The End Of The Republican Party . . . in 1948
By Gordonskene Saturday Oct 24, 2009 6:00pm
(Republican angst - hand wringing is timeless)
As the election returns poured in proclaiming Harry Truman the surprise winner in 1948 (much to the dismay of the Mainstream Media, who had declared Thomas Dewey, the Republican candidate, the winner by a landslide, even before votes were counted), a stunned Republican Party wondered aloud if this spelled the end of the GOP.
Clearly, history proved otherwise, but in 1948 it was the subject of much gnashing of teeth, weeping and soul searching on behalf of pundits and party members alike.
On December of 1948, a few weeks after the stunning upset, The University of Chicago Round Table hosted a panel discussing the subject "Is the Republican Party Over?". The panel featured Senators Raymond E. Baldwin (R - Conn.), Ralph E. Flanders (R- Vermont) and Congressman Clifford Hope (R-Kansas). The moderator Robert Horn set the tone:
Robert Horn: “I am a Republican and I am disturbed about the future of the Republican Party. After the shock of the election, I am beginning to wonder like millions of others what the future holds for the Republican Party or whether it has any future. This year marked the fifth consecutive defeat for Republican Presidential candidates. This Presidential election was the closest one since 1916. But Governor Dewey in 1948 received fewer votes than he got in 1944, although more votes were cast this year than in 1944. And Republican Congressional candidates generally ran below Dewey this year. In fact, Governor Dewey received only 600,000 more votes than Herbert Hoover received in 1928, although there are many more million potential and actual voters now than there were twenty years ago. Moreover, this fifth consecutive defeat means that the Republicans by 1952 will be out of the White House for the longest time that either the Democrats or the Republicans have been out of power since the end of the Civil War. The Republicans can no longer claim to be the majority part of the country. Many people are saying that unless the Republican Party changes it will die. If I were a Democrat I would also be disturbed about the future of the Republican Party.”
The obvious difference between the Republican Party of 1948 and the Republican Party of 2009 is the absence of the lunatic fringe then, which today appears to be driving away all those sane and moderate voices that would otherwise aid in the healing process and perhaps steer the party in a constructive direction.
Nothing like that appears to be anywhere on the horizon I'm afraid.
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.... in watching the nutty demise of the GOP but we should be cautious. In the 70's TV shows like Laugh-In and All in the Family used to joke about a future President Reagan or even voting for Reagan. They joked about it because the idea of it was absurd. But look at what happened. The joy in seeing the GOP going crazy is tempered by the fear that, in this 2-party system, they could take power if the Democrats just simply screw up.
The best thing that could happen to this country, would be for the republican party to split into two sections, thus effectively killing the present day GOP lunatic asylum. This corporate fascist enterprise, must be destroyed for the good of mankind.
Plus, it could be the beginning of a multiple party system which we desperately need. Maybe the bluedogs and moderate republicans could form a traditional conservative party, thus rendering the wingnut kooks to a fringe minority status.
I would prefer the idiot dems to split and the repubs to just go away, then maybe we can get a close proximity to actual centrist politics for once instead of the hard right to fascist nonsense we've been dealing with.
Also who are these moderate repubs? Maybe moderate by their standards but I would never place them there, same for the "moderate" dems whom I consider either hard right or flat out fascist.
Personally, I would like to see any party that is not progressive go under. but reality tells me there are just way too many stupid people in this country for that to happen.
Otherwise, I basically agree with you. What I wrote however, might be more do-able in the short term.
That's because the repukes will never go away. They represent the richest 2%, and the super-rich will always weild enough power and influence to create obstacles to a republic.
By splitting the repukes, hopefully we can reduce their influence.
I also agree that the bluedogs and so-called moderate repukes are a bit fascist for my taste. Despite that fact, I do know quite a few people who still consider themselves republicans, even though they can't stand the current GOP. Why this disconnect? I have no idea, but it does exist. It would be helpful to break them away from the religious right, nut-job crowd.
Maybe they could create a 3rd party with the bluedogs, making them the opposition, as opposed to the batshit crazy-ass GOP we now have as opposition.
I hope the RepubliKLAN party remains out of power for the next 32 years, similar to what happened to the FIRST great depression that they caused.
If you read about or see an independent conservatives these days, they just want to escape the criticism that Bush has gotten and deserves for doing what Herbert Hoover has done.
You have two wings of the GOPranos: The Ayn Rand wing and the Tomas de Torquemada wing. Some of these loonies belong to both wings. Just because someone might only belong to the Ayn rand wing and talks about Freedumb and talks reasonably that doesn't make this person very sane. Joseph Mengele appeared well educated and we can see what he did for his former patients.
As I see it, Republiklan Freedumb will destroy your freedom.
I can't argue with any of that.
Personally, I would like to see them out of power for the next 100 years. Whatever can accomplish this - I am for. However, I still think that splitting them into two wings of 15% kooks, would be better than one wing of 30% kooks.
Remember the lines from "Back to the Future"?
So who's president in 1985?
Ronald Reagan.
The actor? Who's vice president, Jerry Lewis?
As the Republicans slide into oblivion, the Democrats are right there to perpetuate their agenda.
The obvious difference between the Republican Party of 1948 and the Republican Party of 2009 is the absence of the lunatic fringe then, which today appears to be driving away all those sane and moderate voices that would otherwise aid in the healing process and perhaps steer the party in a constructive direction.
WTF? The USA in 1948 was a nation in the depths of apartheid, women were being herded back into the kitchen, the USA had just nuked two cities a few years earlier, and the whole country was blithely skipping into the Cold War with a massive red scare that makes the likes of Coulter and Beck look like amateurs.
The quote above is such an obvious act of historically ignorant propaganda, a Republican could admire its genius in eliding the facts of history.
Kindly retract your nonsense.
The obvious difference between the Republican Party of 1948 and the Republican Party of 2009 is the absence of the lunatic fringe then, which today appears to be driving away all those sane and moderate voices that would otherwise aid in the healing process and perhaps steer the party in a constructive direction.
Paging Senator McCarthy...
seem to share the uncanny ability to:
Look at the modern Health Care Industry and say... SO???
Think we can WIN something in Afghanistan with more troops!
Keep sucking the TEAT of Big Oil from here to Kingdom Come.
Tax the middle class and let the Fat Cats off the hook.
Justify ANY SCANDAL as long as you ask God for forgiveness.
I could go on... and we DO NOT need THAT as a new political party!
Let the Republicans split off into their two parties:
1. NEO CONS and...
2. Stupid Fat White Men.
My dad's family were Republicans from the day his great-grandfather voted for Abraham Lincoln. My grandfather never quit seething about not being able to make a killing in real estate when President Dewey used his home in Pawling, New York, as a "summer White House."
But I know my grandfather would be absolutely sick at what's happened to his beloved Republican Party today. The GOP didn't require militant ignorance as a condition of membership in his day.
Is the greatest con job in the history of our nation. A bunch of businessmen, bankers and robber barons took over the party in the 1920s and used Abraham Lincoln's name as a cover. The truth is Lincoln would have had very little in common with the Coolige- Harding-Hoover Repug party that brought us the Great Depression.
Well, ok, most of the crazy red-necks were Democrats back then. But even leaving aside the John Birch crowd, the Republicans had McCarthy in the Senate and Nixon in the House telling people that anyone with a touch of liberalism was probably spying for Stalin. Nixon became Vice President. They were far more into crazy fear-mongering when they came back to power in '52 than when they lost it in '32.
Obama the first.. Uh, Er.. Eisenhower did us no favors by running in the Facist party.
That was then, this is now. I believe they actually had leadership back in those days. Today, not so much.
I am ashamed to be in the same species with republicans.
Even if the Republican Party died there would be another movement to take its place. There will always be at least 30% of the population that will vote for Republican Party for one reason or another.
The lunatic fringe was there in 1948, but the major difference is technology. Thanks to the internet and sites like youtube allowing video uploading, the lunatic fringe is brought to the forefront. One would think Republicans would start understanding this, but they continue to lie, distort, and throw red meat out to their base.
Net Neutrality needs to be defended and protected at all costs. The Republicans know they need to get control over the internet or they will continue to see a decline in support for them.
"Net Neutrality needs to be defended and protected at all costs." You got that right ! The Dems know that it would be self sabotage / suicidal to let the big ISP's start regulating the net , it's hard to believe they'd let it happen but then again the Dems are the Dems .
All these Republicans in 1948 could bitch about was that "The New Deal didn't solve the Depression, only the entry into WW2 and increased production saved the country". Same line the neo-cons are using today
The important thing the New Deal did was offer new hope to the working people by championing unions, establishing Social Security and actually putting people back to work with the WPA. It prevented bank failures with the FDIC and it established rules like the Glass Steagall act forcing Wall Street to stop acting like the robber barons of the Gilded Age, at least until Phil Graham destroyed it later.
My old man was proud to say that in 1948 he voted for WW1 vet Captain Harry Truman. I'm happy to say that in my family, at least, it's a family tradition not to ever vote Republican, and that for at least three generations, our Republican bullshit detector is working just fine.
Were no different then the people that followed the Nazi's. They decided to colaborate and help because it couldn't happen to them.
I wish some of these people taking weapons to President O's speaches had done so during some of bush/chenny's appearances.
They would have found themselves extroidinaraly renditioned!
Could you imagine a black man walking around at a bush chenny rally carrying an assault rifle?
You bet your ass you wouldn't! They would never let that picture get on the tube. No one would ever hear from that person again.
But the msm is about following the lead of their corporate masters. He that pays the piper calls the tune. You see it on the tv or hear it on the radio or read it in the papers.
Everyone like brooks and these other so called writers are highly paid propagandast's.
republicanism/consertvatism is a mental illness!
From the article: The obvious difference between the Republican Party of 1948 and the Republican Party of 2009 is the absence of the lunatic fringe then....
I hate to say it, but reading stuff like this when you're black in this country, especially by the most well-intentioned people, can really take you aback.
You can't seriously believe that there was not a lunatic fringe driving the Republican party in 1948? Seriously? Of course there was and it's the same "fringe" still acting a fool now.
Depending on what sources you quote, you're finally getting to the end of the Era of Lynching (not the end, just close to it). And also depending on what sources you quote, it's the middle or beginning years of the Civil Rights movement.
My mother was born around this time. So the white equivalent of her "peers" would be today's tea-baggers, birthers and such. Hmm...I wonder if their parents and grandparents are featured in pictures on "this site".
The more things change...
You're a Republican and you're ashamed of the Republican party.
No problem.
I'm a Democrat and I'm ashamed of the Democratic party.
Can't we all get along?
Yes, you're absolutely right - thinking about what you wrote, the madness and lunacy are really the same in many ways (minus the Red Scare). Sometimes we think "jesus, it's never been this bad before" - and then a little careful recall makes you realize the insanity, the twisting of words, the denial, the prejudice, the hate and fear are all the same. I guess it really goes along with my "as much as things change is as much as they remain the same" analogy, but I think the manner of "getting the message across" has changed. I don't get the sense that mainstream media was so eager to believe the misinformation as they are now. I was born when they were still arguing about lynching laws, so it's certainly not that distant a memory for me.
In 1952 The Republicans got Eisenhower, a popular military leader. I cannot see what the Republicans can come up with for 2012 until they stop being cowed by the insanity fringe who are only in it to line their own pockets and are perfectly willing to send everyone over a cliff in order to accomplish that. I've yet to see anybody name just one.
Thanks for your insights.
while reading about the Swedes legalizing same-sex marriage, and the Swedish Lutheran church approving same-sex marriage, that we suffer in many ways from our two-party system here in 'Murika. The Swedes and other countries that form official coalition governments have an advantage insofar as there is a built-in acknowledgement that there is more than one (or two) ways to skin a cat. By insisting that our voters only have two choices, we simplify things to the point that there is no room for subtlety or nuance. Certainly the parliamentary systems that provide for coalition governments will not include every possible take on an issue, but it seems to me six perspectives are better than two, or one, which the repug monarchists seem to favor.
"Many people are saying that unless the Republican Party changes it will die."
It did change, although Eisenhower seems well remembered, it was during that period when the Cold War entered Permafrost, thus ensuring the MIC he warned us about.
And then Nixon's Southern Strategy brought in an over-religious, self-righteous, bigoted fringe into their party and we're seeing the culmination now.
We've become the calumny culmiNation now.
"If I were a Democrat I would also be disturbed about the future of the Republican Party.”
If there is no real opposing party with ideas, the prevailing party will ossify over time, which will probably result in us becoming a nation of multi-fringe parties.
In 1948 the lunatic fringe was supporting Strom Thurmond and the Dixiecrats
They weren't dead then because they found a new block of votes in the south. But the south is now fraying away and there's nothing to replace them. New voters have been exposed to too much of the world to go for their reactionary crap.
The democrats are the conservative party. The liberal party will show up in 12 years or so.
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