RUSH: Peter Beinart, Atlantic Monthly, had a post on Thursday, The Atlantic’s website: There is an “unprecedented crisis of authority in todayÂ’s GOP.” Whereas among Democrats, party hierarchies are clear and largely unchallenged. His point is the Democrats have got their act together; the Republicans don’t. And he explains why. He argues that it’s the Democrats today who are optimists and it’s the Republicans who are pessimists. And it’s even more specific than that. The Democrats are optimistic about the prospects for what they want America to become.
Democrats, to get more specific, he says Democrats looking to the future, “see a growing constituency for tolerance and social justice. When grassroots Republicans do, they see a growing constituency of takers, who want to turn America away from its exceptional nature.”
I just want to warn you I’m not gonna be able to get through all of this plus commentary before I have to take the next break. We’ll have to continue this through the top of the hour. But I want to go ahead and get started on it ’cause it actually is a nice transition here with this bookstore story.
I’m reading from Beinart now on his web post last Thursday: “Over the last two years [John Boehner] has repeatedly retreated in the face of opposition from rank-and-file conservatives who treat him with barely disguised disdain. … Mitch McConnell only avoided CantorÂ’s fate by attaching himself to his Kentucky colleague Rand Paul. … Like Boehner, McConnell is treated with striking disrespect in his own caucus. … In recent cycles, Republican presidential primaries have been relatively orderly affairs where the party establishment rallies around a frontrunner. … This year, however, that kind of elite control looks unlikely.
“In the Democratic Party, by contrast … party hierarchies are clear and largely unchallenged. … Ninety 90 percent of Democrats approve of their partyÂ’s heir apparent, Hillary Clinton, who looks headed towards a coronation in 2016. To a remarkable degree, the parties have switched roles. … Grassroots Democrats certainly get frustrated with their leaders, who they consider too cautious and too beholden to Wall Street. And were an unusually compelling candidate like Elizabeth Warren to run, many would rally behind her.”
Here is an educated — well, I don’t even know what that even is anymore. How educated can you be if you think Elizabeth Warren is compelling. You know, Elizabeth Warren, the fake Native American who said (imitating Warren), “You didn’t build that. You didn’t make that. You didn’t build that. You didn’t have a thing to do with it.” And Obama picked up the theme (imitating Obama), “Hey, you own a small business? You didn’t build that! All the rest of us did that. You didn’t do anything. You just get the money, and we’re gonna take it from you from now on.”
Okay, so Beinart thinks that she’s unusually compelling and if Elizabeth Warren runs against Hillary then all bets are off. “But these anti-authoritarian impulses are held in check by a greater optimism about the direction of the country. Over the last few years, a younger, more tolerant, Democratic-leaning generation has helped elect the countryÂ’s first African-American president, helped make gay marriage mainstream and may soon help elect AmericaÂ’s first female president. As a result, although Democrats may be upset that Obama canÂ’t pass immigration reform, theyÂ’re inclined to believe that because of demographic change, another Democratic president will soon get another chance.
“Republican activists are more pessimistic. Even with a Republican president, they grouse, government kept growing. And unless something drastic changes, it will only get worse. When grassroots Democrats look at the growing percentage of Latinos, African Americans, and young people, they see a growing constituency for tolerance and social justice. When grassroots Republicans do, they see a growing constituency of takers, who want to turn America away from its exceptional nature.
“ItÂ’s because Republican activists are more fearful of the future that they demand politicians willing to take extraordinary, Ted Cruz-like measures to reverse historyÂ’s course. Conservatives like Cantor, who accommodate themselves –” now, this is the key here. “Conservatives like Cantor, who accommodate themselves to demographic trends by supporting citizenship for some undocumented immigrants, must therefore be replaced with politicians who will stand militantly on principle. The irony is that by preventing the GOP from adjusting to a younger, less white, less Anglo country, grassroots Republicans are hastening the very liberal dominance they fear.”
So, can I summarize this for you? What Mr. Beinart here is saying is unless you Republicans become Democrats, you are going to remain miserable losers, and you are going to lose your country unless you change and embrace this demographic change and learn to see a growing constituency for tolerance and social justice, like this bookstore, as the norm and perfectly fine and understandable, even, then you’re perpetually going to lose.
So Beinart is trying to tell us what we have to do to win, ladies and gentlemen. If we don’t, if we don’t accept Democrat policy — and this is the kind of thinking, by the way, that explains what’s happened to the Republican leadership. They have bought this hook, line, and sinker.
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