Not Your Father's Republican Party

September 9, 2008
by Cliff Carson

Joe Biden made this comment and I couldn't agree with it more. A long time solid rock Republican until a few months into George Bush's first term, I was deeply saddened by the direction he suddenly took us.

There was a time when the Grand Old Party stood for something distinctly American, Freedom, The American Dream, Fiscal Stewardship, Constitutional "Rule of Law", Peace in our time. Yes we had that Nixon thing, but there was Ronald Reagan to bring us those million points of light.

And later the White House Oval office was despoiled by a smooth talking immoral President who didn't have any answers for the investigators except the question of what the meaning of "Is", is. During his Impeachment his Party hacks gathered round to salute him as the best of the best. I distinctly remember remarking, "Thank God, my Republican Party would never pull such a stunt as to support and enable a despotic President. And so when this guy Bush came along proclaiming that he would be the great Uniter he got my vote. He was destined to make Bill Clinton look like a Saint.

John McCain made a remark in his acceptance speech this week that echoed exactly one of the tenets that George proclaimed in his run up to his first term. He stated over and over again that he was going to unite the Country, he had "done it in Texas" he claimed and he certainly was going to do it if elected. John McCain made this same promise this week. Did that ever sound familiar to me.

I don't know what initially made me uneasy with Bush, but I think it was when Ashcroft covered the statues. Uh-oh, I remember thinking, this guy's a nut. But when Ashcroft was picked, it seemed a great choice, a Pentecostal, who on earth could be more moral? A Christian dedicated to living the precepts of God. Now there is another Pentecostal running for office.

On 9/11 I was with some business representatives when someone came by the conference room and informed us that one of the twin towers had been hit by an airplane. Gosh, I wondered, how could a pilot get that far off the flight plan - maybe it was some kind of mechanical problem. Then the other tower was hit and immediately I knew it was some kind of terrorist attack. Being an Engineer who dealt with statistical processes and probabilities on a daily basis I knew the numbers would say this was no accident. In almost no time we found out that nearly all the suicide pilots were Saudi's. That's when things began to come apart.

Before Americans could properly reason, the propaganda started, we got into the War on Terror and that seemed reasonable enough, but it was not directed at Saudi Arabia, no instead we targeted Afghanistan, the Taliban, and Al-Queda, but there was a full-blown propaganda stream going 24/7 to place the blame on Iraq. By the time we invaded Iraq, 67% of the American public believed that it was Iraq that had brought down the towers.

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I was wondering, "What is going on", Iraq had nothing to do with this, and I knew that the WMD argument was bull. When Hussein was offered exile and accepted the offer, only to have it withdrawn, I could tell by the rhetoric that our President was hell bent on invading Iraq. But why would he want to drift from the quest to find Bin Laden, except maybe to pillage Iraq for their Oil and to flush the War Industry with profits? Surely we are a better Nation than this, I thought.

But we were not better and that was only the beginning. My Party, that bastion of Constitutional rule of law, began to shred the Constitution. Warrantless spying on good American people became the order of the day, even though it was against the law, Corruption began to sprout up like grass on a warm spring day, Bush and Cheney hired Mercenary Corporations at unbelievable cost to go into the fray answerable only to the Corporate bottom line, Torture was implemented, followed by Renditions, and all manner of depravity to other men.

And when Patriotic Americans rose to protest, my Republican Party gave Bush the same treatment as those despicable Democrats did for Clinton. Seeing the Morality of my Party and Country sink into a moral Abyss, I decided as an American, I needed to raise opposition to the depravity that was beginning to sweep the land. So I began to protest thru writing about the abuse being heaped on the regular citizen of America. I saw us falling prey to an Oligarchy. I left the Republican Party and found an Independent Party, the Populist Party, that espouses obedience to the Constitution and as prescribed in that document -limited power of the Federal Government.

And Mr. Biden, I agree with you wholeheartedly, The Republican Party of our fathers is not the Republican Party of today, and neither is the United States any longer that beacon of light signaling moral kinship with the world.

What happened to my Country? What happened to my Party? What has happened to the people of America that we would allow this to occur? At least, I thought, with election 2008 we can get America back in the proper direction, but I'm beginning to have my doubts.

Today the news came out that for the eighth straight month America lost jobs, 84,000 more during August. That's now over 600,000 for the year. And since America is growing in population, an increase in jobs should be a natural order of things, yet not only has that not occurred, we continue losing jobs. People, we just can't allow this to continue. We have to cause change. And what do we have to choose from? A tired old man who was part of the Party and Policies that dragged our country down to this sorry point, joined by his Pentecostal VP who seems to have rigid views about how all we citizens should behave religiously, a dangerous person who insinuates that the Iraq war is a mission ordained by God.

In opposition we have a bright young man promising fundamental positive change and he is joined by an articulate long term man who seems just right to co-chair this needed change of direction. The young man has a great drawback. Everyone can see it.

What kind of America will we have after November 2008? I think it is up to us.