DEMOCRATIC AMERICA IS BEING TESTED – PART III
The profound wisdom of having only two political parties seems to have been challenged, at least after the general election of 2016. Before that, the leadership of the parties and the elders played a catalytic role. Politics was still the art of compromise. The parties were supposed to fight each other, fiercely sometimes, to attain the best solutions to serve democracy and build a stronger and better nation. But bipartisanship was considered a noble call.
The Republicans, at least the extremist Republicans, have been determined to change that foundation. Their political fights are mortal combats meant to destroy and bury the enemies, the Democrats, or anyone who opposes them. No more gentlemanliness. Coarseness, rudeness, vulgarity, lies, and dishonesty all are weapons they readily use without exception. Bipartisanship is betrayal.
The Republican Party has become as monolithic as the targets of their constant animosity: the communist regimes. Not a single Republican dares to disagree with the extremists’ line, except for a rare example of some who are willing to take the risk of being rudely attacked and ostracized. Except for a handful of them, there is no Republican extending his or her hand across the aisle to reach a compromise. Not even Republican leaders dare to publicly disagree let alone criticize their colleagues’ extremist views.
How the extremists have been able to wrestle the control of the Republican Party?
The current state of the Republican Party has its roots in the Southern Strategy that started out as a scheme to win the white votes to defeat the Democrats in the South.
The weapon they used? Racism.
Up until the election of Donald J. Trump, racism had been used discreetly: words of mouth in small gatherings such as PTAs, clubs, HOAs, neighborhood associations. Racism had proved to be effective to gain control of local and state governments.
Then, several forces converged to push racism to the forefront, widespread and perhaps mainstream – white mainstream.
Immigration has stirred anxiety in the general white population, which has become more amenable to wild conspiracy theories. The manipulators, the extremists, who are not just the KKK and their cohorts, but include many intellectuals, academicians, tech billionaires, influencers such as TV and radio hosts, movie actors, have found a large audience. That combination has encouraged the extremists and made them bolder and more aggressive. They started making public racist statements and digging up past racist discourses of intellects such as Ayn Rand previously reserved for literary salons or academia.
The interaction between these two groups – the anxious white population and the racists – helped push the wave higher and higher until it coalesced with the third force to create a tsunami, which reached the American political shore in 2016.
(Next, Part IV)
