It has become customary to laugh and sneer at the “loony liberalism” generated out in California. Family contacts in the Golden State keep me reasonably well-informed and I must say, I confine my own visits to the north of the state. I doubt I have been south of Carmel-by-the-Sea in 18 years. It’s the northern part that is liberal and which would like to secede from the south of the state.
Southern California, the part that sent us such stellar politicians as Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan and set the stage for Arnold Schwarzenegger, is deeply, irrevocably conservative and Republican. Hollywood types are liberal, you say? Fuhgeddaboudit! Sure, Bill Clinton had his fans out there, but the really big money is real conservative and wants those tax cuts to keep on flowing.
As an unabashed liberal, I’m greatly amused by Schwarzenegger’s election, because he’s had to declare himself pro-choice on the abortion issue. That’s a necessity in California. Elsewhere in the country, it’s humming below a radar more focused on the war in Iraq, Medicare reform (what a joke!) and whether Michael Jackson is gonna go down this time.
Nationally, abortion is a nonissue. Forget about Bush signing a bill into law recently that puts limits on late-term procedures — that was challenged in three federal court jurisdictions before he placed his signature. Anyway, polls indicate that a majority of men and women think the procedure should be available.
And the political tide may be turning against the conservative party. More and more, pundits and pollsters are making mention that being a Republican these days no longer speaks of fiscal conservatism. In the face of the deficits slammed on us by Reagan, Bush I and Bush II, the record speaks for itself. To quote some scary stuff in The New Yorker by John Cassidy, “in only three years, the nation has gone from a surplus of $236 billion to a deficit of $374 billion.” Astounding. Horrific.
So, in what way is the GOP conservative? Why, socially, of course. Their legislative agenda is attempting to “save” this sinful old nation by coercing ethical behavior, according to the lights of such right-wing nuts as Ralph Reed and Pat Robertson. Our founding fathers knew that any government that tried to legislate virtue amounted to tyranny, which is why they left us largely free to screw ourselves up any old immoral way we want.
These “Mayberry Machiavellis” — to borrow Penn State history professor James DeIulio’s smashing phrase (as he resigned his first year as a Bush advisor) — think they surpass the intellectual stature of the giants of our past. What sheer hubris!
It is probably a measure of the rage and anger felt by Democrats everywhere that the San Francisco mayoral election was so incredibly strange this year. The Republican candidate was wiped off the map. Yet the Green candidate, with only 3 percent of registered voters, managed to secure a whopping 47 percent of the vote in the runoff. While the Democratic candidate won, it was probably because Bill Clinton and Al Gore went out there the final week to rally the troops. The Green Party, in case you didn’t know, is far-left edge. Ralph Nader-land. The message from this election? Democrats are sick and tired of lackluster candidates without any ideas or fire in the belly.
So what are the Democrats so mad about? Having a smirking, swaggering liar for a Prez — how’s that for starters? Personally, I’d vote for Rasputin (currently being considered for sainthood by elements in the Russian Orthodox church, by the way) before I’d cast a vote for the Shrubhead or any of his lackeys.
Bush’s lies started the minute he took office, with his remarks that he’d govern from the center. This is a guy who has only to admire a federal program to give it the chop, in the manner of a headsman commenting on the beauty of a particularly fine neck on the block.
Don’t get me started on how he hoodwinked us into war. He isn’t the first prez to do it, either. A fine old Democrat, LBJ, did it first with the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, and we wound up with Vietnam tearing us apart. Saddam is a bad guy. His son Odai was even worse, a serial rapist and murderer. Iraq is undoubtedly better off without them, but don’t give me any guff about an imminent threat from out there.
Meanwhile, here in West Virginia, we have awakened to an unpleasant reality: Bush doesn’t love us anymore! Evidence: He lifted the steel tariffs. Of course, he could have left them in place until they expired, but nooo. The alternative, offered by the World Trade Organization, was a trade war featuring European tariffs on Florida citrus, and we all know how much the Shrubhead owes Brother Jeb. Approximately 30,000 uncounted votes in three greatly African-American counties.
Shrubhead needed our five electoral votes only as long as it took Tom DeLay to finish the national process of gerrymandering congressional districts with a big bang in Texas. If their strategy works, and I see no reason for it to fail, the GOP will pick up as many as seven seats in Bush’s home state, to say nothing of those elsewhere in the country. The only thing that can stop this is court action, and the Pennsylvania gerrymader is in the courts now, as I write.
Anyway, I don’t think West Virginians went for Bush back in 2000 so much as they voted for their guns. It’s kinda hard to believe that a loon like Charlton Heston/Moses/Ben-Hur can wield so much political power, but he did when he stumped here for the NRA in that election. No greater indictment of the intelligence of voters needs to be offered. By the way, the NRA seeks its own cable channel. I have news: They’ve already got one. It’s called FOX.
What we have witnessed, folks, is the final fruition of the Southern Strategy, a remarkable piece of evil genius put into action first by Richard Nixon, who with a nod and a wink from the late Dixiecrat George Wallace set about the process of wooing the NASCAR Dad outta the Democratic tent and into the GOP.
What strange fruit, to borrow a Billie Holliday title (it was a song about lynching). Just in time for the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision that shook the South to its foundation and exposed the nasty little secret of northern racism as well. Yes, it’s Nixon’s hand from the grave. I guess no one thought to shove a stake through his heart at his funeral. It occurred to me.
We are also re-entering the ’50s. Back then, it was Sen. McCarthy and his ilk blasting everyone who criticized the Commie witch-hunts. Now we have the wild-eyed true believer John Ashcroft trumpeting a similar message of fear and destruction every day or two — but only in venues that are friendly to him. Ever notice that? None of these wiseguys goes anywhere they might have to stare opposition in the face, and that goes for Bush’s vaunted trip to Great Britain. Rather than address a rowdy and frankly contemptuous Parliament, he saw the queen. Just like Puss ’n Boots.
Claymore, a Kanawha County teacher, is a Gazette contributing columnist.
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