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samboct -> RE: Why the GOP is unraveling. (4/27/2009 7:51:58 AM)
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On the 2000 election- I found Wikipedia enlightening-
By December 8, 2000, there had been multiple court decisions regarding the Florida presidential election[8] and on that date the Florida Supreme Court, by a 4-3 vote, ordered a statewide manual recount.[9] On December 9, the U.S. Supreme Court stayed the Florida recount, by a 5–4 vote, because, according to Justice Scalia:
"The counting of votes that are of questionable legality does in my view threaten irreparable harm to petitioner Bush, and to the country, by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election. Count first, and rule upon legality afterwards, is not a recipe for producing election results that have the public acceptance democratic stability requires."[10]
The four dissenting justices argued that stopping the recount was an "unwise[]" violation of "three venerable rules of judicial restraint": 1) respecting the opinions of State Supreme Courts, 2) cautiously exercising jurisdiction when "another branch of the Federal Government" has a large measure of responsibility to resolve the issue, and 3) avoiding making peremptory conclusions on federal constitution law prior to a full presentation on the issue. They dissenters opined:
"Counting every legally cast vote cannot constitute irreparable harm....Preventing the recount from being completed will inevitably cast a cloud on the legitimacy of the election."[11].
So much for the impartiality of the SCOTUS. Seems like a few dissenters got it right.
About the Democrats unraveling....Yeah right. About the Republicans unraveling....Well, they're certainly sore losers in my book, since rather than get behind Obama's programs to try and get the economy moving, all they've been doing is sniping and living in a delusional fantasy about how much better things were back then...a nice throwback to Reagan.
As noted earlier- I can't tell if the Republicans are unraveling. It's a possibility, but it's also a possibility that new leadership emerges and takes the party on a more sustainable path. It's clear that there is a large part of the country that feels unrepresented by the current government, and this is certainly the nucleus of a new party or reinvigorating the Republicans. But either way- I hope that the neocons are dead and buried. They're morally, ethically and economically bankrupt. And yeah, I still think Reagan was their torch bearer at the start and that poor Georgie just got all the scorn heaped on him because Reagan's vision really was pretty myopic.
For anyone who wants to understand the fall of the Soviet Union- I highly recommend reading Postwar by Tony Judt. The idea that Reagan "won" the cold war is just laughable. The Soviet Union was a rotten tree, and Reagan just happened to be walking by when enough breeze toppled it. For all I know, Reagan may have actually believed the tripe that he beat the Soviet Union.
Kittin
I agree with your analysis on the problems of the Republican party. They won't get anywhere until they can take a long hard look at their record, discuss their errors, and own up to their responsibilities. While I can admire Greenspan slightly for taking this road, I still am furious with the guy for the mess we're in- based on his naivity that bankers had learned their lessons of the Depression. Hell, the neo-cons are busy rewriting that history as well, using the Austrian economic model which showed that the government stimulus prolonged the Depression, and that Hoover had been on the right track. This is utter idiocy and ignores the impact of nature on what happened back then- along with impact of government as a first customer to get new technology started.
In terms of Reagan classifying ketchup as a vegetable- he's only following Gerald Ford's targeting of the school lunch programs as an anathema. These guys thought that "tough love" was the way to go- sink or swim, and all that crap that punishes children for the poor economic position of their parents. The far more lasting impact Reagan had on education was reducing federal support for higher education- which started the rocket trajectory of tuition hikes back in the 80s.
Sam
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