Is Bernie Sanders the new Goldwater?

During the first quarter of the 20th century, even the most “radical” politicians (fiscally speaking), would be considered absurdly conservative by today’s standards. Conservatives, like Presidents McKinley, Taft, Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover advocated for zero regulations on business, and it was considered radical when presidents like Roosevelt and Wilson tried to stop child labor, or the hiring of thug squads to attack workers on strike. Then, in October 1929, a generation of avarice came to a screeching halt. Millions of Americans lost their jobs, their life savings, and their homes. Hoover, though a decent man and a humanitarian, had never before held public office, and was entirely out of his depth in dealing with the Great Depression. In 1933, Hoover was swept out of office, and in came Franklin Roosevelt, who brought our nation back from the brink, won World War II, and took the country on a massive leftward leaning shift. Republicans of the Harding-Coolidge-Hoover type, now known as the “Old Right”, were booted out of office. In 1952, the GOP finally got a president elected, war hero General Dwight D. Eisenhower, whose policies were basically “New Deal lite”. In 1960, Vice President Richard Nixon ran on all of Eisenhower’s policies, losing to Kennedy, whose platform was only slightly different. Both parties were sane, bipartisan, and could reach consensus. So what went wrong?

In 1964, the only mainline candidate for the Republican nomination was Nelson Rockefeller. He was running against Arizona Governor Barry Goldwater, an Old Right candidate. Unluckily for Rockefeller, the GOP, and the country, Rockefeller’s second wife, a young divorcée, had his child not long before the primaries. This was not looked upon kindly in mid-1960’s America. Goldwater was a quirky man, making off-the-cuff remarks like “Extremism in the Defense of liberty is no vice!” and “I sometimes think our nation would be better off if we sawed off the eastern seaboard and let it float out to sea.” Needless to say, Goldwater was mauled in the election, with President Lyndon B. Johnson portraying Goldwater as a nuke-happy maniac (“In your guts, you know he’s nuts”). Most thought that Goldwater’s flop of a campaign was the last nail in the coffin of the Old Right. However, Goldwater gave second wind to that same faction. The coalition of extremists consisting of evangelical Christians, Dixiecrat Ex-segregationists angered by President Johnson’s civil rights reforms, and old school Republicans that still dominate much of the GOP today was formed in 1964. That same year, a declining B-movie actor who had recently starred in a movie alongside a chimpanzee announced his switch to the Republican Party, saying Goldwater was the right candidate to run the nation, and that conservatives of Goldwater’s type were the future. His name was Ronald Reagan.

Now, let me pause that story there for a minute. Do you notice anything with that story that reminds you of the present day? Could that something have to do with a more ideologically driven candidate running against a party mainliner of dubious moral fiber?

Well, you know what happened from there. The Nixon-Ford administration was bipartisan, but Nixon was a paranoid, pathological liar who flagrantly violated constitutional authority, and Ford was a buffoon (“There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe”, anyone?). Then, in the late 1970’s, the economy broke down under President Carter, and Carter, though a decent man and even a humanitarian, was totally out of his depth in trying to end the recession, as well as the Iran Hostage crisis. In 1980, Ronald Reagan, kicked him out of office. The country went on a massive rightward shift. Democrats of the Roosevelt-Johnson-Carter type (now known as the Old Left) were embarrassed in the 1984 and 1988 elections, and finally, Bill Clinton, after being elected in 1992, made his policies a watered-down form of Reaganomics.

The Republican Party is now a mess, crippled by its own delusional obsession with absolute ideological purity and constantly branding compromise as betrayal. What has happened to the Republicans is going to happen to the Democrats if they aren’t careful.

Here’s a fact: Bernie Sanders will not win the 2016 general election. But, I can hear you supporters of Bernie saying, the polls show him beating all the Republicans by even more than Clinton. I hate to burst that bubble, but polls are irrelevant, especially this early on. The GOP will scare millions of apathetic voters into voting against a self-proclaimed socialist. But that’s just because they don’t understand what socialism is… I’m going to stop you right there, hypothetical Bernie voter. Sheehan’s first law of politics is: all other things being equal, perception is ALWAYS more important than reality. Yes, Bernie will bring millions of poor and disenfranchised Americans to the polls for the first time. And for every one he brings in, he’ll lose two moderate Democrats. But the youth vote… Ah, yes. How about you ask Presidents McGovern, Tsongas, and Dean how the youth vote worked out for them? But, I’ll concede this- Bernie’s sycophants may inherit the party someday. But, I ask, do you want that? Today, Goldwater and Reagan would both be dubbed RINOs (Republican in name only) by the conservative establishment that idolizes them. What if the same happened with Sanders’ supporters? What if the Democrats became just as delusional as most Republicans (fiscally speaking)? That’s bad for our country. I know this is harsh medicine for a lot of people, and I beg you to understand that this isn’t an attack on Bernie Sanders himself, or on his supporters. I just want to show you a historical swing that has happened twice before in our history and how damaging it can be. We’ll never be Sweden or France, and that’s for the best. Once the current right breaks down (and it will, given demographics), a more centrist, rational, compromise-friendly nation can be forged, but it won’t if Sanders has his way. To any readers who can vote in the primaries, I urge you to vote Clinton or vote Republican. I know you like Sanders, but if he becomes the Democrat Goldwater, then it’s only a matter of time until you get a Trump.