When the history of the Republican Party is written, historians will probably regard Jan. 6, 2015, as the last chance the Republican Party had of saving itself.
The re-election that day of John Boehner as House speaker was a shocking event. The shock was not that he won. Most people expected that. Mr. Boehner was the speaker when the Republicans took their largest majority in 80 years. Yet, 10 percent of his caucus voted against him on Tuesday. Nancy Pelosi had a number of Democrats vote against her after the 2010 election but her party lost the majority.
Mr. Boehner’s re-election signals the end of a 50-year civil war in the Republican Party. The war has gone on since 1964 and the presidential campaign of Barry Goldwater. The conservatives had a few notable victories. But now the war is over and the establishment won.
Mr. Boehner’s House victory opens the door for his vision of the next two years. That vision will destroy the Republican Party.
First up is amnesty. Mr. Boehner has ranted about Barack Obama’s executive amnesty. Mr. Boehner’s problem is not with the amnesty but that Mr. Obama did it unilaterally. Mr. Boehner has promoted amnesty in the past. He even has made the ludicrous claim that amnesty will help the economy.
Amnesty will destroy the economy and the middle class. It will depress wages, and the welfare costs for illegals will skyrocket. With labor force participation at a record low and the number of employed Americans the same as it was in 1978, the American worker is in trouble. Mr. Boehner’s amnesty will only make this worse.
Another one of Mr. Boehner’s major goals is free trade. Free trade is in theory a great idea. Free trade is what we have between the 50 states and that works great. Unfortunately, Mr. Boehner wants another free trade agreement. These are not free trade agreements. They are special interest trade agreements. Mr. Boehner wants to give the president extra-constitutional authority to negotiate the Trans Pacific Partnership treaty.
Mr. Obama is either the most incompetent negotiator in the world or he is negotiating international agreements with the intention of hurting America. Either way, no sane person would grant him additional power.
But Mr. Boehner is the congressman from the Chamber of Commerce. He could care less what real Americans think. His only interest is in the bidding of the lobbyists and big corporate interests.
It is sad to say, real Americans no longer have a political party representing them in Washington. The Democrats are the party of the radical left wing that hates America and the party of big business cronyism. Contrary to the myth, the Democrats and other left wing groups are the primary beneficiaries of donations from big corporations and billionaires.
The Republicans are just the party of the Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber does not care about the middle class or creating competition that makes the free market work. The Chamber does not care about a flourishing middle class. All it cares about is shrinking the cost of payroll (the largest single expense for any company) and using government to ensure that some new competitor cannot come in with a better product.
If the Republican Party isn’t going to stand for freedom and liberty, what good is it? If the Republican Party is just going to be the other party of big government, what good is it? If the Republican Party is going to be the Democrats’ partner in national suicide, why should any real American support the GOP?
One-hundred-sixty years ago, America saw the death of a political party, the Whigs. Now, with the establishment firmly in control of the Republican Party, we may soon see the death of another political party.
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