No Sunday story this week, just a look at recent history and the politics of the present and future.
2008
Maybe it was that the honored war hero, John McCain, lost the election. Or maybe, after the successful elections of 2000 and 2004 when Republicans used every trick to win, they finally failed (Every trick includes the “Brooks Brothers Riot” at the Miami-Dade Board of Elections to “Swift Boating” John Kerry). Or, of course, it might be that Barack Obama was elected President of the United States, the first man of color to reach that highest office.
The Democratic celebration was immense. There was dancing in the streets. A new age dawned, an age that most political pundits (myself included) projected for some time in the late 2020’s. But it was 2008 and the future was here, now. A Black man was now President of the United States. The ecstasy of one side was mirrored by the full disbelieve of the other.
I don’t blame what happened next totally on racism. But clearly a massive grassroots movement grew to counter the Democratic victory, a force that even a divisive Hillary Clinton didn’t generate. In spite of the graceful concession speech by McCain, a whole new wave started. They called it the “Tea Party”.
Union or Division
The split between “mainstream” Republicanism, the party of Bush, Cheney, McCain and McConnell; and the raw anti-federalist populism of the Tea Party was evident in the 2008 Republican Convention. McCain, sensing the strong force of Obama’s popularity, flirted with a “National Union” ticket. His travelling companion and friend, conservative Senator Joe Lieberman, former Democrat from Connecticut, was McCain’s first choice for the Republican Vice Presidential nomination. It would have been a “game changer”, the kind of shock to the political system that might stop a force like Obama.
Lieberman was the Democratic candidate for Vice President just eight years before, running with Gore in that ill-fated race. But he grew disenchanted with Democrats, who voted against him in the 2006 primary. Lieberman retained his Senate seat by running as an “independent”, and still caucused with the Senate Democrats. But that primary defeat irrevocably split him from the Party. He would gladly join McCain in a center-conservative match against the more Progressive Obama and Biden.
Palin
McCain’s advisors, folks now familiar on cable-television like Steve Schmidt and Nicolle Wallace, thought the base Republicans would never accept a former Democrat (or an orthodox Jew). They looked for a bright, young star to contrast with McCain’s “maturity”. McCain’s handlers convinced him to choose the recently elected Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. They saw her as an energetic and fiery populist to contrast with their seasoned Presidential candidate. And they were sure that a Lieberman candidacy would split the Party, and cause a delegate walkout on the convention floor.
So McCain chose Palin, and the “die was cast”. She turned out to be horribly unprepared as a candidate for national office, who couldn’t even remember a newspaper she frequently read. Palin didn’t read newspapers. She was lambasted by the media, and by comedians. Palin, and the Great Recession under Bush’s watch, were the final jokes that ended McCain’s candidacy.
Recession and Resentment
So maybe part of the energy in the “Tea Party” movement was resentment. The national media made Palin into a punchline, but many conservative voters saw her as a fair balance to the more mercurial McCain.
President Obama was also elected in the middle of the Great Recession, the financial meltdown of 2008. While the meltdown itself occurred in the Bush Administration, it was up to Obama to pick up the pieces. Deals were made to sustain the economy, helping big corporations and banks and Wall Street investment firms. The alternative was a full-blown depression, but many Americans thought, correctly, that they were unfairly bearing the burden of Wall Street’s greed. A lot of Tea Party energy came from that.
The Tea Party was anti-tax, anti-government, and illiberal. They fashioned themselves from the Sons of Liberty, the ones who dumped British tea in Boston Harbor. The Tea Party even appropriated the famous Gadsden Flag, the poisonous snake representing the people demanding “Don’t Tread On Me” – or else. They weren’t a “movement” within the Republican Party, but they did tend to be former or present Republicans. And the Republican leadership saw them as the “ticket” to return to power. As the famous quote from the 1848 French Revolution went: “There go my people. I must follow them for I am their leader.” Republicans raced to get “in front” of the Tea Party.
Leader to Follow
The Republican Party managed to merge the energy of the Tea Party with the advanced technology of the “Red Map” program. “Red Mapping” used modern computer technology to intricately divide political districts in order to maximize Republican representation. It was all about gerrymandering state legislative districts so that Republicans could gain the power to “map” after the 2010 census. And it worked: state after state maximized Republican districts and minimized Democratic ones. While a state might be just a percentage or two majority Republican, the legislature would have super-majorities of Republican representatives.
The formula was: say the right things to secure the “Tea Party” base, then alter the machinery of government to maintain power. And while the “Tea Party” is now subsumed into the current “MAGA” Republican Party, the lessons of 2009 and 2010 are not forgotten.
MAGA Ideology
Steve Bannon, one of the principal theorists of “MAGA” thought, tried to use the Trump Administration to dismantle the Federal government. That didn’t work out, so he altered strategy. His current move is to try to takeover government from the “bottom”. He encourages heavily financed conservative political action groups to put their money into local government campaigns. School Boards, city elections, and other local campaigns all of a sudden have cash pouring in. Races that used to be a couple of thousand bucks in yard signs and literature, now costs tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars for commercial media time.
Local school boards become high-finance campaigns. And the winners of many are the descendants of the Tea Partiers. Now they defend the “old values” of the United States. They are waging a new campaign, one to reverse the trends that allowed a nation to elect a Black President (and now Vice President). They want their own traditional Christian values to be “the law”. How dare parents think they have the “right” to determine what’s best for their children; now multiple states are determining child medical and educational choices. They “know better” than women about their own medical choices. And what gives schools the “right” to teach about discrimination and inequities that still exist today? They outlaw “Critical Race Theory”, and use that purposely misused term to cover any act that might go against their religious or personal “morals”.
Should Majority Rule
Steve Bannon is getting what he wanted. America is becoming a puritan state, dominated by a single race and religion, and it’s happening from the bottom up. The Tea Party taught Republicans the lesson: raise a “power fist” for the Insurrectionists, and then play to the base fears of everyday citizens. Use that fear to generate excitement and votes – then make sure the vote is fixed so that the minority can maintain control.
That control happens every day. It counters our changing society, with the “last gasp” of the white majority statistically slipping away. But it’s really not about race, or gender, or the “right to life”. The goal is to keep political control and power. The “issues” are just tools to maintain fear.
From a progressive perspective it might seem hopeless – but keep in mind that inexorable demographic changes are coming. America will be a “majority of minorities” nation within fifteen years. No amount of Red Mapping or electoral control can change that: as long as we remain a democracy.
That is the question – will the majority rule?
