Guest article: “Liberty Enlightening the World” – How The Statue of Liberty can inspire a GOP rebuild after the November 2022 elections
Unedited Guest article: “Liberty Enlightening the World”: How The Statue of Liberty can inspire a GOP rebuild after the November 2022 elections
13 November 2022 – Ohio USA
Looking at recent US elections on the Sunday morning after, it appears a threadbare GOP House majority (NBC News is now projecting a House majority of 219-216 – with a range of plus or minus 4) will be unstable and rather ungovernable – with avoidable self-inflicted crises (like shutting down the government and debt ceiling imbroglios) being distinctly possible. That’s especially if the upcoming Lame Duck Congressional session doesn’t manage to expand the debt ceiling limit before the next Congress is sworn in (on January 3, 2023).
Thus speaking as independently as possible, I believe a Democrat House majority (which could now statistically be as high a probability as circa 20-25% judging by NBC News current estimates) may well be more stable for markets – as nothing is as sacrosanct as protecting the full faith and credit of US Treasuries (via regular, orderly, and even automatic extensions of the debt ceiling).
Beyond capital markets, I believe if the GOP loses the House (in addition to the Senate where the Democrats already have re-secured majority control), the GOP will have an opportunity to more decisively move the party past the divisions and anger President Trump deviously exploited. That’s as utter, complete defeat can uniquely refocus party elders on the excruciatingly difficult and vital task of finding a pathway back to relevance from the abject dark tunnel the GOP recklessly followed. Despite the sugar high of Trump’s initial 2016 victory (when the GOP quixotically and haphazardly sold their soul to Trump), his repeated election losses in 2018, 2020, and now 2022 (not to even speak of the insurrection threats Trump directly inspired) delineate the narrow limits of the MAGA movement and election denialism. That’s especially when clear and powerful historical trends should have produced an emphatic GOP victory in this week’s mid-term elections.
In crystal contrast – and with specific reference to the 2013 GOP “autopsy report” (which the Party authored post Mitt Romney’s 2012 Presidential defeat), the GOP forward looking blueprint back then offered an inclusive, compassionate framework and ethical vision towards building a majority governing party (as opposed to an angry, rejectionist opposition) inside the mosaic of an increasingly vibrant and tolerant ethnic and multi-cultural America.
Indeed, the Republican National Committee’s 2013 Growth and Opportunity autopsy offered a positive and uplifting vision of American opportunity where the Party could claim deep and proud philosophical origins (namely, unshackling freedom and opportunity via individual entrepreneurialism less encumbered by government overreach and interference, yet with more compassion for those in need). However, that hopeful “Shining Torch” (that the Statue of Liberty optimistically projects aloft as resounding beacon to the world) was paradoxically hijacked by the cruelty, lies, and divisions of Trump’s negative, white resentment MAGA based movement, which has brought the GOP’s formerly more inclusive 2013 vision to ruin.
As someone who cherishes American ideals of freedom and opportunity (whose own vulnerable, oppressed immigrant ancestors transited Ellis Island with no material possessions and built new lives via America’s bright beacon) – and who recognizes how much our world needs American unity and resolve across party lines (despite healthy philosophical and policy differences), I believe actions which help the GOP return to its prescient, vital, and uplifting 2013 blueprint are things America and the liberty loving global community could truly celebrate. That’s as an United States of America with two proud and functionally governing political Parties would help tackle the daunting problems and challenges today’s world presents with more unity and purpose. Moreover, totalitarian foes could not relish and take succor in American disunity – as they’d encounter considerably fewer opportunities to stoke and exploit wide divisions within the American body politic, which sadly only accrue to our opponents’ distinct advantage.
In sum, I pray GOP post-electoral introspections lead it down a path of return and renewal, as MAGA was a disastrous aberration and monstrous chimera that not only laid waste to the GOP but emboldened authoritarian regimes around the world. “Liberty Enlightening the World” (the Statue’s Own Name) is what America’s Totalitarian Foes Fear Most. Thus, a GOP restored should draw strength from Lady Liberty. Indeed, that’s a mighty and rousing Fanfare (performed here by the timbrels and trumpets of the US Marine Band) that all Americans (of whatever party) can rejoice in as enduring clarion to the world.
God bless America, land that I love
Stand beside her and guide her
Through the night with the light from above.
Guest article by Mr. David Schane
david_schane@hotmail.com