Voting Wisely

Pop Quiz

What comedian said: “If ignorance is a disease Harvard is the Wuhan wet market”?

What President said: “Republicans believe every day is the Fourth of July, but the Democrats believe every day is April 15.”?

What American diplomat said: “Democrats can’t get elected unless things get worse-and things won’t get worse unless they get elected.”?

What columnist said: “The Democrats seem to be basically nicer people, but they have demonstrated time and again that they have the management skills of celery.”?

Answers at the end of this post.

Why vote Republican? Why vote Democratic?

Party politics has a colorful history in the US. In 1800 the two principal parties were the Federalists (John Adams) and the Democratic-Republicans (Thomas Jefferson). In 1828 the Democratic Party ran its first presidential candidate and in 1856 the Republicans fielded a candidate for the first time. Over our almost 250 year history there have been an array of completely forgettable third parties that ran presidential candidates: the Nullifier Party (1832), the Free Soil Party (1848), the States Rights Democratic Party (1948) and Perot for President in (1992).

Since 1860 there have been only two major political parties. How does one explain to young voters today the difference between the Republican and Democratic parties? This post will attempt to provide some facts that might advance the educational process.

With all due respect to Alex Haley it might be helpful to understand the roots that have influenced the present day parties.

The first Democratic Party candidate to be elected was Andrew Jackson. Jackson was a war hero having engineered the defeat of the British in New Orleans in 1815. He was sold to the voters as a man of the people. Recommended reading: The Age of Jackson by Arthur Schlesinger. Schlesinger was an enthusiastic Democrat and his opus on Jackson ignored the real Andrew Jackson. Jackson was a slave owner and protector of slavery in the South. He led the military effort to eradicate the Seminoles in Florida in 1817. He was the author of the inhumane and indefensible Trail of Tears, the forced removal of Indian tribes from Georgia and the Carolinas. Yet Schlesinger makes no mention of this horrific event in the index of his book such was his bias in favor of Democrats.

The first Republican President was Abraham Lincoln. In contradistinction to Jackson, Lincoln fought a war to end slavery and spent the last of his political capitol ensuring that the 13th Amendment was passed by the US Congress. Recommended viewing: Lincoln starring Daniel Day Lewis. The policies of Lincoln and Jackson could not have been more diametrically opposed.

And the differences between them foreshadow the history of the two parties. The Democrats carry a heavy historical burden: slavery, secession, the Confederacy, Jim Crow, the KKK, segregation, lynching and Black voter suppression. The desire to diminish this deplorable history has given birth to a fallacious argument that became fashionable after the 1964 election. Educated (they should know better) Democrats in good standing declare, with a straight face, that the parties switched in the 1960’s. Yet history is devoid of pictures of Republican governors standing in schoolhouse doors to block the entry of Black students or Republican Klansmen levitated to high office, men such as Democrats Robert Byrd and Hugo Black. In most circles this would be described as embarrassment but we must remember that many Democrats are DEIvy League school graduates and they are incapable of such declasse emotions.

Each party has a Hall of Shame. The Republicans have Richard Nixon (forced to resign), Spiro Agnew (forced to resign), and Joe McCarthy (excommunicated by his fellow Republicans). The Democrats have Richard Russell, white supremacist and segregationist, (Senate office building named after him), Mayor Richard (vote early and vote often) Daley died in office and the aforementioned Jackson who appears on our $20 bill. Often we are judged by the company we keep.

The political designations embraced by the parties ebb and flow based on polling:

Liberal: The term was once fervently embraced by the Democratic Party. When it fell into disfavor the party was reborn as “progressive.” A classical liberal advocates free markets, the rule of law, individual autonomy, limited government, economic and political freedom and free speech. William Buckley described himself as a “classical liberal.” These liberal principles have been totally abandoned by the Democrats since the election of Woodrow Wilson.

Conservative:/Right Wing: The term derives from a desire to conserve the best of what has been and conservatives are seen by the leftist media as political Luddites. Conservative has become a derogatory term in American politics, a synonym for anything that can be traced to Adolf Hitler. Hitler of course was a left wing politician…National Socialist German Workers Party. A true conservative is, in fact, a classical liberal.

Progressive: The so-called progressive movement is antithetical to all things liberal. Our first progressive President was Theodore Roosevelt who believed wholeheartedly that the country should be run by a self-identified group of elites, by which he meant anyone who had graduated from Harvard. Progressivism is based on the movement of power and control to a strong federal authority. It is the foundation of the modern Democratic Party.

Today there is a strong economic component to the policies of the two parties. The Democrats oppose free enterprise. Free enterprise is based on free market economics, private property and individual autonomy. It is the polar opposite of progressive theory. As you move left on the economic spectrum the virtues of free enterprise are at best diminished, at worst eliminated. The Democrats want to accelerate that leftward shift.

Freedom of speech is essential to a liberal society. Censorship is a cardinal sin. A society without freedom of expression is described all too well in the dystopian Orwellian novel 1984. Orwell warns of the total consolidation of power in a central governing authority. When the satanic Elon Musk bought Twitter and converted the platform to an open forum he and his cars became symbols of evil in the eyes of all Democrats. Their anti-Musk temper tantrums have devolved into violence and vandalism,

So how do we compare the present manifestations of the Democratic and Republican parties?

Democrats: The party has rejected any vestige of classical liberalism. It stands for economic fascism, top down control of the people and the the suppression of the free exchange of ideas. It continues a 200 year assault on the economic and political freedom of American Blacks. They support an education bureaucracy that deftly manages to avoid actual education…they teach students what to think not how to think. The Democrats are embarrassed by our Constitution and see the very success of America as a threat to the world. They support a government controlled by a new elite, people of perceived intelligence who have no meaningful experience in the world outside of being elected to office and attending college. They want their constituents ignorant and dependent.

Republicans: They (Reagan and Trump) believe in the People and the Shining City of the Hill. They believe in individual liberty and a concomitant individual responsibility. They wish to return power from the overarching Federal leviathan to the people. They are becoming, once again, the party of classical liberalism.

There is another significant measure of the difference between the parties. Whenever a Democratic Party presidential candidate loses they scream foul and seek a judicial intervention. Bush was “selected” not elected and Hilliary claims to this day that her victory was “stolen”. In 2017 the inauguration of Trump saw Madonna speculate about blowing up the White House and the Democrats boycotted the inauguration ceremony. But wait the Democrats scream…what about January 6, 2021? New evidence suggests that the protest at the Capitol was not an insurrection but rather an FBI operation, such was their hatred of Trump.

If we can get young voters to understand this dichotomy all will be well.

Answers to the pop quiz

What comedian said: “If ignorance is a disease Harvard is the Wuhan wet market”? Bill Maher

What President said: “Republicans believe every day is the Fourth of July, but the democrats believe every day is April 15.”? Ronald Reagan

What American diplomat said: “Democrats can’t get elected unless things get worse-and things won’t get worse unless they get elected.”? Former Ambassador to the UN Jeanne KIrkpatrick

What columnist said: “The Democrats seem to be basically nicer people, but they have demonstrated time and again that they have the management skills of celery.”? Dave Barry