Implications of Change

So, with the final stretch before us, the election is looking more and more like a blowout. A good thing indeed if one were to subscribe to the party politics of the left or have bought into the message of the prominent speaker from Ohio. Yet, it is also raises the question as to what we as a nation actually do when we get that power. Aside from the obvious ramifications socially of having the first black president in our nations history (a subject I and roughly a million other people will wax philosophical on in about 10 days), there is also a more dangerous issue of having an entirely one party government.

Those who know me know I am a fiscal conservative, but as the Republicans have done an abhorrent job of being responsible in the last eight years, lets just ignore that the Democrats are generally the big spenders for now. Let's just concentrate on philosophy, which has come into play heavily this cycle.

Change. Aside from clinical definitions, change represents a philosophy that Democrats have used time and time again to win seats. In 1990 they used the keyword change in big senate and house races to take seats away from Republicans whose voters had soured after ten years of Reagan/Bush pushed policies. In 1992, the Dems used it to remove the Republicans from the White House, the only time in American history a post war president didn't win re-election in a year he seeked it. In 2000, you guessed it, George Bush Jr. used a variation of change to gain his bid and eventual seat in the house on Pennsylvania Avenue. The push was a change from 'disgraceful' politics and a chance to 'clean up Washington.'

Hollow promises, each.

So what makes this President any different? Again, aside from the obvious? One could point to his lack of ties to the old Washington. Joe Biden has long been in Washington, but is known for being friendly across the aisle and not being so much of a Democrat as just a Liberal. Someone with different viewpoints than most Republicans, but not someone incapable of bucking his own party to vote with them for things he believed in. So there isn't a need to appease people who helped Obama get to any specific place as there weren't many in the short time he spent in the Senate to accrue. However, that doesn't necessarily cover it. The things that make an Obama presidency much different than those mentioned before is the entire philosophy of the country, the constituents and the need economically and abroad this country has from it's leaders. In 2008 it is a whole new ballgame... and only Obama has seemed to notice.

The last eight years were terrible for our economy and abroad, sure, but they are just the tail end of a failed plan put into place just after Nixon. With the rise of George Bush Sr. from CIA kingpin to a party operative of the Republican core, the focus of the party shifted dramatically from fiscal responsibility, global supremacy through trade, a strong military to protect the public from jealous countries looking to gain something cheap and smaller government allowing the economy to prosper naturally, it has grown into something sinister. Now the party is the champion of division for the sake of loyalty, talking points, global supremacy through military, trade deals being made that benefit countries willing to turn a blind eye to our military exploits and a large government aimed at controlling the public from ever seeing how badly they are getting completely fucked by the system.

In other words, the entire party has done a 180 and has lost its power because of it.

Good riddance.

Exactly what this country needs right now is balance, and the last ten years have provided nothing but one sides policies. Bill Clinton, no saint in these matters himself, was too busy being witch hunted to stop the House and Senate, both Republican run to do whatever they felt like doing. When Bush won office, it was carte blanche to have a field day. Around 2006, when most voters started to get a whiff of their civil liberties being stripped away and becoming disillusioned with the message of constant and permanent states of fear, Republicans began being cast out on their ear in droves. It was a referendum that will continue this year and in a much more dramatic fashion. Not only is the American voting public willing to cast out the party it voted for in 2000 and re-elected in 2004, but it is going in the completely opposite direction. The old Washington Republicans will lose seats in both the House and Senate in massive numbers. The country will be run by Democrats in a fashion it has yet to ever see. The question is what will the Democrats do with this power, and secondary, what will the Republicans do now that they don't have a real say in the day's proceedings?

I see something dramatic happening. The Republican party as we know it will cease to exist by 2014. There will still be a party and it will be called Republican, but it will not resemble the party that is in power now, much like the Democratic party of 2008 resembles very little of the Democratic party of 1998. The ideologies will shift back towards the center and the party will refocus on the largest base of voters in their camps and not the fringe; Palin-voters. Again, the Republicans will focus on fiscal responsibility, states rights, foreign policy. In the background the Religious Right, who had their say for eight straight years, will grow tired of being held back and will strike out on their own. And so, the Conservative Party will be formed.

It will be led most likely by Palin and radio talk show hosts. It will focus on social issues like Gay Marriage (and yes, even if it gets passed in the House and Senate and a Supreme Court starts handing out licenses, it will be an issue like Abortion that these people will never let go of). It will be a party that caters specifically to small town, rural, white, lower income southern and Midwestern voters. And it will lose. Spectacularly. Repeatedly.

The Republican Party, a party now focused on economic and foreign policy restraint will likely rebound and gain seats in the House and Senate running against the spend-thrift ways of the Democrats in power and the nut jobs in the Conservative wing.

They will win a healthy dose of seats with that platform. Easily. Repeatedly.

This whole thing will balance out, as it always does. But this time it will spell the end of a party that thought it could have it's cake and eat it too. It thought it could court the extremists within our own country, and yet not be liable to them when they helped get them into power. When they have learned their lesson and come groveling back to the American Public, hands washed clean of the blood of the Social Conservative movement, they will be accepted and greeted, yes, as liberators.

A one-sided government never lasts, and neither will this. People will likely tire, and quickly, of a liberal and Democratic government after a term or two. But first, the other side must learn from their mistakes and cast out that which hurts them. It isn't rocket science to figure out that the divisive and backwards movement championed by the Palins have hurt the McCain like fiscals in a way that was unthinkable back in 2002.

So, we come back to philosophy. Barack Obama has found his philosophy of hope, which while it lacks specifics, appeals to the American voting block in a way that hasn't been seen since Kennedy ran on the same ideals. Republicans however are split as to what they want. Do they want the government to stay out of the way and let the free market run the way it needs and states to handle matters sensitive to its people, or do they want to ban gay marriage through the constitution and have the federal government spend billions across the world to rid the world of anyone who might possibly not like us and have guns?

A question we shall have answered soon enough indeed. Let's just hope were in a much better position when we find out than we are now.

"Intellectual Elite"

I have heard a good bit of chatter from pundits recently about the Anti-Intellectualism of the last thirty years slowly dying out. Beginning with the push to elect Ronald Reagan, anti-intellectualism has been a pervasive and strong ally of one party in particular, yet not the one that historically makes much sense. Republicans, long the party of fiscal geniuses and principles based on small government allowing a free market to work, has become the party of 'Joe' and almost proudly announces how its candidates don't know much about how the very things they are looking to have control over operate and work.

Where I differ from some of the pundits is that while I agree it is quite asinine, it isn't all that uncommon. It has been practiced in politics for as long as politics have been around. Labeling those who have made the effort to study and learn has manifested itself as 'elites', insinuating that they are part of a small inner circle of 'smart people' who run the world. Not unlike the leveling of Jews by anti-Semites, and sometimes mixing within them, anti-intellectualism finds its largest fan base within the working class.

During the McCarthy era, when America went on its witch hunt for Communists, America actually acted much like a Communist regime. The government controlled what went on television to a degree of censoring newscasts, cartoons were made, pandering to the groups that sought to drive communism out and anyone who didn't cooperate fully and with zeal was seen as unpatriotic and a possible threat to the government.

Sound familiar?

Way back in 2002 there was a movement to label anyone resistant to the idea of going to Iraq as "unpatriotic" and "sympathizing with terrorists." I seem to recall many debates with people who weren't using facts as a march to war, but fear. Fear of a faceless enemy that was very quickly assigned a turban and the Muslim faith. Muslim extremism has been a problem for centuries, just as Christian Extremism and Judaic Extremism have all had their time of rampant and senseless destruction (and some would say the Iraq war was a bit of both Christian and Jewish extremists exacting revenge under the cover of terrorism). This attack, 9-11, while obviously a terrible moment in any nations history and a tragedy for all involved, still did not grant carte blanche to the largest military power in the world to do whatever it felt like doing. And yet, that is precisely what happened. The US government fueled by any number of reasoning's, went into a country they overpowered easily with guns blazing, feigning a reasoning that didn't sit well with half of its own nation and yet anyone who disagreed was labeled as a traitor, a peace nick, a liberal, a sympathizer, unpatriotic, intellectual elite and naive. Notice those last two, Intellectual Elite, insinuating a vast knowledge that makes the owner of such out of touch with common man and its issues, and naive, ignorant of the worlds problems by way of simplicity. Don't those two negate each other? How can one be so intellectual to be considered among the elite, and yet naive?

The Iraq war was sold to the public on the basis of WMD's. Not liberating Iraqis. Not bringing democracy to the Middle East.

WMD's. Period.

The fear was, as it was repeated ad nauseum on CNN, MSNBC, FOX NEWS, and every other organization that broadcast American news and more specifically press conferences with heads of the Republican party, that Iraq not only HAD WMD's, but flaunted that fact and could technically strike the US within a matter of 20 minutes.

"Im tellin ya, folks! We better hurry up and get out there! Saddam could hit the button ANY MINUTE and we'd all be blown to hell with a nuke" they seemed to scream at us on a daily basis. The rationale behind this incredible claim was that we knew Saddam had a WMD because as the late great comedian Bill Hicks used to say "We checked the receipt."

But in the end, there were no WMD's and almost IMMEDIATELY after we went into Iraq and no cities in the US went ka-boom, people started asking questions. So the rational slowly changed. Suddenly we were there to bring democracy (note that does not read PEACE to the middle east, just democracy) and we would be greeted as liberators as soon as we could topple that regime already in place. The people are behind us we were told.

So Saddam fell.

"Where are the roses? Where are the parades? Where are the... oh shit, is that a ROCKET!?!"

Finally, here in 2008, Iraq is a relatively quiet place, mostly because we sent an extra army in to destroy the infrastructure of those who opposed our proposed government for the land and killed off any militants that stood in our way. They are learning to swallow their pride and realize they have been defeated, despite putting up a fight for many years, the last of their men are wounded and dying and they cannot fight any more. Just how every war ends... with the destruction of a generation of men.

Now, scathing as this is, it is not an attack on my beloved country so much as a look at it from a man who supports it with his entire heart. I love the United States of America. I am lucky to have been born here and would like to think had I been born anywhere else I would make my way here as it is truly the home of the great. But great people have not always run the great countries. Like it or not, the breed of anti-intellectualism, a fight against education and growth of the human psyche, has been led by men like George W. Bush. It has been led by his father and the predecessor before him, the icon of the Republican mantra Ronald Reagan. It has even been led by men who could have been great but instead did nothing to stop it, Clinton among them. This slow roll towards the Average Joe, or Joe the Plumber having his say in the government, and then when things go over his head, then that means not that he needs more education, not that he needs to pay more attention, but that things need to be dumbed down to his level, is KILLING our once and soon to be again great society.

Now, for a pressing question. Is Barack Obama the answer to these ill wills? Not entirely. But he is a step in the right direction. Not just his 'change' catchphrase, but growth. We as a nation need to grow up, take responsibility for completely engulfing ourselves in debt to countries we deplore on the surface (China to be blunt), and turn this ship around. I do not like the move towards socialism, fiscally, but the move towards catering to the rich HAS to stop and if a socialist approach is the only opposition we have to it, then it is what I feel more comfortable with. I do not like when a politician seems like he is above the normal people, feeling himself to be royalty, but if a ego driven politician is the only way to get someone in office with the brains to operate the machinery, then so be it. I am much more accepting of a man who thinks too much of himself at the controls than someone who thinks very little of anything at all.

In the end, Barack Obama is not my first choice to run this country... but he IS our best choice right now. More importantly, he is our SMARTEST choice. And that is exactly what Republicans seem to fear the most.

A note to explain

I am not really good at blogs, to be honest. I tend not to update them for months at a time and when I do they are long winded and somewhat cryptic. However I have decided that in this very important moment in our nations history that I might like to look back on my life at this very moment and know what I felt and thought. This will not be edited for content or language and will be my opinions, open to discussion but not to be apologized for. I am a fiscal conservative and a social liberal and that will be part and parcel of my opinions.

That being said, welcome to The Mind of The Duncan. A Musing of the Mentally Mad.