One of my most well received posts was "The Fire and the Spring," where I likened the fear, anger, and blame-based rhetoric of the current Republican party to a roaring fire that must constantly be fed to keep alight, and possibly could grow out of control and consume those who were stoking it.
Enter Donald Trump.
Yes, the sideshow that is the Trump campaign has proven to be a gold mine for comedians and network executives alike, and the fact that he is actually polling neck and neck with the presumptive nominee from the other side all but proves the fire has gotten out of control... but there is still the assurance that cooler heads will prevail, and that this fire will eventually spend all of its fuel and die down.
Down, but not out.
I'd like to tell you the story of Barry Goldwater, the Republican nominee in 1964 who was the Donald Trump of his day... even if his policies seem downright liberal in comparison. Coming off an amazing landslide for the incumbent Lyndon Johnson (who had ascended to the office less than a year earlier following the assassination of JFK) the Democrats were riding high and crowing about how the Republicans would never again be a force to be reckoned with. As the campaign material went, "in your gut, you know he's nuts."
And then the Republicans won in 1968.
The Great Society was stopped in its tracks and slowly dismantled over the next 50 years, Vietnam was actually escalated, and the new Republican Southern Strategy of sly and under-the-radar hateful tactics won the day. The nasty old id of the Republican party didn't go away, it just got cleverer.
And it can happen again.
Don't be so smug in thinking Trump can't, or won't, win, and even if he does lose, don't be so sure that this is the final end of American conservatism. I'll grant that it may even banish the Republican party to the fringes for a while, much like after 1929, but politicians are crafty and politicians with deep pockets thank to deep pocketed backers are far craftier. They will be back, if they ever really leave in the first place.
Exit the Republicans, Enter the Democrats?
Al From, the man who invented the DLC, was instrumental in pulling the Democrats away from the liberal ideals of Humphrey, Kennedy, Mondale, McGovern, McCarthy, and FDR. The cynical thought was that the American people were just too stupid to understand how liberalism could help them, so the easiest and most effective strategy in the short term is to appeal to the conservative monster the Southern Strategy created. Now, under the first African-American President, we see a Democratic Party that is seemingly more conservative than the Republican Party of Eisenhower.
"Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes that you can do these things. Among them are a few Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or businessman from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid."Only recently has President Obama even discussed improving Social Security. In 2013, he even floated the idea of cutting the benefits as part of a unicorn-esque, mythical "Grand Bargain" with Republicans. But if you think that's the only place where today's national Democrats are farther right than Eisenhower's Republicans, think again:
-President Dwight Eisenhower, 1954
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.Contrast this to Hillary Clinton (who refers to herself as a "progressive who likes to get things done") and her reliance on military might regarding Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya. Add to that Obama's embrace of unregulated and unrestricted drone policy and you get a Democratic party that seems much hungrier for war (and the lucrative donations that come from warmakers) than the former general.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
-President Dwight Eisenhower, 1961
The right is not out, do not count them out. They will come back shrewder, subtler. It is not impossible for the Democratic party to morph into a center-right party of bombs and bailouts, cuts and cronyism, after the Republican party has successfully Trumped themselves into irrelevance. We're already seeing major Libertarian donors court Clinton in the 2016 race, and former well-heeled donors to failed boy-king Jeb Bush. It is not out of the bounds of reason to see the next few Presidential elections feature a squaring off of conservative Democrats and liberal Progressives, Greens, or some other possible party.
It is even not out of reality to think the Republican party, in a shambles, completely restructuring themselves back to their roots as the party of radical liberalism first exemplified in Abraham Lincoln. The parties have switched before, and they can switch again. Theodore Roosevelt was a trust-busting Republican in 1905, and Franklin Roosevelt was a bank-busting Democrat in 1933. It is not unfeasible to have a movement or an event shake up our political landscape like it has in the past, and Donald Trump is certainly enough of a caustic catalyst for that to happen. 2016 could stand to be a watershed year in American politics, and the next ten to twenty years could prove to be absolutely explosive to the entrenched political systems of the past century. The biggest question currently is whether we will be able to cool the fire down with spring water, or if the fire will continue to spread and possibly burn down the whole country.
If the fire dies down, it will only smoulder for a while. We must always beware that it might be kindled once again by ignorance and hatred and fear, and we must never again do as was done by Al From and the DLC and give more fuel to the fire. It will give you heat and light in the short-term, but it can also leave you badly burned.
At Your Service,
Doremus Jessup
