When I saw that the RNC had advised Republican lawmakers that gay marriage is a “gateway” issue that must be supported to get young people to even consider supporting the party, I was amazed. I saw it as a huge middle finger to Christian conservative base. In other words, I saw it pretty much like this:
That division within the ranks of the religious right is clear even in their response to the RNC’s report.
On one hand, Wildmon’s American Family Organization, a particularly hard-line conservative Christian organization that owns 200 radio stations nationwide and runs an active grassroots network, has pledged to meet any attempt by the Republican Party to sideline its social agenda with revolt.
“The social conservatives will quit voting,” he said. “They’ll give up, they’ll be despaired. Those are the most loyal people to work for you because they’re energized because they believe their cause is something God stands for and that’s a pretty good motivator. And you take that away? You diss them? You tell them their issues aren’t important anymore? I don’t know who you’re going to be left with. I think you won’t have any troops out there. I don’t know how many country club people will go and walk door to door over the taxes issue.”
The RNC took another stance that startled me. They said that support for immigration reform with a pathway to citizenship was basically a gateway issue for Latinos that must be supported if the Republicans want Latinos to consider their other policies. That was a huge middle finger to their racist base. These two groups, the evangelicals and the racists, have some overlap but they are not the same. In fact, the strongest support for immigration reform on the right is coming from evangelicals.
To be clear, I completely welcome the RNC’s view on both gay marriage and immigration, even though I think it will help the Republican Party if they take this advice. But “help” is relative here, because the evangelicals really provide the energy in the party’s base, and without their commitment the party will suffer. The GOP is damned if they do and damned if they don’t.
Does this drive enough people away to coalesce into a third party, d’you think? I can see a reasonable number of the GOP’s freshly gerrymandered districts flipping to a harder-right party with enough organization behind it.
No chance they stay home. All it will do is remove the fire in their bellies. As you well know: once you bring people in to your coalition on one or two issues, it’s inevitable that they — as a general population — adopt the remainder of your agenda. Fundamentalist Christians are just as much about tax cuts for jaaahb creators as the country club Wall Street cigar-smoking assholes. It will take a new realignment for this to change. Of course… realignments are rare, and they also happen quickly and unexpectedly. So maybe this could spark that. I’m doubtful, having grown up with these people.
Trust me.
I don’t know… what with the seeming rise of Rand Paul from laughingstock to party power, this could easily be the spark that turns the GOP into a hydra-headed sex doll. If Harry Reid keeps doing the same to the liberal base, we could be seeing some amazing realignments starting to gel.
Regardless of what they say or promise I believe that the idiots that control the GOP are and will continue to be bigots, racists and are truly evil. Their public positions and statements will continue to have no resemblance to their votes on issues that separate them from decent folks.
…The GOP is damned if they do and damned if they don’t.
Not really. If the Republicans continue to cater to the evangelicals, the growth of the party would still be in question as young folks may still turn away. However, if they seek to bring in young folks with these “gateway issues, the evangelicals may leave but the party will likely see at least some long term growth in the coming years.
It seems impossible now, but I would wager that in as few as ten years and no more than twenty, the evangelical movement will have dramatically evolved on gay rights issues. The same generational divide exists there, it’s just not as pronounced. That is to say, not all young evangelicals are bigots. Some are for sure, some are not (with some even speaking out quite clearly on the issue), and lots of people are in that space where they’re open enough to gay rights that they will be willing to conform to a new consensus should one form.
10-20 years. Maybe sooner.
They’ll buy gay marriage about when they buy Darwin. On second thought, well after they buy Darwin.
“That [immigration w path to citizenship] was a huge middle finger to their racist base.”
Actually, the immigration deal with a path to citizenship is both stupid for the GOP (they’ll mostly vote Dem) and a middle finger to the American working class whose interests both parties are now selling out on the issue.
Democrat partisans who know these things very well yell “racist” all the time to hide their betrayal of American workers.
As to the God thing, it’s an interesting question whether accepting gay marriage will cost the GOP more in Christian right votes and activism than it’s worth in new votes from younger people.
Maybe the GOP is gambling those Christians have nowhere else to go, anyway, for a low tax agenda they also prize.
In that case they may be much mistaken about just how far the Christian right really cares about fiscal conservatism.
Historically, after all, the whole tribe of W J Bryan were loyal Democrats, and progressives at that.
On the other hand, the Christian right aren’t just the foot soldiers of the conservative movement.
A whole lot of party officials are part of it.
Hence all that anti-abortion action in the states.
And those same state officials who are so at war with abortion and birth control are not likely to roll over on gay marriage, no matter what some DC establishment types want.
IMHO.