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May 12, 2009 06:29 PM UTC

On Republicans...

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  • by: Patrick Sean Byrne

I work every day with people who represent the very best of what the GOP has to offer.  They are not ideological, are not culture warriors, and care passionately about our state’s infrastructure and about making sure that all Coloradans can travel conveniently and safely.

In my opinion, there are currently four types of Republicans.

1.) Old School Republicans – These people are throwbacks to a bygone age, when Republicans were the northeastern party of clean government and foreign disentanglement.  The last bastion of the sensible, pre-Goldwater, pre-Nixon GOP lingers on today in Connecticut and Rhode Island, where my mom’s family is from. Some highlights:

   * Connecticut Governor Jodi Rell (R) was the first Governor to sign a bill adopting civil unions for gay couples without being forced to do so by a court.

   * Former U.S. Senator Claiborne Pell (R – RI) was the creator of the Pell Grants that make college more affordable for low-income families and was one of the most fundamentally decent people ever to serve in Congress.

   * Former U.S. Senator Lincoln Chafee (R – RI) was the only Republican to vote against the Iraq War, against the renomination of John Bolton as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, and in support of federal funding for stem cell research.  

We have nothing to fear from Old School Republicans, only that they are a dying breed.

2.) Barry Goldwater Republicans – These are the people who read Atlas Shrugged in college and then concluded that they knew how to run the government. Although generally benign on issues relating to civil liberties, these folks have bought into the idea that the free market is morally good. Having actually studied economics dispassionately at a high level, I’d argue that markets have no moral dimension (good or bad) and are simply an efficient tool to allocate resources (under certain conditions).

Unfortunately, these Republicans are not sophisticated enough in economics or public finance to understand that government does have an essential role in creating and maintaining our physical and social infrastructure, and in providing a safety net for people who (for whatever reason) cannot take care of themselves.  I would include Doug Bruce and his ilk in this category.

3.) Neoconservatives – These are the people who are largely responsible for the eight-year waste of time, money, and American lives that was the Bush Administration. They are diametrically opposed to everything that Old School Republicans stand for, and want to grow government for the grand purpose of imposing American government on sovereign nations that do not yet have the civil society necessary for sustainable plural democracy.

These are the Fox News Republicans, and they should be repudiated by reasonable people at every opportunity.

4.) Evangelical True Believers – These are the people who would not hesitate to establish a literal interpretation of the Old and New Testaments as the highest law of the land. They are not sophisticated in politics, and have been the unwitting pawns of neoconservatives since the Nixon Administration.

These folks are attempting at this very moment to purify the GOP and turn it into the Party of God (Arabic translation: Hezbollah). The mere idea of these people in positions of power is frightening, and their backwards plans for the GOP should be resisted by all reasonable people, and by any legal means necessary.

I think that the Colorado GOP leadership consists mostly of category 2.) with a sprinkling of 1.), but that the rabid El Paso County base of the party is a lethal mix of 2.) and 4.).

If we Democrats are to enjoy any enduring power in Colorado, we will have to do the following:

   * Convince those Type 1 Republicans that, at least in Colorado, they are actually Democrats

   * Educate the more open-minded Type 2 Republicans and convince them that Type 1 Republicans are better for Colorado’s economy, environment, and people

   * Inform the Type 4 Republicans that they have been played by Type 3 Republicans for decades, and convince them that their evangelical ends are better served without the poisoning influence of government

It will be difficult, but with patience and a united purpose, there is nothing we cannot achieve.

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One thought on “On Republicans…”

  1. And what is it that links these four categories of Republicans into one party?

    1. Enduring conviction that Adam Smith was right: the marketplace is the place to solve social problems based on the competing self-interest of all players.

    2. Enduring conviction that “all men are created equal” isn’t really true; that people with more wealth are worthy of more trust than people with little or no wealth. Put another way: All Dollars Are Created Equal, and everyone should have as many votes as he/she has dollars.

    3. Enduring conviction that–at bottom–WASPs always have been, and should continue to be, in charge.

    4. Enduring conviction that Republicans are right, evidence and facts notwithstanding. Some Republicans of your first type in particular were dismayed by G.W.Bush and cronies, and are not especially enamored of the out-and-out racists who comprise the Southern Branch (formerly “Dixiecrats”), but this dismay is not enough to change their fundamental belief that folks at the country club ought to be in charge– of city hall, the statehouse, and the U.S. Capitol. It is this fundamental irrationality–the insistence on holding onto convictions long ago disproved by the facts–that makes me wonder whether being a Republican is in fact a form of mental illness caused by ossification and/or petrification of the brain, possibly the result of mad cow disease.

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