I used to see politics as just a matter of brand names.
Republicans were more interested in the economy and Democrats in social issues.
The two sides balanced each other like the ends of a teeter-totter and the ups
and downs felt like the proper rhythm of life.
And, serving for close to 30 years as a public school
teacher, I spent my days working closely with wonderful people, mostly
Democrats, and though we would occasionally have testy discussions, mostly our
political opinions seemed distant and unimportant amidst the immediacy of our
daily high school drama.
Then the outrages began – Clinton’s finger-pointing lies,
the fuss over the Bush election, 9/11, -- little by little it became harder and
harder for me to see the liberal point of view as having any merit at all. If
you support women’s rights and are horrified at the way working women are treated,
how do you support Slick Willy’s use of cigars? If you can get your
Fruit-of-the-Looms in a wad over election inconsistencies then why was it OK to
only double check the Florida counties where you thought you could slant the
recount? When they began to accuse Bush of lying about the weapons of mass
destruction, which everyone knew had been shipped to Syria, I’d had enough.
Historically speaking, the transition started with Woodrow
Wilson a hundred years ago; the Democrats began edging slowly left, and the
Republicans, not to be outdone at stupidity, edged with them. Calvin Coolidge
effectively reversed the trend, but the 1929 stock market crash and FDR’s
socialist response dragged us left again. WWII yanked us back to reality and
prosperity (those two go hand in hand), but by the 60’s we’d started smoking
dope and indulging in riots (those things go hand in hand). By the late 70’s most
of us were ashamed of our foreign policy and horrified about the economy – I
know it was most of us because in 1980 Ronald Reagan beat Carter in a landslide
and once again conservative principles proved effective. But we hit that peak,
had a spasm of sensibility in ’94, but since then headed downhill at breakneck
speed.
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| Anita Dunn |
Now I’m just plain puzzled -- the Dems have sidled so far
left that they not only embrace socialism openly – many proudly claim Marx and
Mao as their heroes – quite a few in close contact with, or actually in our
current administration.
