Maine Republicans Adopt Tea Party Platform

[CORed]

Given what happened to Bennet in Utah, this appears to be a survival tactic.

I think it's more an "out of the frying pan, into the fire" tactic. At least I hope so. If the Tea Partiers actually gain control, the US is in deep doodoo.

ETA: I had really hoped that the defeat in 2008 would have pushed the Republican Party closer to sanity. Instead, I think it has had the opposite effect. I'm beginning to think that that the only hope for a sensible conservative/libertarian party is for the GOP to die out and a new party to form. The GOP seems to be working hard on the dying out part. I think the second half of that will be the inevitable result of that.

 

[CORed]

Well, that's the question. Most of the energy, money, and publicity is already coming in from the fringe. If the fringe can't control the Republican party, they have already been making noises about creating a new party they CAN control.

Giving the fringe too much voice can cost them elections. Giving the fringe too little voice might well cost the Republican party its existence.

I disagree. I think letting the fringe take control will cost the party its existence (as a party that has any influence anyway, a fringe "Republican Party" may still be around for a long time). I think it is inevitable that there will be a lunatic fringe right wing party and a more mainstream conservative party. I think the question is which one of those the Republican Party will be, and it's starting to look like the Republican Party will be the lunatic fringe party.

 

[Darth Rotor]

I had really hoped that the defeat in 2008 would have pushed the Republican Party closer to sanity. Instead, I think it has had the opposite effect.

Yes. Maybe Thomas Friedman's tired and overused cliche of "creative destruction" (Pre 9-11) will apply here.

 

[WildCat]

It's a combination of Alex Jones and Ron Paul, and taken over the whole party!

Eventually this will spawn a viable 3rd party, I'm hoping! Though we'd quickly be back to 2 parties, because the crazy one like the Maine GOP has turned into won't have much long-term appeal.

 

[dudalb]

Can't wait to see what Maine's most famous citizen. Stephan King has to say about this since his more recent novel, "Under the Dome" has some not very subtle attacks on The Far Right.

 

[MattusMaximus]

I think it's more an "out of the frying pan, into the fire" tactic. At least I hope so. If the Tea Partiers actually gain control, the US is in deep doodoo.

The hard right elements a la the Tea Party won't gain control per se, or at least if they did it would make the ham-fisted governance by the GOP from 2000-2006 look desirable - then they'd get their asses kicked rather quickly in the next election cycle. My guess is, at most, they'll serve as a kind of "nutty uncle" within the Republican party for a time, basically making embarrassments of themselves.

ETA: I had really hoped that the defeat in 2008 would have pushed the Republican Party closer to sanity. Instead, I think it has had the opposite effect. I'm beginning to think that that the only hope for a sensible conservative/libertarian party is for the GOP to die out and a new party to form. The GOP seems to be working hard on the dying out part. I think the second half of that will be the inevitable result of that.

I think there's something to this. The long term demographic trends look very grim for the GOP, and its strategists know it. That's why you're seeing a schism within the party, despite the fact they're trying to hide it, on issues concerning immigration. The black vote is lost to the Republicans, and with the Tea Party types banging the anti-immigration drum so loudly of late (with a tinge of racist perception in for taste) the GOP can pretty much count out the Hispanic population as well. All the data I've seen indicate the GOP is only really popular with older, white Americans.

Not a good sign for a party that wishes to remain relevant in the long term. My guess is they'll get some victories in the 2010 cycle, crow long and loud about it, take it as "a sign" that they should continue playing the obstructionist role, and they'll get pwned in 2012 by a pissed off electorate.

In the meantime, I think they'll also lose a good number of moderates - not necessarily people who would go vote for the Dems, but people the GOP needs in order to stay competitive. Take a look at what happened in NY Dist. 23 and what's happening now in Florida for lessons on this.

 

[dudalb]

The more legitimate points the Tea Party has,like the Deficit, is being drowned out by the growing emphasis on race and "social issues".There is already a bad split in the movement between the Libertarian wing and the "Christian Conservative" wing.

 

[MikeMangum]

While true, that rather misses the point. The First Amendment addresses the freedom of religion, and freedom from (mandatory State) religion.

I've never seen the phrase used to mean 'you are free to choose your religion, but you still must participate in religious activities'. I'd be appreciative if someone could actually find the phrase used in that way - and not just by people who are asserting motives for others. I've always seen the phrase in the context of 'you are free to choose your religion, or no religion, but you have no right to restrict others from practising their religion because it offends your sensibilities'.

Things like bans on the colors red and green for an elementary class' Christmas mid-winter party, bans on students giving each other religious items on school grounds, schools making classrooms available after school for all sorts of groups but banning a bible study group, etc.

 

[MattusMaximus]

The more legitimate points the Tea Party has,like the Deficit, is being drowned out by the growing emphasis on race and "social issues".There is already a bad split in the movement between the Libertarian wing and the "Christian Conservative" wing.

I never could have seen this coming... oh wait, I did.

Color me surprised. What do you expect when there is a group of people (social/religious conservatives) who simply pay lip service to "small government" when what they really mean is "big government that we want to control in order to force our religious beliefs on the rest of you."

It's only a matter of time before this Tea Party fad implodes.

 

[Ladewig]

I've never seen the phrase used to mean 'you are free to choose your religion, but you still must participate in religious activities'. I'd be appreciative if someone could actually find the phrase used in that way - and not just by people who are asserting motives for others. I've always seen the phrase in the context of 'you are free to choose your religion, or no religion, but you have no right to restrict others from practising their religion because it offends your sensibilities'.

Things like bans on the colors red and green for an elementary class' Christmas mid-winter party, bans on students giving each other religious items on school grounds, schools making classrooms available after school for all sorts of groups but banning a bible study group, etc.

Is your first paragraph referring to "freedom of religion" or "freedom from religion"?

 

[drkitten]

I've never seen the phrase used to mean 'you are free to choose your religion, but you still must participate in religious activities'. I'd be appreciative if someone could actually find the phrase used in that way - and not just by people who are asserting motives for others.

Happy to help.

From that site:

Two hundred years ago, our founding fathers wanted religious freedom. So they put into our constitution that Congress shall pass no law establishing a religion. By this they meant that no one Christian religion would be the official religion of the United States. Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to a Baptist group describing the “wall of separation” of church and state. The purpose of that wall was to protect religion from the overpowering control of government. This “wall of separation of church and state” is not in our constitution. The right to practice religion freely without government interference is one of our basic rights and is found in our constitution. If you’ve heard of freedom of the press, you should also have heard of freedom of religion. For the first 150 years of this country, religion and government were not at odds with each other. About 55 years ago, secularists and atheists challenged prayer in school. The Supreme Court took prayer out of school and since that time, prayer has been removed from graduation ceremonies and football games.
[...]To promote the religious dimension of the Ten Commandments is to ask to have them removed from public areas. Religion in America is flat out under attack by atheists. There is no freedom from religion in our constitution, but there is freedom of religion.

The whole reason for bans on prayer at graduation and football games is precisely because (as the SCOTUS has held), the spectators are compelled to participate as listeners. This person is specifically demanding the authority to so compel the spectators.

ETA also note the misinterpretation of the Establishment clause. Somehow, the author got from the concept of no official religion to the idea of "no one Christian religion" (by which of course, they mean "sect"). Apparently the author is just peachy with the idea of establishing interdenominational Christianity as a state religion, as long as it's no one specific sect.

 

[cwalner]

Happy to help.

ETA also note the misinterpretation of the Establishment clause. Somehow, the author got from the concept of no official religion to the idea of "no one Christian religion" (by which of course, they mean "sect"). Apparently the author is just peachy with the idea of establishing interdenominational Christianity as a state religion, as long as it's no one specific sect.

It is also (in my mind) a very willful misinterpretation. from your quote

So they put into our constitution that Congress shall pass no law establishing a religion.

yet the actual text is:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;

Yeah, I know its semantics, but sometimes semantics are important.

 

[Darth Rotor]

I've never seen the phrase used to mean 'you are free to choose your religion, but you still must participate in religious activities'.

Nor have I.

 

[cwalner]

In all fairness, from drkitten's post, it seems as if those who argue against 'Freedom from Religion' see it differently from us.

We see it as freedom to chose no religion. They see it as a phrase we evil atheists use to justify a state-enforced lack of religion.

Think of it like how we rail against discriminatory practices under the guise of 'Freedom of Religion" (ie landlord refusing to rent to homosexuals).

I am not saying that they are correct, but there seems to be a very strong disconnect between the way use the phrase and the way the hardcore theists do. Understanding that may help move the discussion in more productive directions.

 

[Walter Ego]

Maine GOP Forced To Apologize After Convention-Goers Vandalize 8th Grade Classroom

The Republican convention was at the Portland Expo, but participants went to the nearby King Middle School to hold their caucuses. While there, they went through eighth-grade teacher Paul Clifford’s items, opened sealed boxes, stole a prized poster, and vandalized the room with Republican slogans.

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/05/14/maine-classroom-gop/

More:

http://www.pressherald.com/news/call-it-class-struggle-how-politics-went-too-far_2010-05-12.html

http://www.pressherald.com/news/incident-spurs-call-for-school-use-review_2010-05-13.html

http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/143328.html

 

[tyr_13]

– Republicans opened a “closed cardboard box they found near Clifford’s desk” and later objected to the fact that it contained copies of the U.S. Constitution donated to the school by the American Civil Liberties Union.

These Tea Party leaning GOP members rifled though someone elses stuff, and objects that there are copies of the Constitution?

Let me get this right, they object to copies of the US Constitution.

 

[Cleon]

These Tea Party leaning GOP members rifled though someone elses stuff, and objects that there are copies of the Constitution?

Let me get this right, they object to copies of the US Constitution.

I imagine it was the source of those copies, not the copies themselves. The fact that the ACLU supplied them must taint them with evil or something.

 

[Alareth]

No, the evil liberal was hiding the Constitution handed directly to the Founders by God himself from the children.

He didn't want them to know all the stuff about us being a Christian nation it talks about.

 

[tyr_13]

To be fair, I think that the GOP officials are handling this nicely. They apologize for what the delegets did, and are not backing up some of the trouble makers claim of 'the ebil libreal' infesting the school.

 

[Walter Ego]

To be fair, I think that the GOP officials are handling this nicely. They apologize for what the delegets did, and are not backing up some of the trouble makers claim of 'the ebil libreal' infesting the school.

In other words a typical PR playbook response from the Maine GOP. Note also that the GOP spokesman couldn't resist adding this:

The chairman of the Knox County Republican Party, William Chapman, agreed that it was inappropriate for anyone to remove items or leave the GOP materials. Chapman said he was unaware who took the poster or left the sticker. He said he understands the poster would be returned or replaced.

“The school administration was kind enough to let us use the facility,” Chapman said in an interview. “We should have left it in the same condition that we found it.”

But Chapman acknowledged that he and others were disturbed by some of the posters they saw in the room, several of which he said obviously were made by professionals, not students. He described some of the posters as anti-American, anti-free enterprise and anti-religion.

“I saw nothing in the room — and nobody pointed out anything in the room — that appeared to give a more balanced view,” Chapman said.

http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/143328.html

Read: "Yes, our delegates acted like Goths in town for a weekend in Rome and stole and rifled through private property but the teacher is a liberal commie pinko who should be fired when we take back America, elect Sarah Palin as president and install God back in our public classrooms. Did we mention the teacher is a pinko?"