All republics, all empires, all civilizations eventually die. In the twentieth century alone, the Austro-Hungarian, German, Russian and Ottoman empires all perished in the Great War; the British empire vanished within a quarter century of its “finest hour”; and a Soviet empire succumbed to a collapse of faith following the Cold War. Yet throughout everything, the American empire has endured (Buchanan 2-3).
Now, however, as conservatives have licked their wounds from President Obama’s victory, Republicans threaten to shatter the American empire as well:
The [Republican-backed] invasion of Iraq and the war to impose democracy upon that Arab and Islamic nation that has never known democracy may yet prove a textbook example of the imperial overstretch that brought down so many empires of the past. (Buchanan 3)
The iconic heartlands of right-wing America, home to images, piped in through Charles Osgood’s CBS Sunday Morning each week, of bright church steeples, square dances and stock car races, it seems, have all turned against liberal America.
How is it, the left wonders, that the conservative working class can so plainly vote against their own interests time and time again?
Joe Bageant, author of the enlightened commentary on the demise of the conservative sector,
Deer Hunting with Jesus: Dispatches from America’s Class War, principally blames, what he calls, the American hologram. This Matrix-like construct of media-protected corporate misdirection, wherein average Joes become trapped in a rigged economy that views them as nothing more than ashtray-scented hillbillies who deserve to live in disintegrating double-wide trailers, is the root of all evil.
Anyone who thinks that these white conservatives, both working class and small business class, don’t care about anything outside their own zone of ignorance is only half right. The fact is that many of them cannot see outside that zone at all. They are too uneducated, too conditioned to the idea that being a consumer is the same thing as being a citizen. (Bageant 252)
It was not always like this though; in fact, Republicans have been the favored, most forward-thinking party for the majority of American history. They burst into popular politics in 1856 as a third party with presidential candidate John C. Fremont under the platform “Free soil, free labor, free speech, free men, Fremont”
(“The Republican Party GOP History” 2).
Although originally defeated, the party’s founding principle, the need to restrict the expansion of human slavery, was unquestionably sound (Gould 484). Four years later, in 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the first Republican so snag the presidency. And ever since, for the majority of their time as a formal party, Republicans have been progressives; [they were responsible for freeing slaves through the Thirteenth Amendment and securing suffrage for women.]
The rightist reign continued through most of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, under notable names such as Eisenhower, Nixon, Ford, Regan, Bush and Bush. It was during these years that America became a true superpower. (“The Republican Party¾ GOP History” 5). Under conservative rule came an end to the Cold War, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and victory in the Gulf War (Gould, 446).
However, the elections of 2000 and 2004 essentially resulted in total demise of the Republican party. The 43rd President of the United States, George W. Bush, was the first since Eisenhower to enjoy a majority in both houses of Congress. He was elected based off of his strong belief systems, which were a stark contrast to the views of the amoral Bill Clinton, who’s career was tainted in the scandal dealing with Monica Lewinsky.
It was after the collapse of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, which spurred national fear of organized groups of terror, that President George W. Bush declared it to be U.S. policy to launch preemptive war on any rogue regime that sought weapons of mass destruction. The infamous “Bush Doctrine” was implemented on the neoconservative ideal that the U.S. should go to war to prevent any other nation from acquiring the power to challenge American hegemony in any region of the world. (Buchanan 6) And thus has resulted a widespread disdain for the warped views of the nation’s rightist elites:
Republicans honestly tell the world: “Listen in on my phone calls, piss-test me until I’m blind, kill and eat all of my neighbors right in front of my eyes, but show me the money! Let me escape with every cent I can kick out of the suckers, the taxpayers, and anybody else I can get a headlock on, legally or otherwise.” (Bageant 260)
George W. Bush left his post as President with a 34 percent approval rating, up five percent from his average Gallup poll scores in the last quarter of his presidency. These scores were the third worst in history, just above Harry Truman’s 32 (after botching the Korean War and creating a tax meltdown) percent and Richard Nixon’s 24 percent (following his resignation due to the Watergate scandal). And while his approval rating has improved since Election Day, “the vast majority of Democrats and even most independents still disapprove of how he is handling the job. Only Republicans generally approve of the job Bush is doing,”
(“Bush Presidency Closes With 34% Approval, 61% Disapproval” 2).
With all of the political upheaval that resulted from this in the last election, it is said that it will be virtually impossible for the left to ignore the resentment among the people of ‘heartland America’ that is currently simmering and threatens to soon come to a boil. In fact, the realization of the grave consequences of the liberal core, the mantra of hope and change, is clearly motivating Republicans to “take a stand for the sake of the country,”
(Adamo 1).
This revolution is no bluff either; Republicans across the nation are calling for their own type of change. America is undoubtedly not the nation it was 50, or even five, years ago, which was an important point, primarily unacknowledged in the last election, and thus the Republican party cannot keep up with the times by sticking to all of the ideals of earlier generations.
In such an arena, truly conservative Republicans are presented with a golden opportunity to reclaim their party form their insipid “establishment” counterparts, and rework it into a vibrant and inspiring political force that can reassert the greatness of America, both in its international relations and in its domestic culture. This possibility is real, but it cannot be pursued by a political class that maintains its strategy of sitting the fence, and responding to every ensuing outrage from the Democrats by countering with watered down versions of the same abhorrent things. (Adamo 8)
Yet, the fate of the Republican party does not ultimately hang in the balance of the moves conservatives take in the coming years, but rather President Obama’s actions, no matter how fiercely rightists will dispute this statement. The new administration has already passed up a chance to assert the Bush Doctrine in North Korea, which may substantially weaken the strength of neoconservative values¾ if it works. Furthermore, the success of Obama’s withdrawal program from the Middle East will either make or break conservative followings.
However, the issues of whether the right went wrong under George W. Bush are essentially in the past, although their effects may linger for generations to come. It is time for the Republicans to rise up as a unified party, or forever fade into the foreground.
“Conservative idealism does not exist in a vacuum, of course. It recognizes the reality of prospective danger, and conservatives have long been willing to support large defense budgets, at less disproportionate to other federal spending to reduce the likelihood that America might be attacked,” (Edwards 160).
This may seem depressing, and as though I have given up on life or something, but it's the truth, and I am very happy with this realization. The fact that I have gained the ability to be satisfied with myself, no matter what others think of, has been much more fulfilling than anyone the feedback of anyone else.
and making fun of the ridiculous drug counterculture and hearing trippy music and asking my parents what they were like when they were kids and Charles Gibson's World News Tonight...
and funny-looking people and pretending that I am going to become an estatition and finding kids at school that look like Winnie the Pooh characters...
and when my mom says many of the ridiculous things that come out of her mouth (like the time she eluded to the fact that one of my friends was bi-polar or the time that she told me that she thought schools should teach sexual education based off of fear) and I like the fact that I am probably about to be fired at work for something I wrote in the school newspaper and insisting on being called Princess Emma in Torch and the fact that I got the lowest NCAA bracket score (16 out of a possible 150) during the last tournament because I picked the teams with the funniest names (I had Gonzaga, who only made it to the sweet 16 winning the whole thing) and I like pretending that it was my sole faith in Gonzaga that got them to the last 16...
and I like watching old movies because it makes me laugh to see weirdo hippies and I love it when strangers come up to me and say that I look like Audrey Hepburn (which has happened twice in the past three months)...
and I like hanging around this kid named Michael because he tells me that I'm going to Hell every day and then I make fun of his belief in God...
and I like talking to my parents, even when I know that they're not listening and telling them horrible things that I am 100 percent sure they won't remember and I like lying about my whereabouts at every time and I like when I get caught doing stupid things because it genuinely makes me laugh and there are rarely consequences and I like never talking about work again because if I do I am probably going to get fired and I like finishing blog posts at almost exactly 400 words, ok done!
