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The End Days of the Cult of Republicanism.

By Tom | October 18, 2007

Poll after poll shows that while Republicans proclaim themselves the mainstream, large majorities of Americans side time and time again with positions taken by Democrats. SCHIP is but the latest example. This disconnect is one of many signals that foreshadow the end of the GOP.

Republicans once were  a political party. Once, there were liberal Republicans. There were the likes of Edward Brooke of Massachusetts, Lowell Weiker of Connecticut, John Lindsay of New York, Nelson Rockefeller of New York. There were moderates, like Gerald Ford of Michigan and Everett Dirksen of Illinois in the party.

Today Republicanism is a cult. Followers adhere to a rigid set of beliefs that admit no exceptions. The diverse set of viewpoints is gone, and the previous constraint on wingnuttery left with it. The Republican garden is choked with noxious weeds that cannot survive for long, let alone sustain a political movement.

The cult of Republicanism is an ugly brew of rigidly held ideologies and beliefs that are often in conflict one another, but are bound together by a collective greed for power that manifests as party loyalty at any cost.

It’s important to understand the recipe for the cult of Republicanism, if you want to understand its inevitable collapse.

While the relationship isn’t perfect, the similarities between Fascism and modern Republicanism are striking:

Former Columbia University Professor Robert O. Paxton defines Fascism this way:

[It] may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.”[1]

Paxton further defines fascism’s essence as:

…1. a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of traditional solutions; 2. belief one’s group is the victim, justifying any action without legal or moral limits; 3. need for authority by a natural leader above the law, relying on the superiority of his instincts; 4. right of the chosen people to dominate others without legal or moral restraint; 5. fear of foreign contamination.”[2]

Sound familiar?

The comparison to Fascism, as I said, isn’t perfect. Fascism typically puts the state at the top of the hierarchy, while modern Republicanism — at least in its pronouncements — argues for smaller government. (Though I’d admonish you to watch what they DO not what they SAY.)

The transformation from a political philosophy to a cult is the point at which the seeds of GOP self-destruction are planted. The politician who survives, is the one who is the great dancer, who recognizes that even the one who leads has to turn or step backwards from time to time to stay on the dance floor.

Not so, the cultist.

The Republicans who survive the SCHIP battle, for example, will be those who recognize that while this approach to funding health care coverage for children may not align with their philosophy, it does align with the needs and wishes of voters. Buying philosophical purity at the cost of voting against SCHIP is a fool’s purchase that’s certain to hasten the end of the GOP.

The trouble with cults is that they can’t help themselves. Once they take the first step down the path to self destruction, they can’t stop — even when the terrible destination is in sight.

Think Jim Jones, the Branch Davidians, the Heaven’s Gate cult. Even when they knew what was coming, they couldn’t stop.

I won’t be sorry to see the GOP go. I think there is a valuable place in American politics for a robust, principled conservative movement and point of view. After all, even the sleekest, fastest sports car has to have brakes.

But cults, by their nature, are destructive. They hurt more than themselves while they live and when they die. This particular Republican cult has damaged the Constitution in ways it will take a generation to repair.

 

 

 

Topics: Politics |

One Response to “The End Days of the Cult of Republicanism.”

  1. Republicans: Your Party is a Cult - Political Hotwire Says:
    November 23rd, 2007 at 9:12 pm

    […] behavior of today’s Republicans: The End Days of the Cult of Republicanism. October 18th, 2007

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