Contributed by guest blogger Joe Mays:
Americans are slowly waking up with a horrific hangover, and we are saying as we did twenty-five years ago - It's morning again in America.
Ronald Reagan's 1984 ad campaign, which etched this slogan into our collective history, focused on a calmly determined and optimistic population that was putting the pieces of our fractured country back together through hard work and determination. It's no wonder that, given these troubled times, Americans all over this country are waking up saying, "Was Dick Cheney really in my bed?"
Yes, we have a bad hangover.
But Americans are optimistic and rightly so. The latest ABC/Washinton Post poll finds that over two-thirds of us approve of the job that President Obama is doing, and for the first time in six years we think our nation is on the right track. The polls, in this case, are correct. We are moving in the right direction. Just as one might grasp for a glass of water after a late-night binge, Americans elected a new and different President. And now we are all looking for a way to repair the damage and leave future generations with a nation better than how we found it. I see evidence of this on both the left and the right. The left is looking to invest in and change our education system, health care system, energy policy, and our environment. The right is finally furious with the massive debts that we have amassed. Of course, these two goals are at odds - it's impossible to make investments that require us to spend money we don't have *and* reduce our debt at the same time. But at least we're all concerned with issues that will make our country better rather than what we can do to keep the late-night binge going.
This alone will make our country stronger. As long as every American - Republican, Democratic, and Independent - keeps future generations in mind and makes their voices heard and calmly works for what they believe in, we will all fight. And we'll all eventually prosper. This is what makes our nation great.
Those who are acquainted with me know I'm not a morning person. But this is a morning I'm happy to get up for.
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10 comments:
It really is weird how even when not much is different, you can feel like it's actually different. I know not all the readers of this blog voted for him--so this is probably reversed for them--but for me anyway, I feel so calm just knowing he's in office. What is that?
My only worry is that--I was listening to some historians the other night--apparently the farther the pendulum swings one way, the harder and faster it swings back. If the left likes him too much, they say, it's actually less likely he'll win a second term, because the backlash will come harder and faster. Do you think that's true?
Speaking of partisan politics, are conditions right for a split in the Republican party? There's a growing segment of the population (of which John is a part) which is looking for a different option... perhaps now is the time where the need is great enough that a new party or branch can and will fill that space.
Oh people who are far better-read than I, what say you?
Actually, to add to my own argument (hey! Where is everybody?), speaking more broadly, are party splits and realignments both the symptom and treatment of an idealogical crisis? As an example, for party idealogies to cross the bridge to Civil Rights, a whole lot of crap went down, and I don't know a whole lot about it but I do know that the Democrats became the Dixiecrats became the Republicans. Now we've got several bridges to cross, such as gay rights (which I believe reached its tipping point in the U.S. about eighteeen months ago), the future of capitalism, and foreign relations in a post-American world.
Ok, blah. I'm late for dance class, and I talk too much for the small amount of information I know.
Hi Becky! Here I am! I will reply to your comment!
My God, I hope it's time for a split in the Republican party. Because they have gone so far past what the party was founded to believe in that it's not even the same party anymore. I mean, if you took what has happened in this country over the last 8 years and removed all the names and party affiliations, the Republicans would be appalled. Largest increase in the size of the government, ever? Involvement in two foreign wars at once? Government buyout of publicly traded banks? It all just seems so hypocritical to me. At least coming from the party of small government, low spending, and laissez faire business policy.
Not to mention the reactionary, virulent venom spewing from the Republican pundits. I swear, they would issue a scathing, buzzword-filled email to almost anything the Obama administration said. Obama likes sunshine? Well, sunshine contributes to skin cancer, which kills millions of hardworking Americans every year, so Obama must hate Americans. It's just preposterous, and I can't believe that somewhat intelligent people actually believe that crap. And they don't just believe it, they eat it up. (Try coming to a family dinner with the DeForests sometime. It'll turn your brain to sludge.)
Whew, I'm gettin all worked up here. Deep breaths....
Heh. I liked your little mathematical proof about sunshine. You're right, you could fill anything in there, really.
Holy cow, it's a DeForest invasion!
Becky, to address the questions in your first post, first of all the "backlash" is actually a big part of the reason Obama and the Democrats are in power now - backlash against total Republican control from 2000 - 2006. There's certainly plenty of right-wing backlash against any-and-everything Obama does but as of right now it's a voice that's speaking to a continually-shrinking base. I particularly like that several conservative groups have already started blasting Obama's Supreme Court nominee despite the small matter that he hasn't picked one yet. In any case, I actually said in the run-up to the general election that I believed Obama would be a one-term president (something I hope to be wrong about). But it wasn't attacks from the right that worried me; it was that I thought that he had raised people's expectations so high that it was almost inevitable that they'd be very disappointed in him.
This actually reminds me of a joke (bear with me). An outgoing CEO who has been fired hands two letters to his replacement and tells him "the first time you run into problems, open the first letter. The second time you run into problems, open the second one." So some time passes and eventually there's this big crisis, so the new CEO opens up the first letter and it says "Blame everything on me" so the CEO goes out and does that and it works great. Then some more time passes and another crisis hits, so the CEO opens the second letter and it says "Prepare two letters . . ."
Translation: Obama has done a good job of presenting, and people have generally accepted, the current financial crisis and the Iraq war as "a Bush legacy problem." But the stimulus plan and the shifting of troops into Afghanistan are his calls, and for better or worse he will own the results. Add in the promises to reform health care, education, and our energy infrastructure and I think you have the makings of either a landslide victory or a crushing defeat in 2012.
As for your point about another party forming, I agree with you but if anything I think it's more likely to come from a splintering of the Democrats rather than the Republicans. A poll last week said that right now 35% of the country identifies themselves as Democratic, 21% Republican, and 38% as independent. The thing is that the 21% still hanging on are pretty ideologically homogenous; they've squeezed most of the moderates out. So you end up with a lot of people all in the Democratic tent that are just kind of there by default. There's not a whole lot of fault lines in the Democratic party right now but there are a few (unions, market protectionism, gun control, and whether or not to prosecute for torture are a few that come to mind off the top of my head).
But as for cyclical trends it's interesting to see how recent events bear a striking resemblance to the 1994 election. In that election, the Republicans took control of both houses for the first time in 42 years and the day after the election long-time Democratic Senator Richard Shelby switched parties. At that time it was fashionable to predict the inevitable decline and dismantling of the Democratic party. The Democratic party revived itself largely by moving to the center on most issues. It's a lesson the Republicans would do well to learn.
Laura - My lack of commenting on your post is in no way an indication that I didn't find it interesting. It's just that I don't disagree with anything and have nothing to add. I'm sure that Mike will be happy to argue with you once he gets around to reading this.
So why did no one but DeForests respond to this post? Come on--there's good stuff here! You guys are poos.
Sorry Becks, but it was a short cliched analogy that, without any details, was about three months late.
The whole post/blog could have been boiled down to: "We have a new leader, and the country will be different because of it."
While the statement is true, I don't have anything to say about it. Or if I did, I said it 90-100 days ago, or during the campaign, or the lame duck period.
Blogs are about opinions, and the only opinion given here was that the last 8 years were bad, and people are hoping the next 4 will be better.
I think our level of debate is a little higher than that (or at least it starts at a higher level, it frequently nosedives in maturity.)
Sorry for not getting back on any of this. I forgot that John posted it. So in case anybody's still reading...
To sloth - I don't agree that blog entries always have to have inflammatory opinions in them. Some people always want to argue, and I find it interesting that you are criticizing the fact that my post wasn't critical enough. Nice.
I made the point in the post that it's a good thing that Americans from both parties are focusing more on the future. For example, the libertarian wing of the Republican party is finally standing up for liberty and against the expansion of government. Where were they when (as Laura pointed out) Bush doubled the national debt? There are finally people on the religious right speaking out against torture...
I don't count myself as a Republican - and never have - but there are a lot of conservative principles that I'm happy to see people in the party uniting around.
One thing I hear from the grassroutes level of (what's left of) the conservative movement is that Washington Republicans are tone-deaf and they are *not* connected with the concerns of ordinary conservatives. Republicans are re-acquainting themselves with their values and re-organizing at the local levels. I don't expect or think the party will split - they'll come back.
...and to Becky's point - I don't think that the pendulum has swung too far left either. I hear almost as much criticism of Obama from the far left as I do the far right. This probably means he's doing a decent job.
Er, I meant grassroots NOT grassroutes... I work at a mapping company... My bad.
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