Back in 1964, then President Lyndon Johnson predicted that his work to pass the Civil Rights legislation would cost the Democrats elections for the next 20 years.
If anything, that wound up being an understatement. Democrats won some elections, yet the trend that was set in 1964 has basically defined American elections ever since. And for the most part, it has not been favorable to Democrats.
Prior to 1964, Democrats had been able to rely upon the support of the "Solid South," which pretty much always had voted Democratic in each election for literally decades. But in the decades since then, the trend has reversed, and the "Solid South" is now pretty much political support that the Republicans can rely upon in election after election.
Well, perhaps Republicans are fearful that the tide might be turning in some very real way. After all, in a straight up national election based on the popular vote, without the Electoral College to bail them out, Republicans would have lost all but one presidential election dating back to 1992. Seriously, look it up. Remember, Bush (Jr) lost at least the popular vote in 2000, and Trump lost the popular vote in both 2016 and 2020, even though he very loudly claims otherwise.
So it is no surprise that they are going to previously unimagined extremes to try and safeguard what still remains as a superficial political dominance. They defend the Electoral College vehemently, even though everyone seems to know that this is an outdated system. Also, they are usually the ones who push hardest for gerrymandering. It also always seems to benefit Republicans when, with no advance notice and for no seemingly obvious reason, access to voting stations are somehow limited or outright closed. And let us not forget that they are playing fast and loose with the whole notion of the right to vote, claiming that, for example, those who went to prison effectively lost their right to vote. To my mind's eye, though, it is the right to vote, and not a privilege that you suddenly lose when it's politically expedient for those in power for you to lose it. And of course, Republicans tend to be far more in favor of huge corporations, and thus, they very often get richly funded as a result, which of course goes a long way in this day and age, when big money is essential to winning important elections.
Recently, Republican Senator (and former presidential candidate) Rand Paul claimed that if TikTok were to be banned, the GOP might just "permanently lose elections for a generation." That might be stretched to include pretty much all of the social media engines where a lot of these conspiracy theories were allowed to thrive. Without that, indeed, either Republicans would have to change their ways - it astonishes me just how inflexible they have been in this regard - or indeed, to keep losing elections and thus, to be relegated to secondary significance, at best.
Just some food for thought. But it seems that, in rather typical fashion, whenever we are presented with tools that could truly change and modify life for the better - like our very advanced, even high end technology that has already changed the world in undeniable ways - you can also bet that other people will do everything possible to ruin it.
Sen. Rand Paul says the GOP would 'permanently lose elections for a generation' if TikTok is banned Story by bmetzger@insider.com (Bryan Metzger) • March 29, 2023:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/sen-rand-paul-says-the-gop-would-permanently-lose-elections-for-a-generation-if-tiktok-is-banned/ar-AA19dNQC?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=b70ae9146ab040909e2b3eb9ed62d57a&ei=12
No comments:
Post a Comment