When Loyalty To Common Sense Trumps Loyalty To Party
Last summer, when I left the Republican Party, I did so because I believed it was incapable of change--even in the face of the electoral defeats that led to minority status in the House and Senate. In my book, Against the Tide: How a Compliant Congress Empowered a Reckless President, I wrote that "the Republican base is strong and rallying behind its ramparts. It is kicking out moderates and vowing never to change. It will crawl over broken glass to support the extreme Republican agenda."
Given its history on clean air standards, I expected a deafening silence from the GOP when in my May 16th post I decried the EPA's weakening of rules on building power plants near national parks. In the piece, I called on Republican Senators Alexander, Warner and Gregg, among others, to speak out on behalf of the national parks and forests in their states and protest what I called "the continuing Bush lunacy" on this issue.
But hey, look at this! There's a flicker of common sense coursing through the Republican Party. Three cheers for Senators Alexander, Warner and Gregg who recently joined with Senator Dole in sending a bipartisan letter to the EPA criticizing the proposed rule change. In a subsequent press release, Senator Alexander protested policies that would "take us backwards." He vowed to introduce legislation that would overturn the decision "if the EPA insists on moving forward with this rule in its present form." This is from a Republican!
Might I now be optimistic that the Republican leadership will decry other Bush policies that also "take us backwards?" Will they stand up for constitutional liberties, specifically the first and forth amendments? Will they regain fiscal sanity? Will they embrace again the foreign policies that won us the cold war? (Remember, Republican President Eisenhower met with Soviet leader Khrushchev and Nixon flew to China to meet with Mao. Reagan and Gorbachev engaged in détente).
How refreshing to see loyalty to common sense policies trump loyalty to party. Hope springs eternal.
There always has been. Too bad it's just a flicker. Replacing tax-and-spend with borrow-and-spend is a bankrupt strategy, palatable only to those who are deeply cynical about public governance.
Well, a burned hand is the best teacher. I'm convinced the Republican caucuses will be taught a very painful lesson this November.
BTW, would you be open to taking a cabinet position in an Obama administration? Which department(s) do you think you'd best be able to serve as the head of? Just askin' :-)
June 26, 2008 2:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Might I now be optimistic that the Republican leadership will decry other Bush policies that also "take us backwards?"
Seriously? No. Those few Repubs are up for re-election this year so there will a little speaking up - but since the White House refuses to open EPA email and read it, they won't read this either.
Appreciate your efforts at trying to see some sanity in the republican party - but any real decency left with you I am sad to say.
June 26, 2008 3:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Lincoln,
lets wait and see how these Republicans you referred to vote on issue of environmentalism and national parks and forests.
Do they support drilling and/or mining in these areas?
June 26, 2008 3:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Might I now be optimistic that the Republican leadership will decry other Bush policies that also "take us backwards?" I wouldn't be if I were you.
Will they stand up for constitutional liberties, specifically the first and forth amendments?You have got to be joking right?
Will they regain fiscal sanity? Nope.
Will they embrace again the foreign policies that won us the cold war? (Remember, Republican President Eisenhower met with Soviet leader Khrushchev and Nixon flew to China to meet with Mao. Reagan and Gorbachev engaged in détente). As if.
Sorry to bust your bubble there sir, but I have no faith that the Republican party will ever again put country above party. Just isn't going to happen.
June 26, 2008 4:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with the above posters, Sir. However, you are always welcome in our party. It most closely reflects your core beliefs.
June 26, 2008 5:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's too bad what happened to Chaffee in 2006, but he had to go so the Dems could control the Senate.
Still, I would like to once again see what's been missing for the last 40 years, a Republican Party that deserves the allegiance of people like Lincoln Chaffee.
Now if he could join with other disaffected and former Republicans and embark on a four-year campaign to purge the party of the criminals, the religious bigots, and the crazies, and present some decent candidates in 2012 and beyond, we might get a two-party system back.
It would be good for the country, but I'm not holding my breath.
June 26, 2008 5:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wigmarx,
excellent suggestion.
June 26, 2008 6:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
I see you are still pimping for the Republican party even though you claim to have left it. Yes, you did mention Nixon meeting with Mao but did you mention Reagan sending Rumsfeld to Saddam to deliver him arms and reconnaissance data? How about the illegal arms sales to Iran during the Republican Reagan's term? Or how about the cozy relationship that Republicans had with General Pinochet in Chili and how President Ford sent Kissinger to Chili in 1976 to assure the ,ahem, good general that his state sponsored murders, kidnappings and those jailed and tortured political prisoners would not be a problem for the Ford administration? Viewers can see those remarkable images here.
Of course we would know more about these events if Republicans didn't have such a penchant for prevarication, stonewalling and destroying evidence. Just think of Watergate, Iran Contra, and the current Republican White House criminal, George W Bush and his Republican enablers. In reality for the Republicans, nothing has changed and it won't change until good people, such as yourself, divorce yourself completely from the GOP scourge. Now that would be common sense and hope could spring eternal; but not with the GOP.
June 26, 2008 6:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please pardon my poor editing skills and dead link. The images can be seen at -
http://www.geocities.com/johnie_rebel/RepublicansAndFriends.JPG
June 26, 2008 6:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Agreed.
June 26, 2008 11:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Olympia Snowe is a GOP senator and is still a reasonable person. I have to admit the "reasonable GOP Congressperson" is a small group though.
They will only change if there is a huge voter bashing though.
June 26, 2008 6:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Olympia Snowe a reasonable Senator? Snowe must go. Shame on Maine.
June 27, 2008 8:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
This might be heterodox in these partisan parts, but I always thought that the tendency to take things to an extreme both on the left and the right requires that each is checked by the other.
June 26, 2008 7:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
True Andrew Strat, but until the midterm elections, we had no controls. The Republicans controlled all three branches of government. That's not good, no matter which party is control. The Bush Administration is living proof that checks and balances are what makes us stronger. In this case, the lack of such checks has led us to ruin.
June 26, 2008 9:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
with all due respect, mr. chafee, as a former senator from the state of rhode island you were more than willing to help your former party take us back to a time when there were no wage standards or workplace protections. you fail to grasp the fact that it is not indicative of common sense to regress our country to the days when it lacked essentially what made it a strong, healthy nation.
i have friends who are rhode islanders, and what they have told me is that while you were pro choice, you lacked your father's respect and empathy for the working poor and struggling middle class. you played the margins by offering just enough to elites in the state, like supporting abortions so affluent women could feel comfortable voting against the economic interest of less fortunate women.
you stake a claim to your dad's legacy of envirornmental protection, but your corporate friends who left barrels of hazardous waste behind their abandoned factory, were given a wink and a nod by you. as i am given to understand, the state of rhode island was forced to pick up the tab for what clearly was a brownfield site, and a danger to the health and safety to the area and it's citizens.
perhaps in this day and age, given the fact that the democratic party has returned to it's roots as the party of slavery, you feel quite comfortable with it, but it is no longer a party that represents the interests of it's base, and is being abandoned. it was with great happiness that i learned that john kerry had to accept the fact that he stands to lose his senate seat this coming november, and i am a former kerry supporter and lifelong democrat.
not trying to offend you, sir, but it's not a problem of loyalty to party, but your loyalty to the same corrupt corporate interests that you still share with your former party that is your problem, and makes you very hard to take seriously.
June 26, 2008 9:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Corrupt corporate interests.
June 26, 2008 11:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
the repuglitards are developing common sense ???
yeah right
we got a mook in the whitehouse who thinks if he doesn't open the letter, it doesn't exist
and guess what
he's a repuglitard
and did the repuglitards say anything about their drooling moron in the whitehouse ???
not a fucking word
and did you hear about george bush complimenting the Filipino Ambassador cuz george really likes his Filipino chef ???
where were the "common sense" Repuglitards during that embarrassing episode
the only repuglitard with any common sense is gordon smith of Oregon. Gordon smith is smart enough to be talking about his ability to work with Barack Obama
it ain't gonna do gordon smith any good, but he is man enough to admit that the Democrats are NOT the problem
the repuglitards are proud that they do not cooperate withemocrats. So America is doing the sensible thing, we're getting rid of the repuglitards
take my advice mr chaffee; give up on resurecting the repuglitard party. let it die
start a new party. In 20 years you could be the leader of the party that replaces the repuglitards
quit beating a dead elephant
June 27, 2008 1:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
How about Republican Senators speaking out vocally against the War in Iraq? You talk of fiscal sanity -- let's start with a two trillion dollar war.
Most importantly, Mr. Chafee, thank you for speaking your conscience and not the party line. I'd like to think that if Democrats ever veered this wildly off course, I'd speak out against them too.
June 27, 2008 2:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
The only saving grace for the possibility of having Dems controlling the White House and both houses of Congress is that Democrats are almost as likely to disagree with each other as they are to disagree with Republicans.
In our two-party system, the Dems are really the party of "everybody else who isn't Republican," NOT the party of "everyone." If they don't have a common enemy to fight, they'll fight amongst themselves. Which is good.
I don't think our country is ready for a Bureau of Sabotage, though the Bush White House seems to shoot itself in the foot often enough as it is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bureau_of_Sabotage
June 27, 2008 2:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you Senator!
June 27, 2008 1:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
We reached the Moon and came back,but we find it troublesome to cross our own street and meet our neighbors runescape money
August 14, 2008 11:36 PM | Reply | Permalink