Monthly Archives: November 2020

The Myth of the Lost Cause AKA The Stolen Election- 2020

Philosophy, Politics, ,
The Stainless Banner

As those of you who know me, I am quite a lover/student of history. I read as much as I can about the American Civil War (ACW). Both the Military and Political histories, a lot. One of the newest things in ACW history studies is the critical look at what is called the “Myth of the Lost Cause and Civil War History”. I’ll just call it MLC for short. That is why I have the last of the Confederate States of America’s National Flag. For me, it represents the start of the creation of the MLC. Not that the idealizing the cause by the side that lost is anything new. It is not. But it is one of the first such myths in the modern age. Another such myth, one with much more dire results for the world was the “Stabbed in the Back” myth of Imperial Germanys loss in World War One. An it is this kind of dire effects of Lost Side Myths I wish to talk about here.

In the past few weeks since the election on Nov 3rd the myth of the “Stolen Election” has arisen among the MAGA supporters of Donald J Trump. Like the myth of the “Stab in the Back”, this new myth is the deliberate creation of just a few people being foisted off on unsuspecting people. It is meant only to let the leaders of MAGA keep the power they crave. It is to keep their followers from putting the responsibility of the loss where it belongs. On the leaders themselves. On the action these leaders not only let happen but actively encouraged. They are doing this out of fear of their own base and the anger this base feels.

And this fear they feel is quite justified. It is real and they know it is real. They know this because they have been stoking this anger for over twenty years. They are now faced with giving the base someone or something to blame for the backlash of the voters at Donald J. Trump in 2020. And what is good about the myth of the “Stolen Election” is no actual proof is needed other than the loss. All they need do is spin conspiracy theories and when nothing is found say “See, that is just how nefarious the ‘liberals/socialists’ really are”. I can hear you saying “But that is not ‘Logical/Reasonable.’” Your right it is neither reasonable nor logical, but it is the way think.

On Wednesday, 6 January 2021, in the Nation’s capital we saw just how far the leadership and would-be leadership of the Republican are willing to go. Not only did they attempt to challenge the electoral collage votes of two states, Arizona and Pennsylvania, they did this second ((challenge)), Pennsylvania, after an Insurrectionist Mob was sent by President Trump to take and hold the nation’s capital. After the mob broke into both the House and Senate chambers howling for blood. After the mob attempted to take both V.P. and the Speaker prisoners while calling for the hanging of the V.P. They, the Republicans still objected to the Pennsylvanian E.C. Votes. What has been for over a hundred years a boring pro forma action of the Congress was turn into a horrible moment of American history.

We must remember that Donald John Trump is just a symptom of the what is wrong in this country. Getting rid of him must just be the start. We must dig deep and identify what is wrong and we must develop ways to clean up the mess. We must take a long hard look at ‘Social Media’ and figure out just what went wrong and why. We must look at our police and discover just what is going on and what to do about. We must have a thorough house cleaning of our political system to rein in all of the uncontrolled use of false facts and then call them ‘Alt-True’. True/False is a binary state and facts can only be True, False or Un-proven. We must be ready willing and able to recognize and call out willful false states as lies. Only in this can we stop the Myth of the Stolen Election. Only this way can we save out Democracy.

The Death-throws of the Republican Party

Philosophy, Politics, ,
Dead GOP
The Dead Elephant

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there will not be a political party known as the Republicans. Not at all. What I’m saying is the political party we know as the Republican Party will be no more. It will go the way of the Federalists, the Wigs, and the Know Nothings to name just a few. What do these all have in common? They all have gone the way for good.

No to say the political ideals the stood for, an fought for have all gone away. In some cases, like the Federalists, many of their ideal the stood for have become totally institutionalized in the American political landscape. Something every American takes as a given and is proud of. In other cases like the Know Nothings, while their ideals also became a part of the American Political landscape they are not something we can take pride in. But in all cases’ the political movements these parties represented have faded away in history. And this is what is facing the Republican Party from Lincoln to Eisenhower.

From the late 1960’s the the Republican Party has been an ill advised wedding of the Economic Conservatives and the Social Conservatives. On the surface it would look like a match made in heaven. But it was not. All too often Social Conservatives were not Economic Conservative votives and Economic Conservative were not Social Conservatives. All they agreed upon was their knee jerk reaction to the label ‘Liberal’. They were told by their leaders that “liberals’ were a monolithic block. If you were ‘liberal’ on economics you had to be ‘liberal’ on social issues too. An for many years this worked. Thru the Regan/Bush administrations the Economic Conservatives could depend on the whole ‘conservative’ base to vote Republican. An this base grew.

But not only did it grow, it ossified. At the turn of the century the base became more and more under the control of the leaders of the Social Conservatives. They gave bear the to the ‘Religious Right’. People who said ’No need to think or examine critically, just ‘Believe’ us and you will be in the right. When the leaders of the Republicans saw how well this worked with the ‘Religious Right’ they took it one step further and told all their followers “Accept what we tell you. The ‘Liberals’ are lying to you. Don’t accept all that scientific mumbo-jumbo they spout, it will just confuse you”. An when they did, the base did exactly what it’s leaders wanted. It ossified into a sold base that would do what the leaders wanted, in mass. Unfortunately it had one or two faults.

The first fault to be seen was that it was unruly. It wanted to think it was choosing it’s leaders. An so the “Tea Party” movement was born. Followed quickly by the Freedom Caucus in the House of Representatives. The next fault happened in the Republican leadership. They became committed to “winning”. They accepted the old half-time idea that “Wining isn’t everything. It is the only Thing!” That power, and the un-restrained use of power became their only political principle. This meant that if the leaders wanted to keep their power they had to lead where ever the monolithic base decided to go.

An that leaders us to the age of Donald John Trump. A man who had spent his entire adult life selling the same people who made up the Republican Base and many of the Republican Leadership ‘Snake-Oil’. In 2015/16 he saw that the Democratic Party was going to make one of the biggest mistakes in it’s long history. Maybe as big, if not bigger, as the mistake(s) it made in 1860. They were going to nominate someone who was either personally distrusted or not like by lots of the electorate and someone who could and would motivate many of the undecided away from the Democratic Party. Hillary Clinton. In 2016 there were very few people who had not heard of her and did not have an opinion of her. It was the perfect time for someone who had great name recognition but almost no-one really knew. So Donald J. Trump jumped in and won.

He not only won the nomination, he, against everything, won the election. Not that he really either want’ed the job or knew what to do with it once he had it. An along the way he convinced the Republican Base that they were no longer the Republican Base, they were the Trump Base. That only he knew, truly, what they wanted. That only he knew how to get it for them. That anyone, anywhere, who attacked him was attacking them. He started with the ‘Deplorables’ and moved on from there. An the Republican leadership quaked in their boots every time he roared and his crowds roared back.

An so here we are, 2020. They year that everything started to come apart. The election is over and it is looking more and more likely that Joe Biden has won. But while it is totally understandable that Pres. Trump can not bring himself to accept the lost, it it not so understandable why the Republican leadership is following his lead. We will have to wait and see after the Senate run-offs in Georgia to see if they will follow Donald J. Trump down the rabbit hole. Only time will tell us that.

Go an Vote

Politics,
Some Good Advice

Well it is that time once more, tomorrow, Nov 3rd, is Election Day. I hope that like me you have already voted but if you haven’t….Please go and Vote tomorrow.

While in this election I can not say I don’t care who you vote for, I do, I feel it is even more important that everyone who can, goes and vote. This is because I feel this is the most important election I’ve ever participated in. This election, more than any other, is for the good of the nation. It is for the Soul of the nation. It is about just what kind of Nation we will be in times to come.

There are a great many forces out there that are doing their best to destroy everything this Nation aspires to be. I don’t need to tell you who these forces are, we have been seeing them at work for the last four years. They want you to think your vote doesn’t mater. That even if you do vote it won’t be counted. That even if it is counted it will be ignored. They LIE.

Yes, there will be some places and people that are doing their upmost to keep people from voting. To keep votes from being counted or hundreds of other things to put a wrench in the process’ of democracy. So VOTE. An more than that watch what happens in the days and week to come. To quote an early American Patriot “Now is the time for all good men to come to the ad of their Country!”