Moderate (but disgusted) Republicans hold key to regime change in Washington
JIM KLOBUCHAR
In the traffic jam of a Democratic fundraiser in Minneapolis a few days ago a man in a quietly expensive suit threaded past me, trying to avoid inflicting contusions on the people around him. He wore a look of amiable puzzlement, milling around in the crowd, searching for a familiar face.
He didn't find many. Still, he seemed to enjoy his aimless jostling. He also seemed ready to talk to somebody, and I thought it was the civil thing to oblige.
"You look lost," I said.
"I am. I'm a Republican."
"Do you make many of these things?" I asked, referring to the noisy scrimmages of the Democratic clans in this political year.
"More than I would have thought."
He said he ran a small suburban company. He'd voted invariably for Republican candidates, knew some of them and generally respected them. But that, he seemed to be saying, was then.
This is 2006 and he was lost. What he'd lost was the center of political gravity that once made him comfortable about how he voted and where the country was going. In other words, he'd felt relevant politically. The Republicans then were for business, government constraint and social responsibility, in a manner of speaking.
In 2006 the Bush agendas and the behavior of the party that once spoke for him were suddenly alien to him, in fact incomprehensible. Five minutes later I met a middle-age airline attendant, a woman whose story was essentially the same.
This is not intended as a scene from a morality play. And I leave Democratic campaign strategy strictly to the experts, which in the last five years has become pretty much an oxymoron when you think about it. But the episode at the fundraiser was the capsule of a critical change in the political landscape in parts of America where the Republican Party once tried to represent a sensible outlook on the economic health of the country, and a willingness to look for some serviceable blueprint for social equality.
The party of the orphaned Republicans at the fundraiser now came across to them as the party of endless war with an obsession for monopolizing political power and demonizing its opposition. That monomania has led its leadership into self-preserving schemes of secrecy, deception, illegal trampling of the citizens' right to privacy, refusal to look seriously at need in this country, collusion with the military and contracting industries and the virtual neutering of Congress as a serious voice in the development of public policy.
The Republican Party in itself, through its lobbyists, media harlots and profiteers has degenerated into the role of bagman for corporate power and for the builders of the instruments of war.
Where I live, this is not the Republican Party that willingly cooperated with the Democratic Party for decades in creating a political and economic health, a quality of life, that put Minnesota -- and other states like it -- in the forefront of an enlightened society.
In this part of America, the prosperous Minneapolis suburb of Edina, once interchangeable with Republicanism, went for John Kerry in 2004, and Kerry carried the state.
Why is this important? It is important because those increasing numbers of Americans who call themselves Republicans are appalled by what they see in Washington, and are ready to join in a national response to the monstrosity that it's become. Thousands of them and in rising numbers here have quietly contributed to Democratic campaigns for state and national offices in the November elections. Most of them still call themselves Republicans
It's important because America today seems finally to have been alerted to a fundamental truth about the loopy but dangerous autocracy that it has kept in power. This is a government relentlessly unworthy of the country's heritage and vision and, of the support of people whose political morality and citizenship demand more. Some of those have lost their lives in combat, in a war about which the government refuses to tell the truth. They look and see the mightiest country on earth virtually helpless to manage the chaos it has created in Iraq and the growing debacle of its budget deficits.
When the vice president polls 18 per cent approval and the president not much higher, it tells you that a lot of those people voting aren't Democrats. It also tells you that Genghis Khan might have done just as well in the poll.
A lot of the mounting disillusionment of traditional Republicans stems from the one crowning insult to the Republican who prides himself on competence and rationality. It has to be painful to watch Bush and his handlers trying to straddle the world with two right shoes, bungling into one crisis after another and doing it with all the dexterity of Earthquake McGoon conducting the New York Philharmonic. Here on display, day in and out, is the most impressive collection of bunglers, brownies and misfits recruited to Washington since the Washington Generals, who haplessly used to play the Harlem Globe Trotters. The merciful part of that show was that eventually it ended. This one has two years (or six months) to run.
For a Republican, or Democrat, there has to be a better way.
(This and other articles can be viewed on Jim Klobuchar's website, Jim Klobuchar Writes.)
In the traffic jam of a Democratic fundraiser in Minneapolis a few days ago a man in a quietly expensive suit threaded past me, trying to avoid inflicting contusions on the people around him. He wore a look of amiable puzzlement, milling around in the crowd, searching for a familiar face.
He didn't find many. Still, he seemed to enjoy his aimless jostling. He also seemed ready to talk to somebody, and I thought it was the civil thing to oblige.
"You look lost," I said.
"I am. I'm a Republican."
"Do you make many of these things?" I asked, referring to the noisy scrimmages of the Democratic clans in this political year.
"More than I would have thought."
He said he ran a small suburban company. He'd voted invariably for Republican candidates, knew some of them and generally respected them. But that, he seemed to be saying, was then.
This is 2006 and he was lost. What he'd lost was the center of political gravity that once made him comfortable about how he voted and where the country was going. In other words, he'd felt relevant politically. The Republicans then were for business, government constraint and social responsibility, in a manner of speaking.
In 2006 the Bush agendas and the behavior of the party that once spoke for him were suddenly alien to him, in fact incomprehensible. Five minutes later I met a middle-age airline attendant, a woman whose story was essentially the same.
This is not intended as a scene from a morality play. And I leave Democratic campaign strategy strictly to the experts, which in the last five years has become pretty much an oxymoron when you think about it. But the episode at the fundraiser was the capsule of a critical change in the political landscape in parts of America where the Republican Party once tried to represent a sensible outlook on the economic health of the country, and a willingness to look for some serviceable blueprint for social equality.
The party of the orphaned Republicans at the fundraiser now came across to them as the party of endless war with an obsession for monopolizing political power and demonizing its opposition. That monomania has led its leadership into self-preserving schemes of secrecy, deception, illegal trampling of the citizens' right to privacy, refusal to look seriously at need in this country, collusion with the military and contracting industries and the virtual neutering of Congress as a serious voice in the development of public policy.
The Republican Party in itself, through its lobbyists, media harlots and profiteers has degenerated into the role of bagman for corporate power and for the builders of the instruments of war.
Where I live, this is not the Republican Party that willingly cooperated with the Democratic Party for decades in creating a political and economic health, a quality of life, that put Minnesota -- and other states like it -- in the forefront of an enlightened society.
In this part of America, the prosperous Minneapolis suburb of Edina, once interchangeable with Republicanism, went for John Kerry in 2004, and Kerry carried the state.
Why is this important? It is important because those increasing numbers of Americans who call themselves Republicans are appalled by what they see in Washington, and are ready to join in a national response to the monstrosity that it's become. Thousands of them and in rising numbers here have quietly contributed to Democratic campaigns for state and national offices in the November elections. Most of them still call themselves Republicans
It's important because America today seems finally to have been alerted to a fundamental truth about the loopy but dangerous autocracy that it has kept in power. This is a government relentlessly unworthy of the country's heritage and vision and, of the support of people whose political morality and citizenship demand more. Some of those have lost their lives in combat, in a war about which the government refuses to tell the truth. They look and see the mightiest country on earth virtually helpless to manage the chaos it has created in Iraq and the growing debacle of its budget deficits.
When the vice president polls 18 per cent approval and the president not much higher, it tells you that a lot of those people voting aren't Democrats. It also tells you that Genghis Khan might have done just as well in the poll.
A lot of the mounting disillusionment of traditional Republicans stems from the one crowning insult to the Republican who prides himself on competence and rationality. It has to be painful to watch Bush and his handlers trying to straddle the world with two right shoes, bungling into one crisis after another and doing it with all the dexterity of Earthquake McGoon conducting the New York Philharmonic. Here on display, day in and out, is the most impressive collection of bunglers, brownies and misfits recruited to Washington since the Washington Generals, who haplessly used to play the Harlem Globe Trotters. The merciful part of that show was that eventually it ended. This one has two years (or six months) to run.
For a Republican, or Democrat, there has to be a better way.
(This and other articles can be viewed on Jim Klobuchar's website, Jim Klobuchar Writes.)
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