Steve Benen found something that has been rattling around on the borders of my consciousness for the last couple of weeks.
In 1954, President Eisenhower wrote a letter to his brother. “Should any political party attempt to abolish Social Security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history,” Ike said. The president acknowledged in the letter that there are some who advocate such nonsense, but added, “Their number is negligible and they are stupid.”
A half-century later, there can be little doubt that (1) Eisenhower wouldn’t recognize his own party; (2) he would think the contemporary GOP is, to use his word, “stupid”; and (3) Republicans are eager to test Eisenhower’s assessment of what the American mainstream is willing to tolerate.
One reason I wasn’t able to fully summon this was because I remembered it as having to do with H.L. Hunt, and that’s the context in which it was bubbling up. I think I wanted to use it to talk about climate change, which is a totally different way to use this quote. It turns out, though, that the original quote did include a reference to H.L. Hunt.
Now it is true that I believe this country is following a dangerous trend when it permits too great a degree of centralization of governmental functions. I oppose this — in some instances the fight is a rather desperate one. But to attain any success it is quite clear that the Federal government cannot avoid or escape responsibilities which the mass of the people firmly believe should be undertaken by it. The political processes of our country are such that if a rule of reason is not applied in this effort, we will lose everything — even to a possible and drastic change in the Constitution. This is what I mean by my constant insistence upon “moderation” in government. Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his background), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid.
Their numbers are no longer negligible.
Not negligible? It’s the other way around. Find me a non-negligible number of non-crazy bastard Republicans in office/in the courts.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/03/us/justices-approve-strip-searches-for-any-offense.html?hp
They’re pretty much overt and unrepentant fascists at this point.
Well, you have to recall that Eisenhower was somewhat of a carpetbagger in the GOP. The only reason he ran as a Republican was because he wanted to thwart the GOP’s rising isolationist/kook wing, not because he had any ideological affinity for the brand of conservatism that would eventually be promoted by Buckley, Goldwater, and Reagan in the GOP.
Nuthin but a RINO to these eyes.
/snark
The GOP crazy contingent has volume beyond its numbers. Their numbers aren’t negligible in terms of their weight within the party, and because the GOP ‘moderates’ fear them they set the tone for 100% of half of mainstream, i.e., mass media, discourse–two-party system, one party given over to total craziness. I would even think that 50% is lower than it really is, because there is a bias in the press toward the GOP because of the huge effort over the last 30 years to strategically place people, and because of Fox.
The problem is, though that control of discourse is important, our elections can be skewed only so much. The chances for Romney or a massive upswelling of GOP numbers in Congress I think are small, but the risk of such an unlikely event would be huge, even catastrophic as you often suggest.
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TIN FOIL HAT WARNING
Was he also at the Clint Murchison Party on the eve of the Kennedy assassination, according to Sturgis and LBJ’s tattle-tale lover.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."In the 1960s, H.L. Hunt published a right-wing tract called Lifelines, which was distributed free to members of local chambers of commerce.
My dad was a member of a local chamber because of his government job. So we would get this leaflet every month with attacks on various government doings and agencies as being infiltrated with Communists and the socialist plans for this and that. The attacks included the federal level of my dad’s agency. Most of his colleagues in the chamber at that time (remember this is in SC) considered the tracts way over the edge.
Now, H.L. Hunt would be tagged as a RINO.
58 years on, Ike would recognize neither “political party”, and know them to be both stupid AND bought.
Once the corporate state came into being in the US, his prescience became a cautionary tale that we’d ignored at our own peril, and were he to be able to speak from beyond the grave, he’d say “…um…were you LISTENING when I mentioned the military/industrial/(congressional) complex? You’re all screwed, folks! Sorry! I tried!”
Ike also warned us (in his own way) about Tricky Dick. The country listened the first time he ran for president, but not the second.
Let’s not get too carried away about one private letter. Ike the moderate-conservative preferred to hang out with corporate types as president and his first cabinet was loaded with millionaires (back when a mill or two meant rich). He publicly opposed Kennedy’s Medicare bill in 1962, taking the reactionary AMA position. In FP, in 1965 he backed LBJ’s sudden and disastrous decision to escalate in VN. He also gave us Nixon.
I think he’d recognize today’s GOP since he had a close up taste of it with Tricky and Tailgunner Joe back in his day. Like Poppy Bush, he would likely be endorsing Romney today and otherwise staying courageously on the sidelines as his party lurched farther right.
In other words, he was a Republican. But Booman’s point is predicated on the fact that he was a Republican.
So Romney is going to rescue Paul Ryan from defeat in re-election to Congress by allowing him to experience defeat as a VP candidate?
Problem is, the Supreme Court might beat them to it. (Eliminating Social Security, that is)
Ike thought – a lot of us thought – the modern state was secure, that the types of reactionaries who loosed hired goons on strikers instead of installing railings on the staircases in their mills in 1891 had been vanquished.
Nope. They want it back.
The barbarians always threaten civilization, and fighting them off is every generation’s task.
One thing I learned is the Lemar Hunt is the son of HL Hunt.
Wow. Talk about leading different lives. Lemar is in three different sports hall of fame, was a pretty popular member of the KC community, and took some bold risks to launch the AFL (and NASL/MLS) — and is considered a pretty good guy.
HL? Not so much. Aside from being a dangerous kook, he also had several wives at one time — with multiple offspring.