Somebody Needs a Spanking

This blog post originally ran in December, 2012.  The only correction needed is that the Democratic popular vote margin in last year's Congressional elections was closer to 1.5million.  Without gerrymandering, there would be no Republican majority - and no shutdown.

I was a little kid during the Eisenhower administration, when men were men and Republicans were rational.  Like most little kids, I spent a few years trying to get my way about everything - employing various age-old tactics in the process.

Among the tactics I quickly abandoned was the tantrum.  If confined in an uncongenial atmosphere, such as church, I would begin wriggling and squirming and - if my parents attempted to restrain me - I'd start getting vocal about it.

At which point my Dad would generally yank me up, march me outside, and administer ten or twelve ungentle swats to my bottom.  This didn't usually have the immediate result of quieting me, but it removed me from the scene where I was causing embarrassment - and after a few swats, the tears would come, and I'd be reduced to blubbering for a bit.

On the whole, the treatment was pretty effective.  Dad was anything but brutal.  I think, for him it really was a question of, "This will hurt me more than it hurts you!" -- though he was never so silly as to say anything like that.  Dad's spankings were rare, but they were effective, because they were deserved.  And I quickly learned that the consequence of being  a pain in the butt, was getting a pain in my butt.

I've never raised children, but I know things have changed since those long-ago days.  About the time TV turned from black-and-white to color, spankings started going out of style.  All sorts of new tactics have become fashionable - some effective, some, I suspect, pretty silly.  The pendulum has swung, as pendulums will, from one extreme to the other.

If I had to guess, we'll eventually come back to the spanking, on a much more infrequent basis, based solidly in good research.  After all, it can - properly and appropriately administered - be quite effective.  It certainly worked for me. 

I was a restless kid, easily bored.  Today, I'd probably have been labelled ADHD and given medication.  But all it really took was a couple of spankings to persuade me to sit still and keep quiet.  During my first few years of school, where I was not spanked, I continued to be a nuisance when bored - which was most of the time.  At my school, my first few teachers solved the problem by sending me to the library - which rewarded my misconduct.

With my parents, I quickly became tractable. 

The certainty of a spanking is probably why I skipped the "hold my breath 'til I turn blue" phase of rebellion.  It's almost impossible to protest properly while holding one's breath, so - as far as I can remember - I never tried this tactic.

Which is another reason why I would not make a very good latter-day Republican. 

We live in the era of the tantrum as political tactic.  It shows up at both ends of the spectrum, but Republicans of the "tea party" variety have made it their specialty.  Here we have a party which - with respect to many key issues - refuses to debate, refuses to compromise, and refuses to accept facts.   

Last night's failure of Speaker  Boehner's rather pathetic "Plan B" was merely the latest demonstration of the political tantrum.  Many Republicans - elected to serve the nation in making laws, budgets, and public policy - have come to Congress so freighted with absolute, unconditional demands that they simply can't participate in the legislative process.  All they can do is say "No" and - confronted by their party's rejection at the polls - threaten to hold their breath until they turn blue.

And I do mean "rejection at the polls".  The new House of Representatives will still have a Republican majority - much reduced - but only because of gerrymandering.  Last time I looked, the popular vote for Congress, nationwide, gave the Democrats an edge of about half-a-million votes.

But that won't stop the Republicans' extreme right.  In office, they will prefer the tantrum to the hard work of government. 

They will oppose any tax increase, because they signed a pledge to Grover Norquist.  (Never mind that they also took an oath to all of us to "well and faithfully discharge the duties" of a Member of Congress, though those duties certainly include making the sorts of compromise which make legislation possible.)

Many of them will oppose any legislation to control the availability of military-style weapons and large-capacity magazines in a nation increasingly terrorized by deranged killers.

Most will continue to oppose any improvements to, or extensions of, Obamacare.

And watch this:  Many will even oppose improvements to our nation's lamentable mental health services, even when those services are the only conceivable alternative to weapons restrictions which they also oppose.

But what has logic to do with it?  To be a Republican, today, is to be absolute on so many things that you can only function as an obstacle to progress.  To be a latter-day Republican is to be:

Absolute in opposition to tax increases, or even taxes at their present levels.

Absolute in the conviction that government is "the problem" - if not the enemy.

Absolute on women's control of their own reproductive systems.

Absolute on "Second Amendment rights", as newly defined by a Supreme Court dominated by right-wing Republicans.

Absolute in rejecting the science of global climate change - or even evolution.

Absolute, absolute, absolute - and willing to hold their breath until they - and the rest of us - turn blue.

Please understand - I write this as one who has long since grown disenchanted with the Democratic Party.  It is the servant of too many special-interest groups and a slave to old ideas which no longer work very well.  

It is also too timid, too lacking in force or vision, to lead us into the future.

In writing this critique of the Republican Party, I do so as one whose proper political allegiance once was - in American terms - to the left wing of the Republican Party.

But progressive and liberal Republicans no longer exist, in any meaningful sense.  Those liberals and progressives who still cling to the GOP do themselves, and their country, a grave disservice.

We have long needed a third party which occupies the space once occupied by the liberal-progressive branch of Republicanism.  We need it now, more than ever.

Meanwhile, we can only deal with a minority party which prefers tantrum to governing - and a majority party which refuses to take them out behind the Capitol and give them a good spanking.