Tonight on Rachel Maddow, she and Arianna Huffington discussed this a bit. The suggestion is that a defeated party left alone to flounder about in a weakened and despondent state is dangerous. Prone to erratic and generally destructive behavior, and that it may be in the interests of America and the Democratic Party to help rebuild a sane opposition in the GOP. My first thought was “That’s Retarded”, but my second thought was “Retarded like a fox!” It seems so counter-intuitive that it has a crazy kind of charm.
So how about it? Should the Dems help to settle and rebuild the GOP and how should they do it?
While it’s true that if the GOP were to go into death throes (and I’m not at all convinced that it is), it could do a lot of damage before it finally collapsed, the Dems can’t really help repair or stabilize it. I mean, they can compromise were appropriate and not purposefully screw the Republicans were they don’t have to, but they can’t actually put them back together.
How can a liberal be expected to honestly help a conservative meet his political goals? Why would he want to? Why should the conservative trust the liberal?
In addition to what **Menocchio ** said, wrecking and sabotaging things is pretty much been what the Republicans do, when they aren’t trying to oppress/invade/loot someone else. They are constantly trying to gut the benevolent side of government, in power or out of it; being out of power will give them extra impetus, since they’ll want to make as big a disaster as possible and blame it on Obama and the Democrats. “Erratic and generally destructive behavior” is the norm for those people; propping them up, assuming they need to be propped up won’t make them less destructive.
In other words, a desperate, collapsing Republican Party ( and I too don’t think they are anywhere near collapse ) that decided to lash out in vengeance and do as much damage as it could - wouldn’t change it’s behavior at all.
The only way to repair the Republican is to help it attract moderate voters. It’s that moderate middle that can often make a difference in elections. Maybe the Democrats can help Republicans recruit more pro-choice candidates in the Northeast for instance.
The Republicans will flounder if they stay a regionalized party concentrated in the south. So, the Democrats need to help them build up their base in the north and west. Money would be the best method…so the Democrats could donate money to moderate Republicans competing in primaries in “purple” areas. If they make sure the Republicans nominate people who can run strong against the Democratic nominee, they give them a better chance to win. If worst comes to worst, Democratic party leaders may be able stong-arm some conservative Democratic office-holder to switch parties.
It will unfortunately take more sacrifice than the selfish Democrats are willing to give.
All that would do would be to make those moderate Republicans unelectable, at least as Republicans. Potential Republican voters ( moderate and otherwise ) would look at the Democrat-funded Republicans and not unreasonably decide they are just tools of the Democrats.
It’s not “selfish” to refuse to help your implacable enemies, which pretty much describes the Republicans. The Democrats are if anything too generous towards them already.
Interesting idea, but not likely to be effective. A) They don’t want the help, and they’ll aggressively let you know. They would be eager to bite that feeding hand, not even noticing the food in it. B) Wouldn’t/Shouldn’t trust enough to accept it. C) They don’t deserve it, and would never suggest such a thing with roles reversed. D) They barely understand their problems. After all, America is a conservative christian nation right? Clearly Gawd is on their side.
I think the Ds would do better to take this chance to try and legitimize the third(4th, 5th?) parties. Get together with the Libertarian leaders and hash out a strategy to turn them into the new opposition. Pour some gasoline on the fiscal/social conservative meltdown.
When the enemy is down, you finish them. You don’t help them up (and don’t run upstairs either!). Classic boneheaded good-guy move.
Starting with Abe Lincoln, letting his “beliefs” override the economic necessities of half the country, right? Now I agree the recent iterations with Gingrich’s contract for America turning congress into a vietnamese suck girl for the fundies, and Bush turning the Federal government into some BDSM gimp for corporate interests was destructive in the extreme, but there used to be some principles in the republican party which deserved to be in the debate.
Smaller government, non-intervention, states rights. I still believe the republicans should lose those debates, but someone debating them sanely would help us come up with a more thoughtful policy, and a more balanced one. But if the pubbies stick with calling for more de-regulation in the middle of the worst financial meltdown in nearly a century caused primarily by de-regulation, or continue to push “creation science” as a valid alternative to “actual science” they’re nothing but destructive.
No, indeed the whole idea is rather silly. Opposition will naturally reform. Labour eventually generated a better Conservative party simply by mistakes (and Conservatives learning that appeal to the hard core loses elections, consistently, when one is faced by a reasonably competent opposition as Blair’s government was).
I am amused not only by the silliness of the liberal slant in the SDMB–and buying into every ridiculous notion that comes along–but also by the apparent youth represented here. Or perhaps it’s not youth, but senility, with a memory going back less than a decade. In any case the current euphoria around the death of the Republican party represents a remarkably premature ejaculation of pronouncement. Ms Maddow and Ms Huffington need fodder for the show. That anyone would attribute any sort of depth to this sort of nonsense is embarrassing. The criteria for getting a TV show and a website does not involve either critical thinking or passing a history test.
It’s only been a few years since the Democrats were deader than a doornail, for goodness’ sake.
Buy the rumor; sell the news. If the news is that the Republican party is dead and positions in it should be liquidated, it’s time to bet on the Republicans to rise from the ashes again.
Oh yeah: reading a little history won’t hurt either.
And neither they nor Abe Lincoln are around anymore, and so don’t matter. What matters is what they are like now; not fifty or a hundred or more years ago.
You know what guys, how about we start fixing the problems they created before we start building them back up? I’m still not clear on how much damage a minority party could do anyway.
I’m no fan of the Republican agenda, but one thing is clear: they got 40-odd percent of the national popular vote. They’re hardly in need of a political bailout, and even if they are, it’s going to have to come from within.
The Democrats and Republicans both have an opportunity to show that they are capable of Getting Things Done once more. Republicans must decide if they are going to gleefully obstruct everything and continue to fellate FOX News Anchors; Democrats must decide whether to govern by fiat and pat the Pubbies in the head condescendingly, or to actually be as bipartisan as they claim they are.
Both have a lot to gain. Republicans have for nearly thirty years claimed the crown of fiscal responsibility and now have a golden opportunity to prove they can walk the walk (and importantly, that Democrats can’t). I predict that the Republicans will block Democrat legislation and spin their obstructionism as “we all know Democrats can’t handle money, we’re just raising valid objections.” Democrats have a chance to claim the Fiscal Responsibility title for themselves; they’ll probably say stuff like, “We tried to pass something fiscally responsible but the Republicans filibustered against it.”
The social liberals and the social conservative voters are not at stake, here; each side was pretty polarized in the election. The fiscal liberal and conservative voters are. Whoever convinces the moderates that their party was most responsible for fixing things will get the swing vote in 2010.
I just can’t see any reason why the Democrats would help the Republicans claim the swing voters. If anything, the Democrats will want to make a reputation for themselves.
You can’t compare post-war Europe with the Republicans. One is a group of fascists whose sole goal is destroying everything the United States stands for, and the other are Germans.
I just find this idea so bizarre. The Republicans have plenty of funding sources, they have a large population that votes for them, they have their own think tanks and media. What is it the Democrats are supposed to do for them?