TL;DR: i left the republican party when they moved away from core conservative principles, chasing voters using short-term populist movements and pandering to large voting blocs. today's gop is now focused on short-term charlatanism, and have forgotten their duty to sustain america for future generations. a friend of mine ran for senate from pennsylvania, and most of the article below is my amazon review of a autobiographical book he wrote, ostensibly so that his prospective constituents knew more about who they would be considering to vote for. the content in the review captures to a great deal my view on the republican party at large.
the irony is, that just like a right-wing click bait article, the title doesn't quite match this article itself. in the daily tsunami of available content input, most of these articles are counting on you only reading the title and drawing the conclusion that they want you to come to, in a way that makes you think it was your idea.
but let's get back to it:
1. in short, idealistically, i actually don't believe i left the republicans.
2. i'm quite sure they left me, however.
an old college friend of mine, and fellow army officer, wrote a book a few years back. sort of an autobiography. he'd made a full career out of his natural ability to lead, retiring a few years ago as a full colonel, paratrooper, ranger, infantryman.
as a person, he's naturally idealistic when it comes to understanding what america is, what it has been, and what it can be, which is most probably why he chose a life of public service, to grab the wagon himself and pull it. that's what the meaning of life is to him, it seems. we are all wired a certainly way. john is wired that way.
upon leaving the army, he went back home to pennsylvania and decided to run for US senate as a republican. he was in a small yet formidable field during primary season, and there in his first "at-bat", he found a machine larger than he'd expected, that required a lot of compromise of values and ethical trade-offs to gain and maintain any traction. he was uniquely suited to help change representative democracy back to its original intent. he was however met with a system, that from all angles was not interested in changing.
as for his book. i happen to believe that anyone running for public office, owes their potential constituents a deep look into who they are as a person, in order to give the public the best chance to make an informed decision about who they select to represent them. and in that, john did a great job.
i recently reached out to him through social media to say hi, long lost buds, and in catching up, he asked if i'd read the book and write an amazon review, which is what i'm thinking he was doing with just about anyone he knew. great idea.
so i read the book and while it was cool catching up with what he'd been up to these past few decades, i struggled with the prospect of writing a review given its theme. it's clear this book was for supporting his run as a republican, and i found along the way i was disagreeing with a lot of the points he was making. long story short, i found a way, by coming to grips myself with sussing out the differences between my values, and those espoused by the current platform of the major political parties. once i shook that out, then writing the review became easy. despite our political difference, i actually believe john has the right ideas, and the courage to push through whatever resistance he might meet along the way.
but also in doing so, i shook out my own thoughts for how it was i grew up as a conservative but then later became a liberal. i also shook out how the political parties who self-describe as one or the other actually do a bad job at ensuring their actions match their words.
at any rate, i'll stop there and share this with you. it's the review i wrote for amazon. it's REALLY LONG, so much so that i doubt anyone will read it, but even doing a quick skim, some of the ideas pop out. additionally, even though what i wrote below is in the context of reviewing a book, it gives one tiny slice of a view into my own personal politics, and what i as one citizen believe is best for america, and today's republican party is too toxic to be it. it touches on a few reasons why i don't see eye-to-eye with the gop anymore. there are a lot more reasons than these below, but here are a few:
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Two disclaimers:
1) I had the honor and professional privilege to serve with Colonel Vernon during the earliest phase of our military careers, when we were both still young infantry platoon leaders way back in the day. I'm here to personally testify that there was no tougher young warrior than he. And no better teacher, leader, and guide. There was no one better at understanding the broad concept of freedom and democracy for millions of Americans across generations, and distilling that down, scaling it all the way down into the small unit tactics needed to perform tasks, individual and collective, to standard. These missions formed the lowest and smallest building blocks of defending freedom and democracy of our nation. There was something about this guy, even way back then, that convinced all of us, all of his peers, that he was operating at a different level than the rest of us. He was different. He was on a mission, and he was a natural inspirational leader who kept everyone around him focused and operating at their peak.
but...
2) As a life-long, iron-clad, and proud card-carrying American Liberal, my political views couldn't be further than John's. Following his Twitter feed the past few years, it has, on frequent occasion, been very easy for me to shake my head and wonder how it is anyone could buy into this crap that the GOP machine has been feeding the American people, let alone repeat and perpetuate it. It's been a criminal disgrace how many in the Republican party (not John though, I’m getting to that) has weaponized patriotism against the working class to the benefit of the those who pay for the laws that bend the playing field further in their direction, widening the gap between the smaller and wealthier upper class, shrinking the middle class, and increasing the size of the lower classes from which their even increasing wealth can be pulled. When I live in a world where someone working in the financial sector who uses hedge funds, bad debt bundling, and the gambling of derivatives to parasitically drain millions from hard working people and the economy as a whole, into their pockets, serves more jail time than the 25 year felony incarceration someone caught three times selling a few baggies of weed gets, then maybe I'll consider the righteousness of what the GOP has to offer. Until then, the GOP is the party of parasites, with a long list of inconsistent and self-conflicting views, and the party of manipulating the masses for profit.
That said...
Here's the difference though. Even as a liberal, I do believe that some of the *idealism* behind conservatism is one that I actually believe most if not all Americans share, including liberals. The way it claims to strive for smaller government, less restrictions, and thus giving inspiration, innovation, and sustained effort the most fertile ground and best chance for anyone to pursue the passion, and work to succeed. The way it claims that the best role of government is to build infrastructure, provide defense, and ensure a level playing field for all to work toward their dreams, else get out of the way.
The crime here though is that these are noble ideals that the GOP parrots in order to game the system and trick good people into giving them the votes they need, while the politicians who rise to power gaming this system have no intention of making governing decisions that are based on those honorable principles. My lack of faith in the conservative movement and the GOP in particular is not one of philosophy, rather my contempt in the GOP is due to their actual track record, their actual applied governance, their failed implementation, and their weaponization of patriotism against its own people.
When I read the early chapters that show quite clearly where John's conservative values came from, and how his faith served as the soil from which all his success in life grows, it's inspiring to experience thru John's stories that he actually gets it. He actually has ideas that he can use to represent us. That is, if his message can get out.
The imminent death of the our fathers' GOP was self-inflicted. The strongest and most significant grass roots movement of the past 40 years has been the Tea Party. What offends me as an American is that the GOP cared nothing about the beliefs and frustrations of these people. Just like a big tech company gobbling up smaller startups, the GOP didn't care about the IP, they saw value solely in the size of the subscriber base. And they saw in the Tea Party a semi-unified mass they could feed, control, and profit from. The problem they didn't see was that the ideas that drove these people to action, overtook the party like pervasive weeds. Their ideas were so strong that not only could they not be ignored, they could not be tamed. Granted, if you read the signs and banners they waved, they weren't all that good at spelling or grammar, and they often didn't examine social problems more than one or two steps beyond their own self interest ("cut government but don't touch my medicare”).
In 2016 the GOP presidential candidate field contained a dozen experienced competent public servants and accomplished elected officials, and toxic populist Donald Trump. The decision to cater to, use, then screw over the Tea Party finally came home to roost in 2016. We ended up with King Tea Party. All bluster, no principles, no integrity, and no ability to lead. In this current president, morals, ethics, and rule of law are out--loyalty and winning are in. If it benefits him, it's right, if it turns out to work against him, it's wrong. Russian influence on our election system is not wrong because it was influence from outside our borders, rather, it is ok with Trump solely because he won. If you check Trump's tweets from most of 2016, he was the most vocal critic of the Electoral College system until it elected him. He was cheerleader #1 in the call for a special prosecutor for Hillary Clinton, until he won and then told the crowd "we won, so we don't care about that anymore, right?" Even most of the Republicans in office at all levels of government have conflict positions with the president, but they use logical gymnastics to support him, since regardless of how much damage he does, at least it's not Hillary.
John reflected on his journey toward serving as a US Senator representing the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, it was quite disheartening to realize that the GOP machine is so much bigger and stronger (and different) than the principles it espouses. If the GOP really did believe what it was selling to the American people since the days of Reagan, then accepting Colonel Vernon's offer to serve and represent the people of Pennsylvania would be an absolute no-brainer. As for the ideals that drive him, what makes John different from other Republicans is that he actually conducts business and gets things done according to those principles. Most of the rest of the GOP parrot those principles verbally, but then their actions don’t match them at best, and are purely self-serving at worst.
I have faith in Colonel Vernon. He is an idealist who, given the chance to serve the American people in our national legislature would be a beacon of hope, and inspirational example of what we can collectively do to ensure our representatives have the best tools for continuing this American Experiment decades, and dare I say centuries into the future. As a career Army officer, the connection between what he says and what he does is absolute. We need more politicians who lead in that manner. Given today's crop of manipulators, it would certainly be refreshing.
Other than wearing his faith on his sleeve by including angels in the title, I agree with John 100% that those who desire to represent us in our government of the people should at a minimum write a book. Not only does it show that he can articulate ideas in writing, but mostly it allows the people being represented a bold transparent view into what makes them tick. Before pulling the lever for someone, the candidate should give you an honest look at who they are and what they're made out of, in order to gain confidence in knowing how they are going to serve and lead.
It's a great book. I hope John revives his political aspirations. Our country needs more honorable public servants with the will to continue the American experiment as the founders intended.
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