David Brooks, the moderate Republican columnist for the New York Times, has created quite a buzz online by suggesting in today’s columnthat the more centrist elements of the Republican Party should break away and essentially create a second GOP.
Brooks argues that the current GOP is essentially a Southern and Western party that still hasn’t learned the lessons of the November election and shows few signs of changing. The rural Republicans are set in their ways, with anti-government sentiments down to their core, and a “pick yourself up by your own bootstraps” mentality that cannot be shaken.
The GOP is floundering, according to Brooks, because they haven’t proposed plans that deal with globalization and technology and growing income disparities.
“While losing the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections, the flaws of this mentality have become apparent,” Brooks wrote. “First, if opposing government is your primary objective, it’s hard to have a positive governing program.”
The columnist views the GOP divide in geographical terms:
“It’s probably futile to try to change current Republicans. It’s smarter to build a new wing of the Republican Party, one that can compete in the Northeast, the mid-Atlantic states, in the upper Midwest and along the West Coast. It’s smarter to build a new division that is different the way the Westin is different than the Sheraton.
“The second G.O.P. would tackle both problems at once. It would be filled with people who recoiled at President Obama’s second Inaugural Address because of its excessive faith in centralized power, but who don’t share the absolute anti-government story of the current GOP.”
0 comments:
Post a Comment