A DIFFERENT FACE, BUT THE SAME OLD UGLY!

"You can fool some of the people some of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time."
- Abraham Lincoln -


I had heard the Republicans had revamped their website, so I went to http//www.gop.com to see what all the hubbub was about. I was met with contradiction and disingenuous claims, just as I expected. Across the top of the page, there was a big red banner with white gop letters. The "o" was a human face which would change every time the page would refresh or if you clicked on different subheadings. A large number of the faces shown came up as either women or African-Americans. Interesting, considering how a majority of women AREN'T Republicans, and, at the very most, only about 10% of African-Americans are...

I clicked on a section entitled "learn", then on the subheading "who we are", and up came a rose-colored-glasses view of Republicans all throughout history. The author should get this year's Pulitzer Prize for fiction. "It all started with people who opposed slavery" it begins loftily. "They were common, everyday people who bristled at the notion that men had any right to opress their fellow man." The writer, of course, neglects to mention "except when it comes to business." For even a teenager or fool knows that Republicans support the rights and privileges of business and business owners far more than they do the rights of the individual worker. And if big business exporting millions of American jobs, cutting or freezing workers' wages and benefits even in the face of increased productivity, and then corporate executives rewarding themselves with huge salary increases and bonuses isn't oppression, I don't know what is! Naturally, while praising Republican accomplishments, the writer fails to mention how violently Republicans have opposed labor unions and programs for the poor...

In a section entitled "Republican heroes" you will find the expected photos of Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, Dwight Eisenhower, and a number of blacks and women from the 1800s, curiously enough, from the earlier, far more liberal period of the Republican Party. Few of those people would be welcome in today's ultra-conservative version. And, while one doesn't see Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck pictured there, neither does one see President Theodore Roosevelt, one of the most influential Republicans of his day, and the man responsible for the creation of our national parks system, the building of the Panama Canal, the Pure Food and Drug Act (a precursor to the Food and Drug Administration), greatly strengthening the Interstate Commerce Commission, and other important government regulatory activities which keep businesses operating in the public good. I guess the fact that he interfered with big business over 100 years ago would exclude him from being one of today's Republican heroes...

Under the subheading of "what we believe" is the phrase "helping those around you is worthwhile", under which is written, "The Republican Party believes in the value of voluntary giving and community support over taxation and forced redistribution." Interesting. We all know they hate taxes, but they certainly don't mind forced redistribution when it involves the redistribution of wealth to corporations and upper income grabbers...

Under the section entitled "Republican Accomplishments", they take credit for making the Ku Klux Klan illegal with their passage of their Civil Rights Act of 1871. Oddly enough, they fail to mention how many of the top Ku Klux Klan members of the 1920s were card-carrying Republicans, especially in the state of Indiana, which elected a Republican Klan governor in 1924 and where more than half of its General Assembly members were Republicans and Klansmen...

I invite you to take a peek at this new website. I doubt that you'll be very surprised at what you'll see: the expected small government is best, free markets are the way to go, etc., etc. It's the same old dog, but no new tricks. It's a phony, but slightly different face, but the same old ugly.