The American revolution of 2006 and beyond
Sidney Blumenthal
November 9, 2006 08:15 PM
Bush's radical presidency was the number one issue in the mid-term elections. Republican candidates lived in fear that they would receive calls from the White House suggesting that the president wanted to campaign for them. His last minute blitz in Montana on behalf of Senator Conrad Burns seemed momentarily to lift the beleaguered incumbent, but virtually the moment Air Force One departed the Republican sank once again, this time for good. In Florida, the Republican candidate for governor, Charles Crist, fled upon the president's arrival at a rally on his behalf in the state capital of Tallahassee. Crist's disloyalty and rudeness, leaving Bush in the lurch, was the better part of wisdom. Crist, like other Republicans caught in the storm, managed to survive only by avoiding him. The once eagerly sought presidential photo-op had become the kiss of death.
Before the spotlight turns to the repositioning of the president, the appointment of a new secretary of defense and the machinations of the new 110th Democratic Congress, it is worthwhile to sift through the extraordinary election returns, which contain the makings of a further realignment of American politics in the presidential election of 2008 and beyond.
Bush's radical presidency consolidated the grip of Southern conservatism over the Republican Party. He completed the "Southern Strategy" launched by Richard Nixon in 1968 in the aftermath of the civil rights movement, a strategy that assimilated the Dixiecrat George Wallace third party into the Republican ranks. Over time, the strategy that was supposed to be an add-on to the traditional GOP engulfed it. Bush finished the project that Nixon began. Karl Rove, his chief political aide, hypothesized a permanent national majority rooted in a Southern Strategy in which the rest of the country was an add-on. But in his quest for realignment Rove has left a rump regional party mired in the swamps of Dixie. What purpose does Rove with his scenarios of polarization now serve Bush?
After the mid-term elections, the GOP has become a regional party of the South. And, in the future, Republicans can only hold their base by asserting their conservatism, which alienates the rest of the country. More than ever, the Republicans are dependent upon white evangelical voters in the South and sparsely populated Rocky Mountain states. The Republican coalition, its much-touted "big tent," has nearly collapsed.
Republicans under Bush are beginning a downward spiral that parallels the decline of the Democrats. From 1968 through 1988, the story of the Democratic Party had been its internal disintegration and reduction to its base. Clinton's presidency served as an interregnum, which might have broken the Republicans had his vice president Al Gore been permitted to assume the office he won by a popular majority but was thwarted by the conservative bloc on the Supreme Court.
(The rest is here.)
November 9, 2006 08:15 PM
The dust has settled: Bush has created a rump regional party and set the stage for a deeper realignment of the US parties.The concession by George Allen today confirms that James Webb has won in Virginia, a victory that gives the Democrats a majority in the Senate, completing the party's sweep of both houses of the Congress and ratifying the repudiation of President Bush and his policies, especially in the Iraq war.
Bush's radical presidency was the number one issue in the mid-term elections. Republican candidates lived in fear that they would receive calls from the White House suggesting that the president wanted to campaign for them. His last minute blitz in Montana on behalf of Senator Conrad Burns seemed momentarily to lift the beleaguered incumbent, but virtually the moment Air Force One departed the Republican sank once again, this time for good. In Florida, the Republican candidate for governor, Charles Crist, fled upon the president's arrival at a rally on his behalf in the state capital of Tallahassee. Crist's disloyalty and rudeness, leaving Bush in the lurch, was the better part of wisdom. Crist, like other Republicans caught in the storm, managed to survive only by avoiding him. The once eagerly sought presidential photo-op had become the kiss of death.
Before the spotlight turns to the repositioning of the president, the appointment of a new secretary of defense and the machinations of the new 110th Democratic Congress, it is worthwhile to sift through the extraordinary election returns, which contain the makings of a further realignment of American politics in the presidential election of 2008 and beyond.
Bush's radical presidency consolidated the grip of Southern conservatism over the Republican Party. He completed the "Southern Strategy" launched by Richard Nixon in 1968 in the aftermath of the civil rights movement, a strategy that assimilated the Dixiecrat George Wallace third party into the Republican ranks. Over time, the strategy that was supposed to be an add-on to the traditional GOP engulfed it. Bush finished the project that Nixon began. Karl Rove, his chief political aide, hypothesized a permanent national majority rooted in a Southern Strategy in which the rest of the country was an add-on. But in his quest for realignment Rove has left a rump regional party mired in the swamps of Dixie. What purpose does Rove with his scenarios of polarization now serve Bush?
After the mid-term elections, the GOP has become a regional party of the South. And, in the future, Republicans can only hold their base by asserting their conservatism, which alienates the rest of the country. More than ever, the Republicans are dependent upon white evangelical voters in the South and sparsely populated Rocky Mountain states. The Republican coalition, its much-touted "big tent," has nearly collapsed.
Republicans under Bush are beginning a downward spiral that parallels the decline of the Democrats. From 1968 through 1988, the story of the Democratic Party had been its internal disintegration and reduction to its base. Clinton's presidency served as an interregnum, which might have broken the Republicans had his vice president Al Gore been permitted to assume the office he won by a popular majority but was thwarted by the conservative bloc on the Supreme Court.
(The rest is here.)
Powered by Blogger
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home