We commonly regard our politicians as charlatans and betrayers of our trust. Indeed, I have indulged my feelings about Boehner and McConnell quite stridently. But let's think about politicians in a different light, not as our paladins entrusted by us to do battle on our behalf but as salesmen in the business of selling politics.
Many salesmen do not care whether they are selling mutual funds or motorcars, they want to rack up sales. So it is with many politicians, especially those labeling themselves Republicans, they are not out so much to change the world as to sell it whatever is in inventory. Democrats are heathens who have substituted politics for religion and as converts, they are true believers. Rank-and-file Republicans, although fewer than before, still hold to their faith and do not regard politics as the true Jerusalem. Elected Republicans do not share the honest faith of the base but are at best Christians of convenience and at worst rank opportunists. In political battles, atheist Democrats start with a great advantage, they believe they are playing the only game that matters. Elected Republicans believe Democrats are right but they dare not say so, hence, they play a different game, a double game. For them the game is to play the base.
Some time ago I submitted the following reply at a time when Rino Republicans were abandoning the president on declaring an emergency divert funds to build the wall. Today's argument is about a different wall, a tariff wall to force Mexico to honestly police the border. The game is the same, the players are the same who are playing the same game.
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Conservatives blame Rinos in the Senate who overtly and covertly undermine and openly desert the president on shutting down the government to build the wall. They abandon him when he declares an emergency to build the wall. Peel off this layer of the onion, why are these senators behaving like classic Rinos? The answer is deeper than the obvious, they are behaving like Rinos because they, of course, are in fact Rinos, but why so?
Why do these senators regard it to be in the best interests of the country and more likely in their own best interests to be seen opposing the president? Why do many of them feel that they must soon openly oppose the president publicly in his fight for the wall? Why are so many Republican Senators silent day after day as Mueller's investigation is exposed?
Put yourself in the shoes of an elected Republican official and ask yourself, what are the countervailing forces to which I must respond as a politician? Where does my survival lie? If I sustain the president in his fight, who will be for me, who will be against me and who must I fear the most? This elected official, let us say a Senator, hears from his base, he looks up and down the census tables at the demographics of the state, he surveys the donor lists which financially sustain him in his upcoming campaign, he considers the institutions which will react favorably or unfavorably and reluctantly goes public as and when he is forced to. Put another way, the Republican politician asks himself what will sustain me if I behave as a conservative and what will sustain me if I behave as a Rino?
So this politician looks at the landscape. He considers the base and it is clear that the base of Republicans is at best split. Most want a wall but most want the music to keep on playing. In other words, they want a wall but they do not want to pay a political cost [tariffs] to get it. The Senator knows that his base is divided between committed conservatives, opportunists, special interests, and many sunshine Republicans. He reasonably concludes that there is no special pain or gain to be had either way to conclusively drive a decision to support or not to support.
The politician considers the demographics. Of course, this survey varies with the peculiar geography of his state but more and more demographics to a politician mean race, age or gender. As America turns from white to brown, this politician must be mindful of the risk that he will offend voters of color in supporting a wall. If he considers the age of his constituents, he knows that those most consistently in support of a wall are dying off and those who are young, while not consistent voters, are consistently against anything, such as a wall, which even smacks of racism. He knows their numbers are swelling rather than dying off. The Politician looks at gender and concludes that the Republican message is being rejected by women, especially by single women and the trend is worsening by the election cycle. We white male conservatives would do well to take a look at women's magazines especially those aimed at teenage girls in order to understand why it is we are losing the women's vote.
Women do not want the government shutdown, they do not clearly favor a wall, they certainly do not want to see children ripped from their mothers’ breasts. Many take their opinion from magazines which ostensibly deal with fashions and cosmetics but who are actually pious pornographers and political pornographers at that.
Next, our politician turns his attention to his donor list. The first name on that list is Mitch McConnell because McConnell, like Pelosi, holds his power because he is a fount of money at election time. McConnell has demonstrated in the last few cycles that he can make or break a Senator with few exceptions, such as Ted Cruz' insurgency in the Texas senator's initial campaign. We have seen the ruthless power of Mitch McConnell and it has not been exercised on behalf of conservatism or on behalf of those candidates who might conceivably be conservative if they gain the Senate. To the contrary, time and again we have seen Mitch McConnell use his financial clout to advance Rinos who will not challenge his power. If the politician considers other sources of money, he sees a diffuse electorate in favor of the wall and a phalanx of special interests who want cheap labor. For most senators, if the issue is to be decided on the matter of money alone, it is a no-brainer.
Finally, a Senator looks at the institutions which shape our culture and mold our opinion. If he is a conservative he is looking at a bleak desert. He considers the media and finds that he is confronted with very few exceptions in his home state by nothing but enemies. The State newspapers, the local television stations, the local radio stations and newscasts are all blatantly leftist. He must rely on national and local talk radio and some social media but otherwise the media climate is utterly hostile to conservatism.
He considers the role of opinion makers other than the media such as universities and concludes that if he presents himself as a conspicuous conservative the university culture in his state will isolate and humiliate him. He notes that the universities are becoming demographically significant tumors of liberalism in conservative states. He also notes that the reason the youngsters are opposing every conservative initiative, especially the wall, is because they have emerged from our institutions of learning fully indoctrinated.
What about the churches, he asks? Catholic or Protestant, these institutions have been subverted by the left. The open attack against Christianity has not, for the most part, caused these institutions to fight back against their leftist tormentors, rather they sacrifice their doctrine and their faith to ever more ignominious appeasements. Why should the politician go for the wall when the church will not go to the wall for him? The Catholic Church is under assault, the National Council of Churches has been fully subverted; explicitly fundamentalist faith is the subject of incessant public humiliation. There is no longer a real Christian base for conservatives that can carry the day. What about the institutions of business, are they not inherently conservative by nature? Not today. Once the left succeeds in hanging the label of a racist on any policy position they do not favor, businesses have no viable option but to play along.
So the treacherous Rino Senator, or House Representative in the mold of Paul Ryan, may be less than noble but he is fully rational. We fulminate because these people will not act against their own perceived best interest. We should be angry at ourselves for it is we who have debased our culture and left our politics to be dominated by those who immorally control the culture.
Archimedes said, give me a lever long enough and a place to stand and I will move the world. Leftists know how to move the levers which control our culture. In fact, they are so good at manipulating the culture they actually get us to pay for their manipulations.
Why do we sustain National Public Radio and National Public Television? Why in the last so-called "budget" did Planned Parenthood receive a quarter of a billion dollars from you the taxpayer? Why are we so lavishly funding global warming alarmists? We actually pay for everything we hate, we pay to call evil good and we pay to lose elections, we pay to kill babies.
Leftist control of the culture has become so invasive that the governor of the state of New York can actually safely celebrate the murder of babies in the womb seconds away from natural and healthy birth by ordering the Empire State building to be illuminated in pink light. Recall that Ted Kennedy's despicable indictment of Judge Bork was not that abortion was a positive good but that Judge Bork's opposition to abortion would lead to back-alley abortions. In Bill Clinton’s day abortions were supposed to be “rare.” Today, the governor of New York is telling us that abortion is a moral good to be flamboyantly celebrated. This far have we fallen.
Politics is downstream from culture. Yes, the president is very much alone but America will not be made great again from these skirmishes along the Potomac, the whole American moral idea must be conserved against a virulent invasive leftist culture.
