The most disturbing thing about Republican control of the legislature is not their conservative agenda, but their authoritarian one. Just as the AP is releasing another study showing that gerrymandering in North Carolina rigged the system for Republicans, the GOP is redrawing judicial and prosecutorial districts to reduce the number of Democrats in those positions. Their actions are radical, not conservative.
The conservative movement of Bill Buckley believed in small government, local control and respect for existing institutions. They wanted less taxes and less regulation. They believed that competition made institutions more efficient and effective. The radicals controlling the North Carolina legislature have consistently shown disdain for democracy and local control while undermining the institution that have made our government work.
Beyond gerrymandering, they’ve tried to restrict access to the ballot box for anyone who disagrees with them. They clearly targeted African-Americans with their voter suppression laws and local boards of elections moved voting sites to make them less convenient for young people and African-Americans. And in this Orwellian political climate, Republicans cheer as Donald Trump bashes Democrats who are largely out of power for trying to rig the system.
This latest move to rig the court system seems particularly ominous. Prosecutors and judges are supposed to be unbiased and, ostensibly, less partisan. Increasing partisanship in these offices seems to be a move to reduce accountability for Republicans while strengthening the hand of businesses in civil cases.
The modern Republican Party is now the Trump Party. They’ve abandoned conservative principles for authoritarian ones. They bash the press and the institutions that protect our democracy while rigging the political system to reduce the competition that they claim makes everything else work better. They’re trying to ensure a permanent majority even if they run afoul of the public. It’s a dangerous path made more disturbing because of the rationalizations of traditional conservatives who refuse to speak out.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
And yet you left out the attack on Elaine Marshall, whose biggest crime is being the longest serving Democrat in the executive branch. Berger, Moore, and their minions only care about their power. The are the ultimate in big (brother) government when it comes to slapping some Democrat office holder or local council who doesn’t toe their line.
Thomas and Jay, thanks to both of you for the thoughtful analysis. I can’t say it makes me feel optimistic about the future of this country. OMG, Rick Perry is on the TV with Sean Spicer; I am going to turn it off and have my drug of choice — chocolate of some kind!
The first rule of debate is the first one to bring up Hitler or call the other party a Nazi loses the argument. But Authoritarianism is a prominent feature of today’s Republican Party. John Dean’s book “Conservatives without Conscience” examines the proliferation of authoritarian ideas within the GOP.
Authoritarians are not intellectuals. They do not persuade through reason, logic or facts. Legitimacy is based on an emotional bond to the leader that enables authoritarian leadership. Strong emotions like love and hate will overrule the need for things to make sense. We have seen how Republicans, as a group, fall into lock step behind their alpha male. Their primary process was more like watching elephant seals pound each other into submission. That was underscored by the “Access Hollywood” tapes which, at the end of the campaign, had the alpha male claiming he could grab all the females. The questions of morality, obscenity or criminal liability vanished within days. Authoritarians need their daddy.
Trump campaigned on hatred, belittling his opponents, bragging about how he alone could solve the large problems confronting America. His lies are not a deal-killer for the authoritarian follower. The bond between the leader and the follower is akin to attaching to a father. Daddy may be a liar, a sexual predator, a fraud, and a con man, but if not him, who?
Authoritarian followers will overlook evil in the leader if they believe a greater evil must be confronted. The greater evil was Hillary or “liberals” or “socialists.”
Donald Trump’s candidacy was built on a foundation of lies, misinformation, and slurs. How could someone who is an incapable stringing honest sentences together rise to such prominence in American politics?
“According to a 1990 Vanity Fair interview, Ivana Trump once told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that her husband, real-estate mogul Donald Trump, now a leading Republican presidential candidate, kept a book of Hitler’s speeches near his bed.”
Here are some things he learned from his mentor, Adolph Hitler.
“Great liars are also great magicians.”
“If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.”
“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.”
“By the skillful and sustained use of propaganda, one can make a people see even heaven as hell or an extremely wretched life as paradise.”
“All propaganda has to be popular and has to accommodate itself to the comprehension of the least intelligent of those whom it seeks to reach. ”
“The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one.”
“Success is the sole earthly judge of right and wrong. ”
“The victor will never be asked if he told the truth.”
The Republican Party depends on big lies and the gullibility of segments of the population. Trump gushed: “I love the uneducated.” And he does. They watch right wing news; they believe illogical, improbable lies and they are not motivated to protect their economic or political interests. They love their daddy too much to care about themselves, their families or their country.