2012 v. 1912

Tuesday night, like many, I watched the GOP Arizona and Michigan Primaries returns get reported.  Not that they really mattered at all; Romney won both.  For me, it’s habit; this is what I do on election night.  In retrospect, my night would have been better spent attending a concert.  Alas, we all have regrets.  I hope at the year’s end, there are some Republicans who will wake up, as if from a drunken one-night stand, and ask how in Abraham Lincoln’s name they thought “The Donald” was Presidential.  Pundits discussed Tuesday night about the geographic breakdowns.  Not as much in Arizona, where the results were less interesting than a Zoning Board hearing.  Many talked about my fellow Democrats who voted for Santorum in Michigan (9% of voters), just as the GOP did in the latter 2008 open Democratic primaries.  Others said Romney should had done better in his home state.  I ask, does any of this really matter? 

We all know how the rest of this cycle will go.  Romney will eventually win the nomination; Santorum will get a nice speaking slot at the convention.  Romney will pick some Southern Governor for his VP.  We’ll all speculate as to if each party’s base will show up on Election Day.  Nonsensical issues will come up as usual that will be as relevant as who wore what at the Oscars.  Someone will win; someone will lose. There, I just saved you hours of watching Rachel Maddow.  You’re welcome, North Baltimore.  The state of 21st Century American politics will continue to get more ridiculous.  The predictable farce will go on until we ourselves change it, yet again.

Let us rewind to the Election of 1912.  New Jersey Governor Woodrow Wilson defeated perennial candidate William Jennings Bryan for the Democratic Nomination.  Former President and iconoclast Theodore Roosevelt was so disappointed by his handpicked successor, President William H. Taft, he started the Progressive or “Bull Moose” Party.  There were not just Democrats, Republicans, and Progressives in 1912.  There was the Socialist Party of America (their Eugene V. Debs was also considered a noteworthy presidential contender), the Socialist Labor Party, as well as numerous other far smaller parties.  Parties rose and feel throughout the 19th & early 20th Century with their necessity and viability, and our Republic was the better for it.  This was a time when the term “human progress” was a “buzz term.”  That is what being a Progressive use to mean – the advancement of our species and civilization.  Today, Progressive is simply code for someone is too cowardly to call him or herself a Liberal, or Heaven forbid, a Socialist or Communist.  As if we’re still fighting the Soviets!  Today, in the far flanks of the two parties, GOP leadership takes the Tea Party or Severely Conservatives as seriously as latter-day Progressives are often by Democratic leadership, only in election years. Wilson argued that the Republicans were “3 elements” that were joined together for political convenience.  Currently, that can be said for both parties.  Please go to this youtube page and listen to recordings of Wilson & Roosevelt (from black cylinder to youtube, isn’t technology grand?) from that campaign and ask if our current political discourse is even a shadow of that period, a flawed period of history in its own right though it may had been.  Sadly, many of the same issues are still relevant a hundred years later.

In 2012, we’re playing political checkers.  I say, it’s time we switch back to Chinese checkers.  China practically owns this country anyway.  The market place of ideas demands that true competition exist again.  I challenge the readers of this, my first blog, to reflect upon of what you truly believe.  Where do you want the long-term direction of this nation to go, and what principles it should be based.  Be you a Democrat, Republican, Independent, or have sworn apathy from politics (silence equals consent), Liberal, Progressive, Conservative or “Severely Conservative”, reflect upon if you belong in your party.  Do not think solely in terms of the issues that have or will come up this election year – reproductive rights, marriage equality, taxes, the previous bailouts of private industry, energy, etc.  Think on what you believe should be the role of our government and what our society should be like from now until 2112 and beyond. Then, think about the parties that exist, and which fits best for you.  If one does not exist, start one.  Then become active in party activities like voter registration and fundraising.  Study campaign strategies, law, and technology.  Run for office.  Please though, let no one restart the Anti-Mason or Prohibition Parties. 

Many party insiders will count me a turncoat for advocating party bolting and overall reformation of our party system (which will also dictate radical electoral reform), of which I will not do myself, as I’m a loyal Democrat who has reflected on the above questions.  Others will count me a hypocrite.  There has been a quiet desperation for the breakdown of the two-party system on all sides, and it will not change until the American people decide to change it, again.  Even Lincoln was once a Whig in the Illinois state house.  Would not Baltimore City and other jurisdictions be better off if we had better quality and competitive Green Party candidates rather than the likes of Joan Floyd and Doug Armstrong?  Would not this City and State be better off if conservative Democrats could just admit they are really Republicans and take the GOP over from the more radical Republicans that make a serious statewide GOP candidacy impossible in the foreseeable future?  Would it not create a “fierce urgency of now” to strengthen the Democratic Party and solidify its platform?  Would it not make Democratic events more meaningful since building attendance would have to beyond the usual activists?  The Delegate Sam Arora and Georgia’s Zell Miller types of Dems would become harder to exist.  Governance would be more difficult, but it would certainly be competitive, more fun to watch and participate in, and healthier for the Republic.  

Otherwise, future generations and we will have to suffer meaningless election nights such as Tuesday, and progress will be as foreign of a concept in America as anything else circa 1912.  The great legacy of the United States has been that of dreaming big, of not accepting what is and fighting for what should be.  In spite of current evidence to contrary, I am still proud to be an American, for I refuse to stop dreaming, and will never accept how things are over how things should be. 

R. Ascal 

PS If having functioning ears wasn’t reason enough to not like Kid Rock, then his support of Former Governor Romney should be!