The “Stupid Party”?

It’s really hard to generalize an entire political party as “stupid,” but Louisiana’s Republican Governor and presidential hopeful, Bobby Jindal, used these words to describe his own party at a recent gathering of the Republican National Committee in Charlotte, North Carolina. It’s really a call to arms, recognition that you can’t insult, marginalize, ignore, restrict and take away the earned benefit from various segments of voters and then wonder why they just won’t vote for you. “Legitimate rape” (Congressman Todd Akin in his run for the Senate)? A pledge to render the right to abortion, favored by the vast majority of Americans, “a relic of the past” (Speaker John Boehner)? A blind rejection of anything that might add reason to gun ownership after a spate of horrific mass killings? Opposition to immigration reform (at least at the Tea Party level)? Making sure that Republicans who might be willing to compromise on legislation to get the country back on keel will face internal Republican forces to insure their defeat in the next primary election?

The latest casualty of this vituperative “my way or the highway” mentality is Georgia Republican Senator, Saxby Chambliss (above), who indicated that he plans to step down next year. He’s been in the Senate since 2002, but his crime against the GOP that is literally taking him out of the fight? He was willing to accept that new tax revenues could be considered as a part of the deficit reduction package, a policy favored by the vast majority of American voters.

Although Chambliss denies this is the reason, close associates suggest he’s just not up for the battle with his own party. “Mr. Chambliss lifted his public stature in 2011 as one of three Republican senators in the ‘Gang of Six’ hashing out a deficit reduction plan that the group hoped would capture broad appeal. Along with Senators Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Mike Crapo of Idaho, both Republicans, Mr. Chambliss cemented strong bonds with Democratic deficit negotiators and ultimately embraced a framework that would include increases in revenues and cuts to entitlement programs to get the deficit in check.” New York Times, January 26^th. Such efforts can be fatal to a Republican political career.

In this battle of rural vs. urban, white vs. growing minorities, denial vs. dealing with climate change… the GOP is on the wrong side of demographic trends. Rather than appeal to their strengths in fiscal responsibility and protection of states’ rights, the Republican “base” – most deeply represented by “we will never compromise” Tea Party faction – instead seems hell-bent on making everyone in the United States accept their view of the world, rejecting that a democracy can actually thrive with diverse opinions and perspectives. The actual result is a road-blocked Congress and a clear threat to the very existence of the United States as a viable nation.

Given a history of using tactics to achieve that the GOP wants pretty clear, needless to say there are “strategists” with a plan to give Republican voters more clout than their Democratic counterparts. With demographic trending clearly working against the GOP, there is a new potential path being debated in several states where Gerrymandering has resulted in some pretty strong Republican forces locked into a majority of local districts in several key states.

“Republican lawmakers in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin are considering whether to abandon the winner-take-all approach to awarding Electoral College votes and replace it with a proportional allocation.” Charles Blow writing in the January 25^th NY Times. English translation: while the overall winner won’t take all the electoral votes in the entire state, the winner of a particular district will take all of the votes of that district.

And since the districts have been reworked to “spread the Democrats around” but insure that Republicans have majorities in a majority of the districts (not always representing the split in the general population), the GOP can get more electoral votes that way. Effectively, cities would be marginalized and rural districts would increase their power. The GOP proponents of this new legislation (where their redistricting may actually give them the power to implement this change) are pretty open as to why they may push for this solution: this structure will give the GOP a huge advantage over Democrats in a presidential election, shifting the power to districts that favor the GOP and marginalizing the districts that form Democratic strongholds.

Mr. Blow notes: “The Washington Post reported [January 24^th] that the sponsor of Virginia bill’s, Charles W. Carrico Sr., a Republican, ‘said he wants to give smaller communities a bigger voice.’ Carrico told The Post, ‘The last election, constituents were concerned that it didn’t matter what they did, that more densely populated areas were going to outvote them.’” Subtle huh? Effectively, this system would have reduced pro-Obama voters to 3/5^th of a full vote according to sources cited by Mr. Blow.

While these forces may move forward, there is less traction for legislating this change than many in the GOP may have hoped. You see, there is a census every ten years, and while the next big one is not until 2020, the coming realignment of demographics could result in giving the Democrats that ability to implement their own Gerrymandered alternative, making it almost impossible in those future years for a Republican presidential candidate to have a chance. As many have said, this new GOP proposal is a “bad idea,” no matter which side of the aisle you favor.

I’m Peter Dekom, and the fact that so many of us really believe that Americans have embraced a “one person, one vote” system is amazing.