The Republican Party, if it is indeed to remain a viable political entity must disassociate itself from the lunatic fringe that even after suffering a sweeping defeat remains utterly delusional. Today, losing VP candidate Paul Ryan finally emerged to speak to the media. He had not one word of self-criticism but instead blamed the lopsided 330-206 electoral defeat on “Urban” voters. “Urban” being a code word for minority voters.
Ryan, the idea man who, in his defense, was quickly castrated of his ideas by the GOP leadership has donned blinders to the truth that the “Urban” vote played little role in the GOP defeat. The GOP problem is best seen in the little reported fact that Obama’s 39 percent total of white voters matched that Bill Clinton received in 1992
Ryan proved unable to even deliver the electoral votes of his own native state. Romney was even worse unable to deliver the state where he governed or his native Michigan. Has the GOP leadership forgotten that presidential elections are based on the Electoral College? In choosing such masterful candidates it certainly appears that this was the case.
What is equally troubling for the GOP and for both Paul Ryan’s and Rick Santorum’s potential as a presidential candidate is that Ryan, who avows the cult Catholicism of the Catholic bishops, was unable to bring a majority of Catholic voters to support the Republican ticket. Instead, Obama won a clear majority of Catholic support.
If the GOP is wise, it will acknowledge that the Catholic Bishops are like unto a cult within a religion whose rank and file has long disconnected from the ever more shrill teachings of its leadership. One has only to visit such websites as catholicvote.org to see exactly how detached from reality apocalyptic politics espoused by the Catholic Bishops has taken its brain-addled followers.
The combination of Republican self-delusion combined with its followers blindly mistaking right-wing entertainment media as viable news sources will spell the ultimate demise of the Republican party. As David Frum, recently put it,
The problem with the Republican leaders is that they’re cowards, not that they’re fundamentally mistaken. The real locus of the problem is the Republican activist base and the Republican donor base. They went apocalyptic over the past four years, and that was exploited by a lot of people in the conservative world. I won’t soon forget the lupine smile that played over the head of one major conservative institution when he told me that our donors think the apocalypse has arrived, that Republicans have been fleeced and exploited and lied to by a conservative entertainment complex.
The Republican intelligentsia must drag this party back from the brink of intellectual extinction.
The GOP must first and foremost adhere to separation of church and state. America was founded by the Protestant work ethic. It is as foreign to Catholicism and its tenets as it is to the Taliban. Democracy is an idea born of ancient Greece. Demos meant of the people- an idea that has no place in Catholic Church hierarchy. Having Catholic Bishops seeking to dictate America’s political ethos is very much ill-advised. Having Catholic candidates who support this is the very issue that JFK fought, overcame, and would roll in his grave to see resurrected.
Mormonism? Suffice it to say Romney was given a major pass. Billy Graham identified it as a cult religion up until October 2012 with good reason.
The hysteria of much of the GOP rank and file is palpable. In the week following the election, it is becoming all too clear that the profit-driven conservative media has no intention of letting up. Wm. F. Buckley Jr. once described a conservative as one who stood athwart the road of progress shouting Nay! Unless a brake is applied to the apocalyptic rhetoric and genuine conservative thinkers rather than entertainers regain a measure of influence within the GOP, it may be best to apply the gun and one bullet.
Joseph Jett
Managing Partner - Jett Capital Management LLC,
Offering Private Equity, Intl. Corporate Finance, Expert Witness, Reputation Management
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