How The GOP Purged A Conservative

[Segami]

by Chris Currey


" I do not recognize myself in the Republican Party anymore. As someone said it before, I did not leave the Republican Party, the Republican Party left me.

......Maybe I am too old and too cynical, but I think the Republican party is in the last stages of agony."



I am an old Republican. I am religious, yet not a fanatic. I am a free-marketer; yet, I believe in the role of the government as a fair evenhanded referee. I am socially conservative; yet, I believe that my lesbian niece and my gay grandchild should have the full protection of the law and live as free Americans enjoying every aspect of our society with no prejudices and/or restrictions. Nowadays, my political and socio-economic profile would make me a Marxist, not a Republican.


I grew up in an era where William F. Buckley fought the John Birch society and kicked them out of the Republican Party. I grew up with -– in fact voted for the first time for –- Eisenhower. In 1956, he ran a campaign of dignity. A campaign that acknowledged that there are certain projects better suited to be handled by the government. See, business thinks in the short term, as he said. That’s the imperative of the marketplace. I invest and I expect that in a few quarters, I garner the fruits of my investment. Government, on the other hand, has the luxury to wait a few years, maybe decades, for a return on a given investment. As a former businessman, I know that first hand. Am I a Marxist for thinking that?


I witnessed the fight for equal civil rights in the 1960s. And as a proud American, I applauded the passage of the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act, and we became a better country because of them. Those acts made America stronger. Those acts, at their core, represented and still represent all the values upon which the Republican Party was founded. Yet today, our GOP representatives and leaders are ashamed of them. When they talk about them, you feel their discomfort, their clumsiness, and sometimes their shame. That awkwardness is so strong that it crosses the television screen and hits you in the face in your living room. Why is that? What happened to this generation of Republicans? We are the party of Abraham Lincoln, and yet we act and behave as if we are the party of Nathan Bedford Forrest.


I did not like Medicaid and Medicare when they were passed. I was opposed to them. Maybe I was too young, too strong, and too ideologically confined. Yet, over the years, I saw how Medicare helped millions of elderly Americans. I saw how Medicare helped my mom in her final years battling emphysema caused by years of smoking. You have to be blind to oppose those programs. You have to be blind to wish for the suffering of millions of Americans just because you believe in personal responsibility."


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<http://www.frumforum.com/how-the-gop-purged-me>

[louis-t]

1. Publicans believe in "personal responsibility"

except when it involves Publicans.

[Winterblues]

2. Just like the Spotted Owl

This guy is bordering on extinction. :shrug: There used to be reasonable people that called themselves Republican.. That day is long past..

[Segami]

3. The ' new blood ' taking over has civil war beating on their minds. How much

more will they accept standing outside the rings of political power while the Democratic Party continues to govern and implement Democratic programs including SCOTUS appointments?

[Festivito]

4. "certain projects better suited to be handled by the government" Health Care?

Since each of us wishes to live longer than five years, hopefully, that would be better handled by government.

Yet, the author did not realize this about Medicare at the time.