Would a Palin presidency turn the GOP into a theocratic party?

[Marr]

The GOP has been pandering to the religious right for decades now, of course-- but the party has always kept them well away from actual power.

Recent years have seen a struggle between different factions for control of the Republican Party that was summed up pretty well by the last Republican primary season, with Romney representing the big business faction of the party and Huckabee the Christian right. The party establishment reacted very negatively to Huckabee's early primary win. Fox News was leading the charge to cut him down, in fact.

Now we've got McCain, an elderly man with a history of health problems, with a running mate that seems to fall in the Huckabee camp. After watching eight years of the Bush Administration transform a functioning government into a blundering Heritage Foundation employment program, I have to wonder if Palin wouldn't do something similar-- but in service to the Christian right rather than the conservative establishment.

Once in charge, a small group can really transform an organization. Staffing is everything. So I wonder, if Palin were to become president, what do you suppose would happen to the GOP?

[VP505]

1. Yes it will and

you can bank on it!

[ElectricSoul]

2. PALIN IS ON A MISSION FOM GOD

She will make the US a theocracy; and in so doing destroy the democratic process for which she has little or no respect. She has nor respect for ability or merit, only for secrecy and loyalty to herself and what she believes is God's will.

[VP505]

5. I think your correct!

and welcome to DU!

[GoesTo11]

3. Theocratic nation more like. Can we just split Red & Blue?

We want different things. Why don't we just separate and the red nation can just build Walmarts and shoot cans, secure its borders and spy on its citizens and pray for good health, while the blue nation advances in science, education and its public good. As long as people can move to their preferred nation.

[alsame]

15. That would be my preference too. eom

[aquart]

4. "Turn" it?

Fascism always links with religion.

[saltpoint]

6. I don't care much for Huckabee, but he at least exhibits some degree of

intelligence and wit.

Such as it is.

Palin exhibits none of that at all. Instead, I sense a shrewd hyper-awareness in her, and it seems to be of a piece with her reputation as a very competitive personality -- the "Sarah Barracuda" of the basketball court stories -- but I don't sense a ...

sensibility

... in her apart from her go-for-the-jugular hyper-competitiveness.

I understand and respect subsistence hunting but see no honor at all in Palin's enthusiasm for the aerial shooting of wolves. It is an entirely different universe, IMO.

I don't care how many countries she's visited per se but since she's in line for the presidency, I care about it a lot.

She's thick. She holds power because she wants to wield it and not as a tool for the common good. She has been described coarsely but IMO accurately as an "oil whore." If you are an environmentalist, my guess is you will not be supporting the Republican ticket in 2008.

Her address in St. Paul was cynical and sarcastic and mean-spirited with no glimpse of eloquence or thoughtfulness. Her speech was sheet metal, as opposed to Joe Biden's wooden shelter. A cadre of behind-the-scenes slasher Pukes gave palin a script to read and she went out and read it. Hers was a metallic barrier that she rapped on to make negative noise while Biden's wood was shapable and re-shapable -- the difference between a junkyard vandal and a good carpenter.

I agree with your point about Palin and a GOP theocracy, and also your point that the GOP has been courting this for some time. It's disturbing to encounter anyone -- espeically a national ticket nominee -- who believes only in the promise of the next world over this one because it appears to me to absolve them of responsibility to others in the here-and-now. In pursuing their "Christian" afterlife they neglect the tenets of the ministry of Jesus for obligations to others in THIS life. IMO it is a form of cowardice. I don't respect it.

When you sprawl in the gutter with feral dogs you get fleas. The Republicans are facing a major infestation going into a national election. I think it's more than fair to call them on it and force them to defend their politics of hate and division.

[dkofos]

7. It already is.

[fascisthunter]

8. It's Already a Theocratic-Fascist Party

[VP505]

9. It seems to me that the Reptilians have always

exploited the religious right for votes and campaign funding. They dangle the carrot of overturning Roe v Wade, and incorporating religion into everything Government knowing full well that they have no intention of giving up their hot button vote getting social issues. That's about to change should McSame and Palin find success in their campaign, I have a feeling that they will shove McSame aside and start the process of transforming not only their Party but Government into a full fledged Theocracy. Its a scary thing to contemplate and something that we just cannot let happen by supporting Obama/Biden every way possible.

[saltpoint]

10. If Obama-Biden is the winning ticket in November, and I believe it will

be, it will be a st-back for the fundie nutbags, especially if the exit polling analysis shows significant misgivings on the part of voters over Palin's theocratic bent.

[Marr]

14. That's what I'd like to see.

A Republican candidate couldn't pander any harder to the Christian right than McCain has for this election. He's reversed many of his own policy stances to accomodate their demands, and he's even placed one of their own in the VP slot.

If that fails-- if it drives off other Republicans-- it'll demonstrate once and for all that Republicans have to finally cut that cancer out of the party. Or at least stop feeding it.

Hopefully the GOP's established corporate shills will recognize that and see a McCain loss as the best way to reassert the dominance of the corporate faction within the party.

[VAliberal]

11. Maybe it will depend on the outcome of the election

were McCain to lose, perhaps the non-fundamentalist Repubs would rebel and drive the theocrats from the party - but are there enough such creatures remaining in the RNC to effect that sort of change? It doesn't look like it. They all seem to be either neo-cons or fundamentalists.

Hopefully, this election sets the RNC on the way to marginalization or extinction.

[AndyTiedye]

12. Yes. And America's Slide Into Theocracy Would Become Permanent and Irreversable

There really is no way back from a theocracy, once it has taken hold in a country.

[madrchsod]

13. they are a very small minority of the christian religion

but when the rest of us refuse to confront them then we all loose. we can look to other religions who have let their zealots rise to power because they were afraid to confront them