The EU

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Saturday, January 3, 2009

RNC Chairmanship

This is the month when the Republican National Committee elects the next chairperson.

The Washington Post has an article that reviews the candidates for this position. There are some good ones and some not-so-good ones. Two of the candidates are Black office holders (from Maryland and Ohio). Both come across well. One is someone who doesn't know the difference between the Chairman of the Grand Old Party and Rush Limbaugh (Chip Saltsman, former advisor to Candidate Mike Huckabee). He should not get a vote.

We have two State Party Chairs in the race. There is Michigan Chairman Saul Anuzis and there is South Carolina Chair Katon Dawson.

And the incumbent, Mike Duncan, is running, arguing that the races settled after the big November vote shows that Senator Obama was a phenomenon and that the Republican Party is still capable of winning elections. This man needs help, help he will not get in the GOP National Headquarters.

And, people outside the 169 voting delegates (three per state plus some others) are showing an interest in the future of the GOP.

I think this item from Samizdata is worth reading. The poster, Perry de Havilland, writing from London, says it is time for disunity in the Republican Party. Keep in mind that he is writing from London, so when he uses the word "liberal" he is using it the way the people on the Continent would use it--"that terrible liberal, Margarent Thatcher." Liberals in that sense are people who believe in free markets and subsidiarity. It is one of those cases where the word reverses meaning as it crosses the Atlantic Ocean.

Mr de Havilland calls for revolution, or at least a figurative "night of the long knives:"
Well to quote Mencken, the American electorate are going to get what they voted for good and hard, because this is also the year the global economy is truly going to crash, big time, plunging us into a recession and indeed a depression that will last longer and be driven deeper by the policies being implemented by governments on both sides of the Atlantic.

And this presents friends of liberty with a great many opportunities.

Never has there been a better time for cleaning house. The usual excuses given for pragmatic 'broad church' politics no longer apply on the so-called 'right'... no amount of unity will change the fact that regulatory tax-and-spend politicians will be in charge for the next few years regardless of what people of a classical liberal disposition do. And so I would strongly urge such people to get into politics like never before, not primarily to fight the statist left just yet, but to create opposition parties that are actually worth voting for.

In short, I am calling on anyone who believes in liberty and limited government to reject all thoughts of party unity and work tirelessly to drive the statist right from their parties.
I think the line I put in BOLD is the payoff line.

However, Mr de Havilland is not a purist. He is for a "big tent" GOP.
The simple fact is that people can be fellow travellers on a path that leads to liberty without all marching in ideological lock-step. It just boils down to asking the question "do you want the state to have less control over people's lives or more control?" If a person can honestly answer that they think the state is too powerful and needs to be reduced, that is a fellow traveller.
And here "fellow traveller" has a good connotation.

I fully agree with him that now is the time for people who want the government less involved in their personal lives to get involved in politics. This is not to say that we don't wish the government to do its part in helping us through the current economic problems. However, there are a lot of other things government at all levels involves itself in that we might be better off if it didn't. And, there are a lot of things that higher levels of government are doing that might be better done at lower levels of government (in the sense that it would be more aligned with the needs of local peoples). My thumbnail of this is that sometimes the People of Lowell, Massachusetts, have more in common with the People of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, than they do with the People of Cohasset, Mass.

It's a new year. So, go out and get involved in your party!

Regards -- Cliff

Cross Posted to the LRCC Blog

2 comments:

The New Englander said...

Cliff,

One question for you about the bolded part of the quote from the British author...I noticed he said "parties" plural. I know the British system is a little friendlier to third-parties (and the Lib Dems actually thrive alongside the Conservatives and Labor).

Do you think that a centrist, moderate Independent would ever have a realistic chance at election, whether totally non-aligned or as a member of a new, third-party?

I think that "third-party" in this country often gets associated with fringe, and most cases where non-R/D candidates have won, they were already famous or successful pols (i.e. Jesse Ventura, Lowell Weicker, Angus King, etc.)

Still, I think that the viral power of the Internet could be a game-changer, and traditional party power structures could be overdue for some dismantling..

..but any chance you think we'll ever see a viable non-aligned or third party candidate nationally or statewide?

-gp

C R Krieger said...

GP

I did think that the use of "parties" plural was interesting and a bit ambiguous. The third party does survive in the UK, and I thought Paddy Ashdown was a pretty good leader there for a while. SBS early in his life and all that.

With regard to here in the United States, I think that a "third party" could grow up and replace one of the two main parties, if they are not successful in differentiating themselves from each other. Or, if one of them is knocked down so hard it can't get up. This is the story of the Republican Party. It took a cause and ran with it and succeeded, but a lot due to luck.

So, I think the deck is stacked against a third party in the US, but if one of the two major parties stumbles, a new one would form to take its place.

Regards -- Cliff