The Fall Of The GOP

A lot of folks wonder what happened to the GOP. I mean,before it splintered off in Limbaugh lunatics, and Beck Believers and Palin Putz's and Tea Parties. I, myself, wonder what happened to the GOP.

Well, author Jacob Weisberg has an idea of when and where and how, and perhaps even why, the, as he calls them, "Responsible Republicans" became extinct. In an article for Newsweek [HERE] Weisberg, remembers the GOP that rode roughshod over Ronald Reagan's 1982 veto of a tax increase that was designed to fix the mess created by his 1981 tax cut. He remembers the Double-R's working with President George H.W. Bush in 1990 to reduce the deficit.

But since then, according to Wiesberg, the responsible Republican has not often been seen. In fact, as Wesiberg points out, President Obama went looking for one, just one, during the health care debate and came up empty.

So, what happened to the Responsible Republican? Weisberg says their path to extinction began with a 1993 memo written by conservative commentator William Kristol, who offered the GOP advice on how to repsond to then-President Clinton's health care battle. Kristol believed the right thing to do was to simply not cooperate, and Weisberg believes that marked the day when the GOP "shifted from fundamentally responsible partners in governing the country to uncompromising, hyperpartisan antagonists on all issues."

Uh-huh.

In his memo, Kristol took special note of Bob Dole and his desire to work with Clinton on a compromise plan for health care. Kristol then advised that the GOP "adopt an aggressive and uncompromising counterstrategy designed to delegitimize the proposal." In other words, say and do nothing; offer no alternative.

And thus was born the Party Of No.

A trickle at a time, Republicans opted to heed Kristol's advice. Newt Gingrich began drinking the Kool-Aid and goosestepping with Kristol, and even Bob Dole, in responding to Clinton's 1994 State of the Union address, stated that there was "no health-care crisis."

Flip.Flop.

And Kristol's plan took root. Gingrich created his "Contract With America" and the GOP took Congressional power in 1994, though Gingrich's plan never gained any real momentum. The GOP failed to enact one single idea, their leaders fell in scandal, and Clinton won re-election in '96.

Yet, as Weisberg points out, the GOP still seemed destined to follow the Kristol Plan. And with the arrival of yet another Democratic president in 2009, Republicans have reverted to the do nothing, complain loudly, spew mindless barbs, kind of politics for which they've become quite familiar, though this time they have not been able to block Obama's major initiative.

So, does this continued age of strict partisanship help or hurt? Does standing against anything and everything the President tries to do, and say, get any real work done? No; all it does is succeed in making Americans angry; all it does is grind government to a halt; all it does is cause the entire nation to suffer.

No. That's their solution, which Weisberg calls "hyperpartisanship".

And it isn't working for us.