By Douglas V. Gibbs
A listener of my Constitution Radio with Douglas V. Gibbs program on AM Radio has been constantly asking me by email if I have taken an oath to the GOP. The question is loaded, for if I say "Yes," then I am a traitor to my constitutional values because the Republican Party has long since swayed from those principles. If I say, "No," then I am a liar because of my willingness to argue that there are republicans worth a darn out there, or that the GOP has not completely gone somewhere out there in the wilds of Wonderland.
He uses my illustration in his question that we are on a raft on the Niagra River, and in the distance we can hear the roar of Niagra Falls. As we float closer to destruction, there is some idiot with big ears, and a colorful "O" arm band, at the head of the boat yelling, "Do you hear that? That's hope and change you hear!"
You and I know the roar of the falls is our destruction, and in the distance is a sign. The sign says, "The point of no return."
No matter how good of a swimmer you are, or how good of a rower you are, once past that sign, the current will be too strong to stop us from going over the great descent into destruction.
The sign is getting closer, and it is time for us to all grab our oars and start rowing. But even if we stop the boat and get it to start moving in the opposite direction, we can't stop rowing, because the current will still send us back towards the falls. We must never stop the work.
The email'r argues that we passed the point of no return long ago, and the GOP is part of the reason. The Republican Party, itself, he argues, is way past the point of no return. The very existence of the two-party system is the problem, he contends.
I believed the American People had seen enough of the idiot at the front of the raft, and believed that Romney would win the 2012 election. I was wrong, because as Hari Seldon did not see the "Mule" coming in Asimov's Foundation series, I did not see coming the fraud and incredible "get out the vote" effort by the Obama team. Romney lost, I was wrong in my prediction, and now we have another four years of Barack Obama, and his efforts to destroy the nation as it was founded.
The listener/reader wrote, "We can never change what we refuse to confront."
He believes I am refusing to confront that the GOP is useless, and now in the hands of the liberal left. If anything, he thinks the Republican Party has become a greater threat to our freedoms than even the Democrats.
I wrote to him that the question on regarding if I have taken an oath to the Republican Party is a ridiculous question, and if answered opens up an opportunity for a barrage of questions and accusations that rely on a false premise. You seem to adhere to an absolute idea that either you are with the Republican Party, or you are not. A "for or against me" kind of position. I recognize the failings of the GOP, and realize that it has been infiltrated by the left in ways that may be irreparable. I am not "about" a party as much as I am about the Constitution, and I recognize that the two-party system is one of the sources of our problems. A central government is the source of our problem as well, and all tyranny rises from the concept of a central government, but does that mean then to fix the problem we must eliminate the existence of a central government and rely on either the union being held together by a confederacy as under the Articles of Confederation, or that we should eliminate any idea of a central system and leave the States to fend completely for themselves?
The two-party system would spell the end of America, stated John Adams, and Madison stated that men are not angels so we need government, but it is a necessary evil that is prone to tyranny. So how do we fix a problem when the problems are rooted in things that we need to move forward?
The answer is not to eliminate the Republican Party, or the two-party system, but to recognize first of all that we have this system because it is in our nature to have it. All issues have a pro and con. Birds of a feather flock together, these groups organize, leadership develops, and before long, you have a political party, so the elimination of the party system is literally against our human nature. It must exist, so we have to do what is right within the system as it exists. We have to work with what we've got. Will the GOP collapse as did the Whigs, or the Federalists? Ultimately, yes. The Democrat Party will someday be no more than a footnote in history as well. The truth of history indicates so.
As a constitutional republican system, we are in a period of catastrophic failure, but the reason for the failure is not the Constitution, or our system, but the very fact that we have refused to adhere to the principles that have gone into that system, as well as realize that it was given to us by God. Our refusal to be a virtuous nation is more at the heart of the problem than is the existence of a central government, or a two-party system.
You can accept that, or not. I believe I have provided a very logical argument, but to you it may be as illogical as can be. At my last Constitution Class I argued about marriage being a State issue as per the Constitution, and how I think government should not be involved in the matter in any way, shape or form. Of the over twenty people in the room, two disagreed. That is the beauty of America. We can disagree, but the fact that people are disagreeing with us, and are doing what they can to move America in a direction it shouldn't be going is not the fault of the system, or the fault of the two-party fiasco, but the fault of the fact that we have become a nation that has lost its way when it comes to our virtues.
As John Adams put it, "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
Adams wasn't saying that you have to be a Christian, or a religious sort, for the Constitution to work, but that we need to be a people of principles, of moral standards, and a people willing to recognize the realities that face us everyday and respond to them in a virtuous manner.
No, I have not made an oath to the GOP, but that does not mean I believe it is a useless shell. The Republican Party is in bad shape, the progressives have all but destroyed the platform of the party, and if the politicians in the party continue to moderate as they have been the political base of the party, largely made up of Christians, will walk away. Until then, the Grand Ol' Party is the major party I more closely identify with, and it is the one of the two that is the more likely to be turned around. Until the day comes that it collapses, and a new conservative party, or a party based on the founding of this nation, rises up, I will be a registered Republican.
I am not a Republican, but I am registered as one because it is the one more likely to be saved.
Of course there are problems in the party. We are individuals, and as individuals a myriad of battles are in play because as individuals we refuse to force ourselves into a collective, as the Democrats propose, and instead we think for ourselves. But, in the end, if we have no vessel, we are simply lone voices in an empty forest, and whether they are worthy of my attention, or not, the GOP at least provides a vessel for me to fight the good fight.
The problem isn't the GOP as much as it is the fact that the people in the GOP are unwilling to cling to the original principles of the platform. Instead, they fall for, and quake in fear under the onslaught of, the propaganda of the left. Therefore, the war is one of information, and it is my goal to educate as many about the truth as possible.
After all, I would rather fight on my feet, than live on my knees.
Douglas V. Gibbs
-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
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