for the past eight years. That's right, he decided to really stick it to him – 10 percent of the time.

Well, let's be clear: John McCain attacking George Bush for his out-of-hand economic policy is like Dick Cheney attacking George Bush for his go-it-alone foreign policy.

Fortunately, President Bush doesn't seem to be at all offended – because yesterday, he cast his vote – early – for Senator McCain. And that's no surprise, because when it comes to the policies that matter for middle class families, there's not an inch of daylight between George Bush and John McCain.

Like George Bush, John McCain wants to keep giving tax breaks to oil companies and CEOs and companies that ship our jobs overseas. It's the same, failed, Wall Street first/Main Street last economic policy – and we're going to change it.

Like George Bush, John McCain wants to tax your health care benefits for the first time in history, and let insurance companies keep discriminating against people who need health care the most. It's the same, failed, insurance company first/your family last health care policy – and we're going to change it.

Like George Bush, John McCain wants to privatize Social Security – and leave it to the whims of the market. Like George Bush, John McCain ignored this housing crisis until it was too late – and then proposed a $300 billion bailout for Wall Street banks that does hardly anything to help people stay in their homes. Like George Bush, he wants less government regulation of business – he said it again just yesterday, the twenty-first time he's called for less regulation just this year. Now none of us want to see unnecessary burdens on business. But after what we've seen on Wall Street, isn't it obvious by now that we need some commonsense rules of the road to protect consumers and our economy?

I think we've had enough of the Bush-McCain economics. I can take ten more days of John McCain's attacks, but the American people can't take four more years of the same failed policies and the same failed politics. We're not going to let George Bush pass the torch to John McCain. It's time for change.

The great McCain versus Bush debate, which the current GOP nominee tried to fake up in a last-ditch effort to legitimize his "maverick" and/or "reform" candidacy, is settled.

Barack Obama won it.

Comments (52)

that there is an apparently substantial portion of americans who actually believe that senator obama is either a socialist or marxist is all the evidence we need about how uneducated this country really is.

Posted by darladoon at 10/26/2008 @ 12:16am
it is no wonder why europeans think this country is full of idiots when you have a news organization in florida ask senator biden whether obama is, in fact, a marxist.

if marx were alive today, to see the "debate" over obama's secret marxist inclinations, he wouldn't stop throwing up.

Posted by darladoon at 10/26/2008 @ 12:18am
Posted by darladoon at 10/26/2008 @ 12:16am

Does that also include the same uneducated fruit cakes who call John McCain a fascist?

I see the F word thrown around a LOT around here.

Too bad it's almost entirely not applicable to these foolish republicans, no matter how evil they may be.

Trust me, the egos of these clowns are too big for them to be fascists.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 12:24am
I'm just stokes to see how far the attack ads go.

Posted by Cccomfo1 at 10/26/2008 @ 12:42am
Po' Bill & Hill, just think, all this could have been theirs.

If they hadn't been such arrogant campaigners & sloppy managers.

So now it's all Obama's, who's winning it virtually without their help, indeed even in spite of them.

Nixon's southern strategy supported not only the GOP of the last 40 years, but also Dem pols like Bill Clinton.

The Obama landslide buries the need for the Dems ever to have to nominate a white southerner again. That winning argument is now a loser.

So does the GOP have to find a mixed race Harvard Law Rev editor to win?

Posted by sloper at 10/26/2008 @ 04:25am
So does the GOP have to find a mixed race Harvard Law Rev editor to win?

Posted by sloper at 10/26/2008 @ 04:25am

No, the GOP simply haven't used the fact that Obama was the editor of the HLR to their advantage. In a country where intellectuals are held in such low esteem, that could certainly have stuck. Picture the campaign ad:

"Who is the real Barack Obama? Some people say he's a muslim, a terrorist, a socialist. We like to believe he's all those things, and we'd prove it if we could. One thing that is certain, however, is that Barack Obama is an INTELLECTUAL. He reads books, he even writes books - and he can remember the titles if you ask him. He pals around with professors and, even worse, he used to be the editor of the most important legal magazine in the world, the Harvard Law Review. Obama has had the audacity to confess to all of this. He doesn't feel any remorse about all those thousands of books he's read, and you can be sure he would read another thousand if he had the chance. America cannot afford to have Barack Obama as its president. He knows too much.

I'm John McCain and I approve this message."

Posted by Amsterdam69 at 10/26/2008 @ 07:22am
See, here's the thing-

Obama HAS to be painted as a "socialist" to the electorate AND to the Repub base so that as McCain pretends to be "in the Center", he can point to Obama as "the Extreme Left"....and Dubya as the "just a little bit right of me, but not too much".

Otherwise, it would be Obama in the "center-left" and McCain atleast CLAIMING to be in the "center-right" and it wouldn't highlight enough of a difference.

It would also mean that he is subtlely admitting that Bush is on the "far, far Right" of economics, which is a slap in the face of his own base. And OPENLY admitting that Reaganomics/Bushonomics is a failure.

The public wouldn't see a major difference...or more importantly a SCARY difference between them and McCain would lose handily.

So by saying "Obama is a socialist"...McCain gets to appear the "moderate", the "one in the middle" (by moving the 50 yard light 20-30 yards closer to his goal, so to speak).

AND he doesn't insult his own base by having to totally reject their economic model.

Now the problem is...it ain't working. It came too late and too shrill and looks like blatent desperation. Oh, the RIO/RED-LVLIB-PONTI-etc. base believe it....of course they believe anybody one inch to the Left of Grover Norquist is a "socialist"...one inch left of Rich Lowry or Newt Gingrich is a "COMMUNIST!"....

but the general public isn't buying it.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 07:26am
The Right has gone so far right from Right that we no longer know where the Center is. We should give them a new name.

Posted by boing007 at 10/26/2008 @ 08:32am
As a former Republican, I know the difference between genuine conservatism - sound fiscal policy, limited government, running government like a business - and 'movement conservatism' - borrow-and-spend, a burgeoning, intrusive police state, running government like a charity for profiteers.

So how is 'fascist' not an apt term for today's 'conservatives'? Look at what a disaster Mussolini's invasion of Abyssinia was - Italy's black shirts were better at oppressing their countrymen than at fighting an actual war against a (badly) armed populace.

Posted by samcrossett at 10/26/2008 @ 10:12am
Posted by samcrossett at 10/26/2008 @ 10:12am

It'll be interesting to see who emerges in 2012 from the upcoming Republican civil war...

the Palin/Dubya-loving 28% Club...

or the David Brooks/David Frum/Peggy Noonan wing.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 11:13am
We should give them a new name.

Posted by boing007 at 10/26/2008 @ 08:32am

Above and beyond "wing nut?"

Posted by skeletonman at 10/26/2008 @ 11:13am
The best way for democrats to win a presidential election?

Run anybody after eight years of the Bush administration.

I know Obama is a great orator and all that.

But dubya deserves some of the credit.

Posted by bleedingheart at 10/26/2008 @ 11:20am
2010 census effects on electoral college:

+3: Texas +2: Florida +1: Arizona, California, Georgia, Nevada, Utah -1: Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Missouri, Pennsylvania -2: New York, Ohio

Posted by bleedingheart at 10/26/2008 @ 11:23am
I'm taking bets...

If Obama wins a week from Tuesday, will "bleedingheart"...

(A) Change his nick and start posting as an open Republican that he really is?

(B) Continue as "bleeding", sniping at an Obama Administration as a "TRUE progressive" who thinks Obama is "not good enough a liberal"?

(C) Disappear off the blog, ultimately failing at his GOP poser plan of "trying to pretend I'm a Naderite and sway some of the lefties over at 'The Nation' to vote for Obama"?

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 12:00pm
Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 12:24am

You may want to fire up the ole Google and peruse the "Fourteen Defining Characteristics of Fascism." And then with an open mind see how many of those characteristics may apply to McCain or any other Repug.

Then you can back to us with your report on us "uneducated fruit cakes."

Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 12:05pm
Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 12:05pm

I wouldn't, chaos. That blurb was posted by some Czech guy who posed as an academic, but really wasn't linked to any accredited school.

Fine fodder for left-wing blogging....but hardly political science.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 1:11pm
Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 12:05pm

Ah cool!

A fruit cake!

Gee I'm not running around calling everybody on the other side of the political aisle from me a fascist, I must be an asshole.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 1:37pm
"The Obama landslide buries the need for the Dems ever to have to nominate a white southerner again."

Now if we can just purge whitey from journalism and Hollywood.

Posted by bleedingheart at 10/26/2008 @ 1:41pm
"The Obama landslide buries the need for the Dems ever to have to nominate a white southerner again."

Now if we can just purge whitey from journalism and Hollywood.

AND... Obama's cabinet.

Cracker ass crackers.

Posted by bleedingheart at 10/26/2008 @ 1:43pm
I honestly think there's a point there. As Powell pointed out (though I don't it translates to "I voted because of race), electing a black man to the presidency would be a watershed for this country, ESPECIALLY if at least one of the states he won was in the south. That alone absolutely should not be enough reason to vote for him (assessing his policies and what he can or cannot offer is, I think, the real key), but it's worth pointing out what a huge step this would be. Much of my family is Republican (like I somewhat am), and they split between McCain and Obama this year, but they all recognize just what a huge step this would actually be. It would be a mistake at that point to still pronounce the civil rights struggle officially over (because there's still a lot of difficulties to face in poverty that our government often refuses to pay attention to), but it would be a huge step forward in that journey.

Posted by Thrawn at 10/26/2008 @ 1:50pm
Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 12:24am

Can you make some kind of argument that consists of something more than loaded language, equivocations, and appeals to your authority like "uneducated fruit cakes", "almost entirely", or "[t]rust me?

Here's an example:

1. Fascism has four main characteristics: nationalist ideology like "the U.S. is the greatest country on earth"; national level economic controls; state control over society and culture; and militarism.

2. The United States exhibits all of these qualities.

3. Both major U.S. political parties support policies that can be described as fascist.

4. It can be argued that fascist policies are more central to the Republican party that is focused on National Security (militarism), the Economy (directed from the top down despite claims to the contrary), and Values (includes nationalism and state control over society and culture).

5. If the U.S. exhibits fascist policies and fascist policies are at the center of the Republican party platform, then Republicans advocating those policies can be described as fascist.

C. Some Republicans can be called fascists.

and

1. If John McCain supports fascist policies, then he's a fascist.

2. John McCain supports fascist policies.

C. John McCain is a fascist.

I even threw in some extras not central to my conclusion, so you'd have more to attack. Feel free to argue that Republicans or John McCain are more something else than fascists. Or that the term is less useful because it has emotional connotations. Or whatever. But please, don't pretend that you have any special authority in this matter where us bumpkins should just "trust you". That dog ain't gonna hunt.

Posted by srjenkins at 10/26/2008 @ 1:57pm
Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 1:11pm

We know fascism without the definition coming from an acedemic. This defintion is as good as any, probably better than most. If you want academic look at the Oxford University "Critical Comments in Political Science."

Many academic works are presented. But none of them distills something in a relatively easy to understand point by point representation.

The end result is the same. This country is and has been becoming a fascist state.

Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 2:28pm
A fascist state is simply represented by the fact that a fascist government "simply opposes liberal views."

This is expressed even by the academics..

Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 2:34pm
People outside America have long regarded it as in some senses fascist - under Democrats but most especially under Republicans. With its flag-waving nationalism, its anti-intellectualism, its incarceration and execution rates, the US is undoubtedly a Police State - and with its vast military, stockpiles of WMDs, and the One Party of Big Business with its left and right wings, the US has a great many of the hallmarks of Fascism.

But there are exonerating features - freedom of speech is still technically allowed. Various other freedoms are guaranteed, to those who can grasp them. America is big, chaotic and inventive, and it may invent its way back to a more moderate and caring model.

The Far Right would like to drag the country deeper into fascism, adding religion and hate-speech into the mix, appealing more to fear and mass-psychology. This kind of tactic works well in a depression. How will the American Left organize against Fascism? Prevention is better than cure.

Posted by mikecope at 10/26/2008 @ 3:19pm
Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 2:34pm

Unfortunately, fascism isn't "simply opposes liberal views." In fact, frequently views described as "liberal" in this day and age could legitimately be called fascist. Take a look at these comments from Old Right journalist John T. Flynn:

"The test [of Fascism] is – how many of the essential principles of fascism do you accept and to what extent are you prepared to apply those fascist ideas to American social and economic life? When you can put your finger on the men or the groups that urge for America the debt-supported state, the autarchial corporative state, the state bent on the socialization of investment and the bureaucratic government of industry and society, the establishment of the institution of militarism as the great glamorous public-works project of the nation and the institution of imperialism under which it proposes to regulate and rule the world and, along with this, proposes to alter the forms of our government to approach as closely as possible the unrestrained, absolute government – then you will know you have located the authentic fascist."

I'd argue that both the Democratic and Republican parties are authentically fascist according to this criteria. It is also a criteria more at odds with the views of Old Right conservatives than modern day, self-described liberals.

Can you deny it?

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig2/fascism.html

Posted by srjenkins at 10/26/2008 @ 3:26pm
Posted by srjenkins at 10/26/2008 @ 3:26pm

nice quote.

btw it's one criterion, many criteria (grammar fascist lol)

Posted by mikecope at 10/26/2008 @ 3:33pm
Posted by srjenkins at 10/26/2008 @ 1:57pm

lol

y'know, I could argue til I'm blue in the face. I have to make a week's worth of dinners in about 30 seconds so I will save it for some other time.

All I have to say, is you all are managing to sound like the lovely members of the far right-wing, like Sarah Palin, or LVLIBERTY, when they call Obama a socialist, and then elucidate such succinct points as "He supports socialist policies so therefore he is a socialist." I would expect that somebody who would say republicans are fascists, is a progressive of some breed, and as a progressive would have some tiny shred of objectivity.

It appears I'm expecting far too much.

But let's be honest, for me to argue any further, would just be time wasted, nu?

The worst part is, we're on the same team. I think our so called republican conservatives are some of the worst people to ever run this country. I despise their ideology, their fear-mongering, and their hate speech.

That doesn't make them fascists.

Also, you can be uneducated without being a bumpkin ; )

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 4:11pm
Although maybe John McCain and George bush are armed militants trying to overthrow the government and instill a dictatorship.

I must have missed that episode of Dateline NBC.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 4:18pm
" If some historians have used the model of totalitarianism in order to analyze fascism, others, & they are in the majority,have used the model of the "good revolution." The French, American, and especially the Russian revolutions, so it is said,led to the progress of mankind, while fascism was an attempt to stop the clock, to maintain old privilege against the demands of the new classes as represented by the proletariat. In reality, fascism was itself a revolution, seizing power by using twentieth century methods of mass mobilization & control, & replacing an old with a new elite."

THE FASCIST REVOLUTION By George L. Mosse

Posted by Sorelish at 10/26/2008 @ 4:20pm
Posted by srjenkins at 10/26/2008 @ 3:26pm

The usual response by fascist repubs. Rule one. Always blame the other side for what you yourself are doing..

Right out of the playbook.

We will know "your names".

Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 4:39pm
Yayyyy, the quote game!

"The word ‘Fascism' is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else... almost any English person would accept ‘bully' as a synonym for ‘Fascist'."

-George Orwell

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 4:57pm
After all, we all know about the republicans undying hatred of laissez-faire economics...

Or their desire to eliminate our economic dependence upon foreign nations/economies, and their support of social welfare.

Not to mention the loads of politically motivated violence, and totalitarianism.

Oh wait!

None of those are applicable to the GOP.

Shucks : (

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 5:04pm
Anyhoo, I hope arguments like this won't come between what seems to be our agreement on how god-awful the GOP rule has been, and how glad we will be, collectively, to see it end.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 5:18pm
Posted by mikecope at 10/26/2008 @ 3:33pm

Technically, yes. However, it sounds fake in normal discourse, right there along with, "Whom among us doesn't like NASCAR?" Correct, yet wrong all the same.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 4:11pm

You'll notice that I don't limit my critique to Republicans. Fascism can be plausibly argued for both parties.

Also, if we changed the statement to, "He supports [primarily] socialist policies so therefore he is a socialist." This doesn't strike me as an argument that is obviously false.

Posted by chaoszen at 10/26/2008 @ 4:39pm

I remember going to a socialist conference once where I questioned the one-sided story being argued about how communism was better than anarchism - where the anarchists would be but up against the wall right alongside the capitalists as an enemy. If fascist Republican is your code word for the enemies of the kind of leftism you articulate on a daily basis here, then please feel free to continue to think of me as one.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 5:04pm

Did I miss the memo where billions of tax dollars were no longer being given to aerospace, defense, agribusiness, energy, and so forth during the Republican or Democratic Congress? Or the reduction of the negatives in our balance of trade? Or the decrease of the national debt? Or less spending on military adventurism? Oh, that's right. It didn't happen.

Let's not pretend that the Republican party represents the Old Right anymore. It hasn't represented laissez-faire econonics, economic independence, non-interventionalist foreign policies, smaller government or anything like it for decades. You must really think we all just fell off the turnip truck.

Posted by srjenkins at 10/26/2008 @ 5:35pm
Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 4:57pm

My, but do you have an extreme patience. Some say the market will take care of all our problems. Others look toward the govt.for some balance. You obviously, settled in your club chair, look down upon your wingtips, a la Robert Crumb's notable cartoon character.

Your motto- Give torpor a chance.

Posted by Sorelish at 10/26/2008 @ 5:49pm
Yes, you've got it!

I'm a secret right-wing operative, a fascist spy, sent here to argue with you about how we fascists are NOT fascists!

BINGO!

Tell me something, do you consider Barack Obama and the democrats to be fascists?

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 5:49pm
At this point, since I seem to be the only one arguing any sort of sense, I'm not sure what else to say.

Must be a slow Sunday.

The only thing I've talked about so far is my dislike for knee-jerk democrats/liberals to label republicans as fascists, and for knee-jerk republicans/conservatives to label democrats as socialists.

BOTH labels are absurd, and are both marred by overly-emotional ideological whining. Such name-calling and mudslinging does NOTHING except make people look foolish. IF it is indeed your desire to look foolish to the reasonable people in the world, feel free, but don't pretend it's anything else, and don't be upset when you're marginalized and looked upon as ridiculous.

Keep making assumptions about me though, I wouldn't expect anything less from people so horribly indoctrinated by only what they want to hear. You all have much more in common with the LVLIBERTYs of the world than you would ever admit.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 6:05pm
Posted by Sorelish at 10/26/2008 @ 5:49pm

Yes, you've nailed it!

As I sit here laughing at all of you, while dining on lobster and caviar.

Bravo!

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 6:07pm
"YOU DON'T AGREE WITH US, THEREFORE YOU MUST BE REPUBLICAN/FASCIST SCUM!"

Pardon me while I roll my eyes.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 6:08pm
All of the open-minded, liberal, Obama voters in the room, raise your hands!

Quick, let's all have a "Who's more liberal" contest.

Posted by TexasFlood at 10/26/2008 @ 6:11pm
If that should occur, you would see the end of the Republican party as one of the major parties. A 3rd party would quickly spring up to take it's place.------Posted by lvliberty1 at 10/26/2008 @ 6:29pm

So if the moderate Repubs win...you guys bolt to a 3rd Party...

but if THEY get sick of YOU guys....

where do THEY go?

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 8:14pm
I think they ought to become Democrats.----Posted by lvliberty1 at 10/26/2008 @ 8:18pm

And then, what would happen to the Republican party, if all the liberal and moderate Republicans leave to become Democrats?

Electorally, that is?

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 8:23pm
Only in the mind of John Nichols could a sitting Republican President voting for the Republican nominee be newsworthy.

I wonder whom the Clintons plan to vote for... Johnny, any thoughts on that?!

;-[)

Posted by freiheit1 at 10/26/2008 @ 9:23pm
I wonder whom the Clintons plan to vote for...

Posted by freiheit1 at 10/26/2008 @ 9:23pm

why, ralph nader, of course.

Posted by frosty zoom at 10/27/2008 @ 01:10am
Sure they're not really fascists. But in the words of Henry Wallace, "The symptoms of fascist thinking are colored by environment and adapted to immediate circumstances. But always and everywhere they can be identified by their appeal to prejudice..."

Appeal to prejudice? Hmmm, where have I seen that lately? Class? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

Posted by masussman at 10/27/2008 @ 02:11am
Posted by lvliberty1 at 10/26/2008 @ 9:00pm

Sure, there would be a choice.....it just wouldn't include ridiculous ideas like banning abortion or no money for stem-cell research or no money for sex ed unless it's "Just Say No" silliness or starting wars with countries that never attacked us on faulty intell.

The Repubs could still fight for lower taxes, less government, and balanced budgets.....and win. (That is, if they actually tried to implement such things, unlike lately).

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/27/2008 @ 07:16am
Speaking as the resident Commie, Pinko SOB (Trotskyist School), I'd just like to:

(a) Disagree with TexasFlood that there has been a lot of "Republican = Fascist" name calling here at TheNation.com. I've seen a few instances, but until this thread - unless I missed something over the weekend - this is the first sustained debate on the issue that I can remember here.

(b) Also disagree with srjenkins that either the GOP or the Democrats are fascists. Liberal bourgeois states can be just as imperialist as fascist ones, and occasionally just as authoritarian. Also, fascist movements tend to have hodgepodge ideologies that are hard to buttonhole because they arise in reaction, primarily, to an active working class and with the support of at least one wing of big business.

Neither of our twin parties of Capital is fascist, although both are desperately trying to defend capitalism in both theory and practice. Now, if the working class broke free of the Democratic Party straightjacket and not only fought back but went on the offensive, maybe we would see the fascist reaction take over one of the parties. But we aren't there yet.

Posted by cka2nd at 10/27/2008 @ 10:37am
Posted by lvliberty1 at 10/27/2008 @ 09:52am

LVLIB, I would HOPE that those views get their representation...didn't you get that from my post?

Again, what happens to the GOP if you "true, blue conservatives" win the up-coming civil war and AS YOU WISHED, the David Brooks, David Frums, Peggy Noonans, Chris Buckleys, Colin Powells, Anchorage Daily News editors (heheh)...all become Democrats.

I think you WOULD have your representation ....you'd just LOSE every election. Or do you have polling that shows that a majority of Americans want abortion completely outlawed? (Wait...that IS what your fellow "pro-lifers" who AREN'T "win hearts and minds" types want)...or that a majority of Americans think that embryonic stem-cell research is the equivalent of Dr. Mengele in a camp?....or that a majority want their daughters (and sons) to roll the dice and possibly turn out like Bristol and Levi?

If so...present it.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/27/2008 @ 10:54am
Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 07:26am

Wow, I actually completely agree with Mask's analysis in this post.

It'll be interesting to see who emerges in 2012 from the upcoming Republican civil war... the Palin/Dubya-loving 28% Club... or the David Brooks/David Frum/Peggy Noonan wing.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 11:13am

So if the moderate Repubs win...you guys bolt to a 3rd Party...

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/26/2008 @ 8:14pm

Ah, that's better! I wouldn't call Brooks, Frum and Noonan the "moderate" wing of the GOP, except maybe on social issues. They are, in fact, the neo-conservative wing of the party, the faction that pushed the U.S. into invading Iraq and has been trying to do the same with Iran.

We've got at least four or five wings of the Republican Party: the Religious Right, the neo-cons, the so-called paleo-conservatives and the libertarians, who are split on social issues. Most of the first two support Bush-style imperialism, while both libertarian camps oppose it and the paleo-cons are split on the subject. The paleo-cons and the religious right are hardcore on social issues, while the neo-cons are soft, or outright supportive, on abortion and reproductive rights, queer equality and civil rights. Again, the libertarians are split here, with Ron Paul, Lew Rockwell and the von Mises Institute being more socially conservative than the Cato Institute folks. Finally, while the libertarians and the paleo-cons seem to have some shame over Reagan-Bush style deficit spending, the neo-cons and RR evince none.

Personally, I wouldn't be surprised to see some of the neo-cons return to the Democratic Party and resume their positions as (Henry "Scoop") Jackson Democrats while the GOP civil war rages.

Posted by cka2nd at 10/27/2008 @ 10:57am
Posted by cka2nd at 10/27/2008 @ 10:57am

Well, CKA, here's my analysis of that anaylsis (and implication)...

the Dems, despite claims by the Right, haven't run their hard-core fiercely ideological faction and won (uh, that'd be you and the other out-and-out socialists)...the Republicans did.

Despite the new claims (to continue to prop up their ideology) that "Bush wasn't a real conservative" (i.e. Medicare drugs and no spending vetoes)....he was 90% everything that LVLIB and the Hard Right wanted.

If the Dems ever even RAN a guy who was 90% what you and the Hard Left wanted, he or she would lose to even Palin.

Now for the GOP to come back, what's got to happen is the Brooks, Frums, Noonans, etc. to take back the reins, tamp down the religious zealotry (but not crush them...useful idiots still are "useful") and seriously re-claim Dubya's initial foreign policy outlook....that of non-interventionist.

Run on that and either 2016 (or even 2012, if Obama seriously screws up)...they can resurrect themselves.

But if they keep the Paliniacs, 26%ers (Dubya supporters), and LVLIBs in positions of political power....they'll keep losing. It'll be like continueing to run on "Hooverism" post 1932...

and if you want to know how well THAT went....ask Alf Landon, Wendell Wilkie, or Thomas Dewey. It took IKE to salvage the GOP!

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/27/2008 @ 12:13pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 10/27/2008 @ 1:39pm

Yep...and I noted it is one of the rare times that you and most everybody here at "TN"...agree.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/27/2008 @ 2:14pm
Now for the GOP to come back, what's got to happen is the Brooks, Frums, Noonans, etc. to take back the reins, tamp down the religious zealotry (but not crush them...useful idiots still are "useful") and seriously re-claim Dubya's initial foreign policy outlook....that of non-interventionist.

Run on that and either 2016 (or even 2012, if Obama seriously screws up)...they can resurrect themselves.

Posted by Maskdelta at 10/27/2008 @ 12:13pm

I'm not sure about Noonan, but you just can't expect Frum, or even Brooks, and the rest of the neo-cons to take a non-interventionist stance. They may not be religious zealots, but they are serious about their principles, including that the U.S. SHOULD be interventionist. And we're not even talking about "defending the country" robustly, we are talking about "defending our interests" abroad by spreading "democracy" (read, free market capitalism) around the world, by military means if necessary.

Essentially, a neo-con led GOP would have to buck the "Vietnam Syndrome" and the "Iraq Syndrome" of the American public, and that will be awfully hard to do absent a Jimmy Carteresqe failure on the part of Obama.

By the way, I would never expect the Dems to run on an explicitly socialist platform, or even flirt with true socialism. But could they have won more over the last 20 years running on ideas taken from Jesse Jackson's 1988 presidential campaign and Paul Wellstone's campaigns? Yes, I think so. Of course, they would have betrayed the working class in the end, but the political culture would not have been so thoroughly ceded to the right.

Posted by cka2nd at 10/27/2008 @ 4:47pm