HispanicVista Columnists
The Rise and Fall of the GOP
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By
Sal Osio, JD - From the Publisher's Corner
- January 28, 2007
- From the Publisher's Corner
- The Rise and Fall of the GOP
- By Sal Osio, JD
- A message to the GOP: "Clean house. You snooze - you loose.
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- Sal Osio, JD is the publisher of HispanicVista.com (www.hispanicvista.com). Contact at: SPosio@aol.com
The Republican Party reached the stratosphere of political might when George W. Bush was elected president with a majority Congress in 2000. And the GOP reached its zenith after September 11, 2002 in the aftermath of the terrorist attack on American soil. The American nation, with the sympathy of the rest of the world, was united behind President Bush and his party and supported his initiative in waging war on terrorism.
Soon thereafter, one misstep after another, culminating with the unwarranted invasion of Iraq, based on flawed and manufactured evidence, started the downfall of the Bush Administration, and with it the GOP. The misadventure resulted in the destruction of a nation and its population - over 300,000 deaths and casualties as of 2006 - coupled with the death of 3,000 American soldiers and the disability of 30,000 more - at a cost exceeding $250 billion. And, worse yet, the unjustified invasion amalgamated and invigorated the forces of terrorism - the opposite result of the intended 'democratization' of the Iraqi people.
In a defensive posture for its support of the imperialistic war, the GOP engaged in a strategy to divert attention from the willful war through the Patriot Act, designed to protect the homeland, by curtailing the constitutional rights of the Americans, and, more, by demonizing illegal immigrants as 'terrorists.' Wrapping itself in the American flag, spokesmen for the GOP, such as Representatives Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin, Hunter of San Diego, Norwood of Georgia and Tancredo of Colorado, led a GOP war on the illegal immigrant/terrorists and caused the passage of legislation to erect a 'Berlin Wall' along the border with Mexico and a campaign to arrest and deport the undocumented workers present in the United States, denying them and their families of basic human needs during their illegal stay in the country.
This exercise in xenophobia was a simple strategy to divert attention from the failed war on terrorism. By changing the focus from radical Islam to the defenseless immigrant, the war on terrorism could be won without American casualties. And just as important, a victory could be claimed by the brave and patriotic GOP faithful whose failure in the Middle East, the nuclear nest of terrorism, was conclusive.
But the brave GOP stalwarts were unable to fool the American people by disguising their failure. The Democrats took over the control of Congress in 2006 in a direct slap at the GOP.
Like the Whigs, the Isolationists and the Know-Nothings before them, the GOP faces extinction. It has become the party of divisiveness and exclusion - the recipe for political oblivion. The party has sown the seeds of self destruction by demonizing the immigrant worker instead of addressing constructive solutions that are fair, equitable and realistic to a labor exchange dynamic that impacts both Mexico and the US. Our agricultural and service sectors need access to low cost labor for their economic survival. Mexico's workers need to improve their standard of living. Their need/want is our need/want.
Surely, under the circumstances a practical guest worker program that would legalize the labor exchange is the solution. Why the mega billion dollar 'Berlin Wall'? Why demonize and classify as terrorists hard working human beings, our neighbors, whose only sin is accepting our offer of employment for low wages?
(Note: This publication has analyzed the dynamic of immigration extensively. Enter 'immigration' on the search engine and a host of relevant articles will be identified.)
The GOP is losing the remnants of the Hispanic vote that it had previously attracted due to its policies of ostracism. The GOP will forever lose the Hispanic vote as well as the support of other minorities and fair minded Americans if it fails to reach out to these minorities and seek out just and equitable solutions to the fluidity of our borders and the employment of undocumented workers. At present the GOP is being pushed in a free fall to oblivion by its GOP vigilantes, demagogues and bigots - the controlling factions of the party.