My Opening Salvo…

This post was first posted on my original site, which I’ve since learned was a pain in the ass to update.  So, for the sake of continuity, I’ll repost here:

For as long as I can remember I’ve been a Republican.  Long before I understood what it meant politically, I suppose I identified with it (or aspired to) on a personal level.  My earliest political memory is waking up early the morning after the 1984 Presidential Election to watch the coverage and see if Reagan had won.  I was 6, with no real comprehension of the actual race, and certainly no understanding of Mondale’s total ineptitude.  All I knew was that Reagan was the good guy and I wanted to be sure that the good guy had won.

By the time I reached my teen angst years I was wearing khakis and penny loafers to school (not a big look in the mid 90’s) and founding the Young Republicans Club at Chaparral High School along with my best friend and my future wife.  I remember being so excited about the ’94 “Republican Revolution”.  Finally we’d be able to make some changes.  The utter failure of that Congressional Class and the resulting downfall of Newt Gingrich struck me as a fluke.  We just didn’t have the right guy in charge, and I’d argue to the point of discomfort with anyone who disagreed.

Like a lot of Republicans I continued this feeling of moral and intellectual superiority squarely into the beginning of the Bush Administration.  Of course we were right, and now, FINALLY, we had the right guy to lead us to victory.  And what a team he had assembled!  Battle hardened GOP warriors like Cheney and Rumsfeld and Powell. Sure he’s an idiot, I told my self (and probably conceded in more than one debate), but he’s surrounding himself with the best and brightest, and THEY will do the heavy lifting.

Well, they sure did.  9/11 changed the game, as it did all of us.  The Bush Administration could no longer afford to dabble in the minor leagues.  For the first few years of the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq my support was unwavering.  Of course we were justified.  After all, 9/11 wasn’t Bush’s fault, he was still suffering from Clinton’s systematic dismantling of our military and intel communities.  It was all Clinton.

But somewhere along the way my absolute faith in the party and its leaders waned.  I began to question motives and listen to arguments, both centrist and liberal, rather than merely focusing on my defensive response.  The resulting feeling was disorienting to say the least.  This was my identity.  What now, become a Democrat?  I certainly didn’t identify with them (and still don’t).  And independents are a side act.  Never quite ready for the main stage.

This introspection led me to realize that I hadn’t changed.  My party had.

The modern GOP has abandoned all of the very ideas that made it great.  Limited government, limited spending, freedom of choice, states rights and on and on and on.  These essential tenets are now trotted out only when convenient and dismissed with a simple “this situation is different” when it suits the occasion.  The party has been hijacked by the vocal minority on the far right.  Evangelicals, isolationists, racists (yes, I said it) and the ignorant that simply fear the modern world and the inevitable changes of an evolving and maturing society.

It’s no longer acceptable to disagree with this minority.  For whatever reason they’ve managed to convince the GOP at large that the key to political sustainability is to cater to their every demand, shouting down all who dissent as RINO’s or worse.  Media is labeled and sorted, with patronization or mere acknowledgement of unacceptable outlets branded as blasphemy.  How did we get here?  What happened to our independent spirit?  Most Republicans will still argue that they ARE the independent thinkers.  Everyone else is “drinking the kool-aid”.  Well, I disagree.  And I hope to use this blog to start an honest and open discussion about it.

I promise this will be my only long, boring autobiographical rant.  I just felt it best to begin this thing with an explanation of how I got here…

 

-EL