Republican Political Strategy Hinges upon the Ignorance of Their Voters

 

What is Socialism? What is a social conservative? What is a fiscal conservative? Are social liberals and economic liberals one and the same? What is Fascism? What is regulation/deregulation? Are tax policies and a budget one and the same? What are entitlements? What is discretionary spending? What is Dodd-Frank?

To the five people who read my posts, I know those questions sound a bit elementary. What's even more elementary is that I can't tell you what any of it means in a simple sentence. I'd have to sit down, have a few drinks, give a brief history lesson, complete with examples, and hash out paragraph-long dictionary definitions as well as political science ones. In short, there is no way we could understand these concepts without an in-depth discussion. We darn sure wouldn't learn these things from a five-minute campaign speech.

That's okay, because what I'm seeing in this very long, excruciating Republican primary is that Republican candidates really depend upon our ignorance. They often conflate entitlements with socialism, and social conservatism with fiscal discipline. Actually, these are false relations, and nothing is further from the truth. The people who are the most socially conservative are actually the most economically liberal. They believe in social conservatism, but want a laissez-fare economy. So, it is actually okay to regulate what kinds of birth control women get, but not a Republican policy to regulate the companies which make the birth control pills. Sounds crazy? Even hypocritical? That may be true, but it's one of the many examples of how conflated the political rhetoric actually is, and how confusing it can be to disentangle it.

Fiscal conservatives, however, believe in regulating the markets, and not letting them run free. We must regulate for the safety of our citizens. These people are also more than likely support freedom for individual's personal choices, and stay away from social issues like women's birth control pills. Again, sounds confusing? These are the tenets of the Democratic Party.

I heard a Romney supporter say this morning that they're going to have to appeal to more social and fiscal conservatives. Does she mean they need to appeal to more Tea Party members and liberal Democrats? Republican rhetoric is so confusing, that sometimes even they get crossed up. For instance, Republicans speak of taxes as a way to stimulate the economy. What they give us is a tax plan. This is not an economic platform, but they conflate the two so much that even their base does not know the difference. Trust me, I've painfully sat through Fox and Friends.

Here's my concern: where are the smart Republicans who will ask them to clarify themselves? Who will ask the Republican Party to stop treating their voters like idiots? I'm guessing that no one would risk the challenge to Rush Limbaugh, first. And second, it just wouldn't be good tv.