05-18-2016, 08:25 AM
(05-14-2016, 04:01 PM)Bronco80 Wrote:Quote:So, Donald Trump. He both terrifies and excites me.
What's terrifying is obvious, and it starts with him having access to the nuclear codes. My #1 fear of Trump is him as Commander-in-Chief running foreign policy. It continues in that I think Trump would be more interested in appointing sycophantic yes-men in his Cabinet to stroke his massive ego, instead of finding people that are actually qualified to run major federal departments. Then, of course there's the bigotry. To be fair, the GOP has been exploiting bigotry ever since the Southern Strategy, but it has at least been in a controlled, calculated manner to benefit the nation's elite. Trump, on the other hand, is chaotically declaring open season on disadvantaged groups.
At the least, Republicans used to promise something in return for trickle-down economics and lax regulation of business. One might find some job security in being underpaid and overworked -- at least until one wears out, as was the norm in the Gilded Age. Low wages allegedly promote investment and hiring, even for those who have endured discrimination in the past.
Quote:So what's the exciting part? Not only do I think he's going to lose, and lose badly, but I hope that he has irrevocably splintered the Republican political alliances to make them unelectable, at least on the presidential level, and over time hopefully that will filter downticket. The GOP elites that have running their weak government, pro-corporate agenda have always been small in number, with that agenda being quite unpopular unless it's buttressed by pandering on Southern strategy style wedge issues. But there was always the risk that the masses would overrun the elites. Trump has masterfully exploited that, and even if he loses in 2016 he's created the blueprint for himself or another Trumpist to do it again in 2020 and beyond. It's been amusing listening to the #NeverTrumpers--I can sense the desperation that their ideology could very well be exiled to the lost woods of politics.
The wedge issues can work when the Democratic President is... well, you know. But ignore the melanin, and his policies have worked.
Quote:Putting my Fourth Turning hat on, by the time this turning is over I could easily see the Seventh Party System begin with a new realignment. How that will turn out, we still have a very long way to go. But here are my two guesses:
--1) The Democratic Party turns into a dominating centrist party, kind of like the PRI in Mexico, with powerless rump parties on the right and left. While it would put the Republicans out of power, I don't particularly want a Clinton-style corporatist party running the show.
That is a parallel to the Republican Party from 1865 on. Any agenda can become conservative, and Barack Obama has some very conservative traits. He's more conservative than Lincoln or FDR for his time. Even his support of same-sex marriage is consistent with homosexuals deciding that they are going conservative on issues of child protection. Homosexual rights are not simply compatible with law and order (usually a conservative objective); they are necessary for law and order.
Quote:--2) The Republicans finally get the hint that their increasingly extreme economic agenda, paired with pandering to bigots, is a losing game, and they finally cast out the bigotry and evolve to the point of other center-right parties in the world that understand the value of things like universal health care, paid family leave, higher minimum wages, and the like. This is my preferred realignment, as it would also push the Democrats further to the left.
Maybe the Republican Party survives as a non-ideological safety valve for dissidents from the Democratic majority, for people challenging machine politics, and as an alternative for the incompetent, out-of-touch, and corrupt Democrats when those appear.
Quote:Of course, none of this is going to happen unless advice is heeded that I recall Eric harping about frequently: people, especially Millennials, need to get out there and vote, and not just once every four years! Midterm elections are incredibly important, and that message needs to be made clear on the Democratic side.
Yup! But as significant -- Millennials are entering the age in which their first figures start getting into high office. Someone who talks the Millennial lingo can excite the Millennial generation. We are going to see lots of aging Silent and first-wave Boomers disappearing from public office through death, retirement, and defeat.
The oldest Millennials have begun to turn 34 this year.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.