Comments
THE VIEW FROM HERE - We need no CSI forensic team to identity the culprit. It was the American Political Science Association (APSA). In 1950 it published Toward a More Responsible Two-Party System. At the time, it was nincompoopery based upon zero comprehension of American principles and was a formula for disaster. The rightful condemnation which it received, however, may have allowed it to survive as so many scholars thought it was too outrageously imbecilic to have any influence. They underestimated the gullibility of the American public and the machinations of anti-social power mongers who realized the division meant money and power. See Hate Money Stalks America
In essence, the 1950 APSA report said that America should have two political parties with totally separate political platforms. Then, the voters could chose one party which would implement its policies and discarding all dissent. If the voters were unhappy, then in the next elections, they could vote for the other party and reverse everything which had been done.
The aspect of American politics which they wanted to abolish was the fact that many GOP were more liberal than many Dems and likewise, many Dems were more conservative than many GOP. As a result, when all these Congressmen and Senators got to Washington, there was no national party agenda. Instead, they listened to the concerns of their constituents back home in Ohio, Oregon, and North Carolina which resulted in a government of compromise and cooperation. See Yascha Mounk Of course, politics never ran smoothly, but that is due to human nature. The role of government in America, however, was established in the Declaration of Independence. It was to provide the context which protected each individual’s inalienable right including Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness (LLPH). People remember LLPH, but often forget that mutual cooperation is essential to protecting individual rights.
In the 1950's, we had fringe extremists such as Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-WI), we had communists, we had the American Nazi Party, and the John Birch Society. McCarthy was most famous not only for his extremism but for his total fall from power, after Boston lawyer Joseph Welch told McCarthy during a televised Senate Hearing said, "Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness." Welch ended with the question, “Have you no sense of decency?” McCarthy’s extremism violated the core American value of mutual cooperation and respect of the individual.
Conservative TV host and commentator, William Frank Buckley Jr., was in the forefront of ousting the John Birch Society from the GOP party as well as opposing left wing extremist such as communists (who actually existed in the 1950's).
Why Extremism was Expelled by Both Parties
The lack of a national mandatory policy for their Dems or the GOP was due to the parties’ having a spectrum of overlapping constituents. In those days, each political party was a variation on a theme, and not a rejection of mutual cooperation. As Martin Luther King observed, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” MLK was not the first to make this observation about America, but MLK had the genius to succinctly state American values, e.g., “I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”
Both concepts were based on the recognition that America was not yet perfect, but that slowly we were advancing together in the right direction. When attorney Welch brought down Sen. McCarthy by asking, “Have you no sense of decency?,” Americans shared a common culture. In the 1930's when Superman said, “Truth, justice and the American was,” it was in opposition of Nazi extremism. No one could stray too far for too long from the center.
The Division which Destroyed America
In the 1960's and after, America allowed power-mongers to emerge who sought only power and not the general welfare. They jettisoned the core of American Constitutional law in Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954) by excluding Blacks from having the inalienable right of Liberty. On even an even deeper level, the opinion denigrated the ability of American Blacks by also depriving their of the inalienable right to Pursuit of Happiness. Instead, the Supreme Court started us on terrible track of division where Blacks had the right of integration if and only if their achievements were lower than those of Whites. Under the logical extension of the Brown philosophy, it is not sufficient that each person have the right to pursue Happiness, but rather Blacks were entitled to “happiness of outcome.” Equality of outcome replaced equality of opportunity.
Extremism Kills
America no longer has two political parties which are a variation on a theme, but two parties which are captive by their most extreme elements. The extremists specialize in cancel culture. Both will stamp out any sense of cooperation with the other. When former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) worked with Dems to pass a budget to prevent the nation from default, the extreme MAGA made a motion to remove him from the Speakership. In one of the greatest betrayals of America and of the US Constitution, all the Dems voted with the extreme MAGA to oust McCarthy. Had they voted with centrist GOP to retain McCarthy, MAGA would have become impotent and Donald Trump’s political prospects seriously injured. The Dem extreme Wokers, however, did not want a centrist government. If the center GOP and center DEM came together to make Kevin McCarthy Speaker, the Wokers would likewise be impotent. The center GOP and center DEM are far greater in numbers than the lunatic fringe (roughly 85% to 15%). The center can cooperate for the mutual benefit of America. Instead, we have extremism which has abandoned Ukraine, abandoned Israel and supported Hamas thereby strengthen all the Islamists worldwide, and have left our Southern Border in chaos.
Today’s historians look at pre WW II Germany and point out crucial moments when Hitler could have been stopped. Future historians will do the same with America. I suspect that future analysts will find the refusal of the Dems to support Kevin McCarthy for House Speaker to have been the alea jacta est moment when the die was cast.
The APSA Got its Way
We have two political parties which are ruled by their insane extremists who only care about their petty personal power; the national welfare be damned. It fact, that is close to the marching song of the Wokers, Damn America. They clearly state that America must be destroyed as it is built on White racism. For Wokers, individual inalienable rights are a White man’s construct; rather, people are henceforth to be judged by the group to which they are assigned. As we learn from Wokers demonstrating in the streets, for them the only way to throw off the yoke of the Oppressors is to exterminate Jews — then the Whites.
(Richard Lee Abrams has been an attorney, a Realtor and community relations consultant as well as a CityWatch contributor. You may email him at [email protected].)
