“Often when you think you’re at the end of something, you’re at the beginning of something else.” (Fred Rogers) – as seen on the Jack’s Winning Words blog.
The recent Presidential election may have been the end of both the Republican and Democratic parties as we have known them; and maybe that’s not a bad thing. There was an article in the Detroit Free Press about the new movement which has sprung out of the election of #Tweeter-In-Chief. The paper dubbed this emerging organization of people objecting to and resisting the changes that #POTUS is trying to decree as the Liberal Tea Party. I seriously doubt that this handle will stick since neither the original Tea Party people or the nascent resistance “movement” really want a liberal group to be associated with that term.
Certainly, Trump laid waste to the old guard in the Republican party and shows little intention of working very hard to rebuild bridges to the very leaders that he criticized during his campaign. They are, after all inhabitants of the “Swamp” that he promised to drain; although, thus far he just seems to be exchanging one set of old alligators for a new set of crocodiles. So far only two elected members of the Republican party in Congress have shown any real backbone by voting against one of the questionable nominees for important government jobs that #POTUS has put forth. Both, it might be noted are women.
The Democrats didn’t really fare any better in the latest election, having the dark underside of their party leadership exposed by WikiLeaks. One of the better postmortem analyses that I saw correctly laid the blame not just on Hillary’s campaigning decisions but on the overall sense of entitlement that the Democrats have developed over time. They seem to sound a bit like a broken record from the 20th Century which when played just repeats the phrase “we’re the party of the working people” over and over, as if that is sufficient reason to vote for their candidate. I’m not sure that they even understand who “the working people” are anymore; although Bernie Sanders tapped into the a big group with a message that seemed to resonate with some of “the working people.”. I still think that it would have been a hell of a race between Trump and Sanders, or at least more fun to watch.
Enough Monday morning quarterbacking. Where do the parties go from here? I fear that the Republican Party has sealed its own doom by swinging way right and embracing a populist message. As I’ve written here before, I still recall the moderates within the Republican Party, which kept it somewhat balanced. There seems to be no room anymore for anyone who won’t swear allegiance to the dictates of some obscure far right economist or to the restrictive social issues of the far right religious groups. And heaven forbid that any Republican ever have the backbone to stand up to the NRA. There is little hope for moderation, bipartisanship or even intelligent decision making for those beholding to the Republican Party and their financial backers.
Unfortunately, the Democrats have themselves fallen victim to this trend, albeit in the opposite philosophical and political direction. One seems to have to prove their liberal credentials to the extreme to be accepted by the Democratic party and its current leadership. The complaints that the Democrats have become a bi-coastal party and a party of elitists does have a ring of truth to it. The other complaints that surfaced during the last election that the party has been taking minority voters and union voters for granted also holds some water. Those issues deserve to be addressed and need to be addressed before the Democrats can reclaim any leadership in Washington.
I have heard from a number of people that they held their nose and voted for one candidate or the other, which indicates a serious degree of dissatisfaction with both parties. The idea of it perhaps being time for a third party has gained a little traction in the post-election angst of those who feel left behind by both parties. I’ve opined here before about the need for that new party, a centrist party unencumbered by the pull of either extreme right or left and more concerned about running the country right than trying to force a set of moral standards on everyone. In the mid-20th Century these politicians were called moderates, which is now a dirty word in both parties. The last semi-successful third party effort was mounted by Ross Perot and was a populist effort. Many might say that Bernie Sanders effort was also populist, but he chose to stay within the confines of the Democratic Party; which, in retrospect, was probably the wrong decision.
It is somewhat sad to think that in order to be successful today one must be a Billionaire or at least have a few of them in your corner (that is, if you are not peeking out from their pockets). I’m thinking of sending a message to Michael Bloomberg to challenge him to jump in and get active at the Presidential level. He seems content right now to sit on the sidelines and take pot-shots at #POTUS through the vehicle of his Bloomberg Business Week. Perhaps at 75 he is considered to be too old, but at least he could put his billions to work either revitalizing the Democratic Party or starting a new third party. I’ll bet he could get Warren Buffet to jump into that effort with him.
So, anyway, maybe it took a shock like the election of #Tweeter-In-Chief to awaken the giant; that huge majority that is not really comfortable way off on the Left or Right of the political spectrum. We shouldn’t have to hold our noses to vote for someone to be President of the United States. Let’s get people back in Congress and eventually back in the White House who can work for all of the people of this great country. Maybe this started something new. Join the new movement and take back our country.
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