There are a few things I’ve come to expect when Republicans gather in large numbers — inexplicable chants of “USA,” enough guns to supply a small army, “Reagan/Bush 80” pins and shady businesses peddling disaster preparedness supplies to conspiracy theorists. In recent years, however, a new tradition has started at Republican gatherings — attempts to secede from the Union.
Wisconsin’s Republican party is no exception to this trend. With much pomp and circumstance, the GOP held its state convention last weekend. And on the list of potential items to add to the party’s platform was a resolution for the state of Wisconsin to secede from the United States (which was handily rejected when it came up for a vote).
Hopefully it doesn’t need to be explained why attempting to secede is a less-than-awesome idea.
For mainstream Republicans like Gov. Scott Walker and Rep. Paul Ryan who are trying to tidy up their images in preparation for presidential runs in 2016, it must be frustrating to lose some free publicity to a worthless issue like this. Party conventions are more than anything an opportunity for politicians to get a few nice stories written about them and a couple pictures of them giving a stump speech in front of the adoring masses.
By having issues like secession on the table, however, Wisconsin’s Republicans are losing the spotlight to these senseless sideshows. Now matter how much Walker boasts about his tax cuts, it’s simply not as interesting of a story as the possibility of secession.
However, establishment Republicans are just as much to blame for this as the radicals who are actually pushing for secession. When the Tea Party first began its rise to power in the wake of Obama’s election, the Republican Party chose to embrace it. In the short-term, this seemed like a great decision — they were able to ride the Tea Party wave to numerous electoral victories in proceeding elections, both at the state and national levels. As a result, radical Republicans controlled many state legislative bodies in 2010, which allowed them to cement their majorities for the next decade via gerrymandering.
But by ceding much of their control of the party to crazy people, mainstream Republicans are now realizing that crazy people are exerting influence on the Party as a whole — for example, by attempting to get the Party to support secession. In essence, Republicans made a Faustian bargain, and now they’re being forced to pay up.
Of course, secession wasn’t the only brilliant idea put forth last weekend. There was also a proposition having to do with nullification, which would allow Wisconsin to ignore federal laws, i.e., the Affordable Care Act (note: this isn’t actually possible, and is in fact unconstitutional).
These “radical” proposals weren’t only from the right, though. One member of the party had the gall to suggest that Republicans might change their platform to state that a “household with two parents in a committed relationship” is the best environment in which to raise a child, as opposed to the current language, which says that a “marriage between a man and woman” is best for raising children. Needless to say, this measure was quickly rejected.
Because God forbid a child have two loving parents.
By embracing the crazy wing of their Party, the Wisconsin GOP allowed an event that should have provided free, positive publicity for their rising stars to get hijacked by the embarrassing sideshow of secession and nullification resolutions. Until moderate Republicans distance themselves from the radical right, they’ll have to continue dealing with embarrassing gaffes like this.
I don’t know how this situation will end up, but it sure is fun to watch.
Joe Timmerman (jtimmerman
