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Memories of the 28th Century

Deaths of Two Parties

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Back in 2013 I started writing about the demise of the major political parties in the U.S.A., and it is taking a long time for them to get with the program, but it appears that we are approaching the end. W and the tea party fatally wounded the Republican Party, so much so that they nominated Trump and even got him elected. The final coup de grace will take place in the Fall election. The real problem will not be Trump’s defeat, but the attempt to put the party back together together with the attempts to put the economy back together.

The Democrat Party lost its old collection of groups years ago, but it continued to roll along even after Reagan stole many constituents. Obamacare failed, but most people didn’t figure that out, and the Dems continued handing out money as fast as they could. The lack of a cohesive center and the perception that the Dems give away money will finish it off, especially with the assistance of antifa and the Black Lives Matter people. While Biden will win the presidency, the party will continue to dissolve along with the economy.

But political parties seldom actually die, at least in the U.S.A. It is more common for political parties to dissolve and for the people dissolved to migrate to another party. Considering what has happened to political parties in the U.S. In the last few decades, it is probable that the parties will simply redefine themselves. Remember that just a little over a hundred years ago, the Progressives were a branch of the Republican party, and the Democrats were still that party of business, and that didn't change until the 1960's and '70's, and the former party of Lincoln became the party of someone who was pre-Alzheimer's and had some friends who wanted to plunder the government for their own benefits, and that's what the Republican party has remained since then, the party of plunderers.

I think that we can expect that the reformed Republicans will continue to be the party of plunderers, but they may try a new twist in an attempt who make themselves seem less like bandits. They may start calling themselves the Party of Lincoln again. Even into the 1980's, there were Black people who identified themselves with the Republicans, simply because it was the party of Lincoln. There still are people who were among those Republicans, and there are even more children of such people. Another potential piece are those who know that in the 1920's, the Republicans were the party of serious business people; the '20's were a time when the parties flipped.

As a whole, political parties are simply clubs for people who want to think they are like-minded. They can identify themselves as one thing, and as the membership changes over time, they can identify with the opposite. The question is: what groups can each party assemble into a new party.

The Dems have been cultivating the radical Blacks for decades, but they have not gotten them to join the club in great numbers. On another hand, they have had a lot more success attracting women to the Democrat party. The workers movements that the Dems connected with in the 1930's and later have largely dissolved, along with the rest of the labor movement, and the connection that Hubert Humphrey had with farmers has also dissolved. The agricultural industry has its own goals, and government is not closely involved, except as setting the limits within which that, and other, industries must keep to.

The Reps have been associated with the financial industry for about a hundred years. That has been especially true since the SEC was created during FDR's first term, but the association became more appropriate after Lizzie Warren championed even more regulations on financial products. The regulations were touted as consumer protection, but they haven't protected consumers, just as earlier regulations didn't protect consumers. Banks of all sorts have come to understand that there is an implicit guarantee of salvation, because the boundary between government and the private sector is very porous, with people going back and forth frequently. But the Dems have backed regulation of the financial sector, while the Reps have given lip service to less regulation, so big money favors the Republicans.

The best possible re-alignment of political parties would be for both the Dems and Reps to collapse in laughter at Trump's embarrassment. There would be a radical reappraisal of objectives and two new parties would rise: The Federalist Party and the Anti-Federalist party, but that's just hopeful. The more likely alignments are Federalists and Centrists, with the Federalists favoring the present constitution in which the states have lent some sovereignty to the federal government but retain power of most functions.. The Centrists would favor making the central government supreme, but it would allow the state governments to manage some aspects of government.

There are Centrist and Federalist aspects to both of the present major parties, and I would expect former allies to become enemies in the new alignment, and we have no idea which side might be called which; although traditionally the Dems and Reps have varied in the degree of central government. And we will have to get past Trump before the Republican Party will refine itself.

Another possible alignment would be a division according to the amount of dictatorial power they were willing to accept. And then there is the matter of outlying groups and where they might come down; I am thinking of antifa and some militias. We already know where the Libertarians stand, and the same is true of a few other parties.

There is only one way to know for sure.

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