The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

105 Years Old, But The Ink Never Dries

Posted on | September 21, 2010 | 3 Comments

by Smitty

Mike Walsh has a fine post at Big Journalism on gangster government, which concludes with a Senator Plunkitt quotation. He frames the challenge the Tea Parties face explicitely:

You see, [political parties] differ on tariffs and currencies and all them things, but we agree on the main proposition that when a man works in politics, he should get something out of it.
The politicians have got to stand together this way or there wouldn’t be any political parties in a short time.

It’s a trifle naive to hate political parties. We need them. There needs to be multiple vessels for gathering chunks of consensus, filtering out the whackos, and carrying forward related collections of ideas.
Parties are a means to an end, and, like anything else in culture, desperately want to become ends unto themselves.
What remains to be seen is whether the Tea Party de-emphasis on individual figures as centers of gravity will amount to much. The GOP elephant consumed the Ross Perot proto-Tea Party enthusiasm in the 90s.
This time around, the onslaught of the Tea Parties seems, more or less, to reveal a mousy backside behind the elephant maw.
I submit that the post-Progressive era will mean fewer “professional politicians” and something in the direction of everyone getting to catch javelins for 15 minutes.

Category: Politics

Comments

3 Responses to “105 Years Old, But The Ink Never Dries”

  1. jefferson101
    September 21st, 2010 @ 5:39 pm

    I don’t notably hate “political parties” in the generic. But I do hate the fact that for the last 20 years or so, the main thrust of the “Republican” effort has been toward compromise.

    In other words, we start off with the position that we’ll give the Democrats half of what they want, and then negotiate a settlement from there.

    I have purely had it with that tactic. If the Republicans can’t start from the position they, and We, the People, will get half of what we want?

    The next two years will tell the story. Either the Republicans become something that represents me, instead of the vested interests, or I will find a replacement for them.

    I’ll vote absolutely straight ticket Republican, this time. But either the Republicans start acting Conservative, or I’m going to start voting for someone who will.

    And that’s the name of that tune.

  2. Right Wing Extremists: September 22, 2010 | REPUBLICAN REDEFINED
    September 22nd, 2010 @ 5:25 am

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