Can the Republican Party Change?

No longer a party that supports individual rights, it now seeks to impose almost parental power over people, reading their mail, snooping in their bedrooms and implementing radical new forces to keep the great corporations of America growing in power.

After Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Addington, McCain, Palin, McConnell, Stevens, Falwell, Boehner, Gingrich, and others, there's not much left in how it can reasonably hope to achieve anything constructive in today's world. These vengeful angels appear ready to drag down the ship of state if they can't get their own way which means no discussion, no debate, no new ideas and no compromise.

The Republican Party has always been a party of power. Now, with one war in Iraq, another in Afghanistan, and continuing drive-by shootings by American military forces taking place in Sudan, Syria, Pakistan, and maybe elsewhere, the party seems committed to long-term international policies involving pre-emptive political and economic force over other nations - more and more including our traditional allies. War and bombings seem to be always a ready alternative to solve all problems . The rest of the civilized world is trying to veer away from war, and now we wonder if the republicans can live in that kind of world? Will the American Repubiclan Party even allow such a world to develop?

In order to stabilize its quest for power the party has been forced to seek help from other groups. Religion has answered the call and is already moving to take charge. Which religion? Well, that won't be clear for some time. They will call it Christian, but it will be based on power just like the military and economic forces it plans to use. It will know Jesus' wishes and will intend to bring them to the entire planet, again by use of force if necessary.

So the Republican Party which emerges after this election will be "conservative" in political philosophy, but like its religion, that meaning will also require explanation on the part of its leaders. It will clearly attempt to take us back to what the new leaders of this movement think our founding fathers were trying to do when they wrote the constitution.

Economically, the new party will insist on the "Gospel according to Adam Smith". It will be raw capitalism - uncontrolled by any government. If the new economy should ever need governmental help, it will tell the government what to do, and when and how much it needs.

There will be no place left for intellectuals, or any form of "progressive republicans". This new Republican Party will be a construct of the 19th and 20th centuries, and will attempt to establish itself as the rightful leader in a world of military power, economic force and God with a cross, and America will be its supreme ruler, world policeman, inquisitor and punisher.

So now the election. If McCain wins, America will be in for a very long and disastrous period. There will almost certainly be a democratic majority in both the house and senate, and they will feel the call of a mandate for change. McCain and Palin will be firmly rooted in the past as the rest of the United States and the rest of the world move into a new era of international relationships.

If Obama wins there will be new challenges, new opportunities and perhaps a very different world will emerge. Sarah Palin apparently sees herself as the "republican winner" if McCain loses the election. But it seems clear that she will pull a large part of the most fanatical republican base out of the party.