The many faces of Romney captivate an astonished nation. Since the Republican primaries, Romney morphs and shape-shifts his positions. The presidential debates clearly exposed Romney's shifting positions on virtually every issue with the exception of tax cuts for the very wealthy. More is at stake here than a mere candidate for president who apparently lacks a moral core.
During my lifetime, the Republican Party transformed itself from a bastion of white protestant businessmen into a strange amalgam of religious fundamentalists, anti-government activists and pro big business advocates. A single core belief seems to separate national political factions. Conservatives and Republicans see people as basically evil and something that must be controlled, often by strong leaders. Moderates and Democrats tend to view humanity as basically good. Reality is almost certainly in between either view but leaning toward good.
As the Republican Party transformed itself, its ideals metastasized from Ronald Reagan's benign conservatism into the extremist positions exhibited by Republican candidates at every level. If Ronald Reagan were alive today, he would be driven from the party as too liberal. Historically, political extremists populated both party fringes. However, few extremists captured as many candidate or elected positions that now define the Republican Party. Currently, a vote for any Republican candidate is a vote for extremism and failure. Previously, I identified fatal Republican foreign relations and economic policy flaws. Now, here are five, additional flaws for your consideration.
- The Republican meme that government does not create jobs is false. At every level from local road maintenance to the federal government Mars program, jobs are created. Occasionally, I encounter a counter argument that without the private sector, those jobs would not exist. As long as people exist in communities, services will be required for survival. Government provides those services perhaps with private sector assistance. New York metropolitan recovery efforts from Hurricane Sandy demonstrate this synergy at its best.
Government research and technology produce employment and growth in often unsuspected ways. When we watched U.S. rockets exploding on launch pads at the beginning of the space race, few imagined that we would land on the moon. Today our government is literally exploring Mars and the private sector is heavily employed in space from GPS and communication satellites to resupply ships. All are surprising offshoots boosting U.S. and global economies.
The Republican Party appears to be sinking into a miasma of ignorance and prejudice that is beginning to damage the economic and military future of the United States. Voting for any Republican in the current election cycle only encourages more extremism coupled with fewer freedoms. President Obama and Democratic senatorial candidates earned election.
Further down the ticket, Democratic candidates for federal, state and local offices, even a few of marginal quality, deserve election to office. The pathology infecting the Republican Party, plainly on view in the current House of Representatives, establish that party as unfit for elected office.