DIFFERENTIATING ELITISM FROM IDEALISM
By
Rudy Takala
November 9, 2008
NewsWithViews.com
"You have sat here too long for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!" — Oliver Cromwell
Few words exist to better summarize the view of Republican Party activists towards the party elite responsible for losing the 2008 elections.
When I talk about “elitism,” I am referring to those who are in politics to serve themselves. It defines many, though not all, elected officials in both parties.
But it does not describe those who get them elected. It does not describe those who become involved in politics because they have values that they desire to protect and preserve.
Occasionally, individuals from the more honorable group make it to elected office. They are activists, idealists; when we are talking about the Republican Party, they may also be called conservatives. It was they that the elitists spent the brunt of their time attacking in 2008.
Elitists feel threatened by people who become involved in politics for reasons other than personal aggrandizement. As elitists are involved simply to promote themselves, they feel more comfortable around each other. They know that if they scratch each other’s backs, it will be all they need to do to get what they want.
Occasionally, they throw their party under the bus to get what they want. It could be said that they also throw their values under the bus, but that would require them to have values.
They are disconcerted, however, by activists, by idealists. Elitists have nothing that we want, because we want only to promote our values. Elitists are afraid of activists because they cannot be bought off, and it is something they cannot understand.
Personal experience has aided me greatly in understanding these dynamics.
Days after I was elected chairman of my county Republicans, the chair of our party’s congressional district called a member of our organization to call me a “chickens**t” and ask how I could have been elected. This chairman’s name was Ted Lovdahl, which I use only reluctantly to facilitate clarity.
This chairman spent the next year and a half trying to find someone in my organization willing to help him remove me. Eventually, he did find a couple of individuals who met that description (power can and will always find patronage). One was the husband of a local mayor, a member on our board, who wrote a letter to Mr. Lovdahl complaining about my leadership and asking that he do something about it.
In this letter, he complained that it was difficult listening to my “constant diatribe denigrating elected party leadership, elected Republicans [including] the governor… [and] party candidates local and national.” (Mr. Lovdahl’s response, as well as my board’s, may be found here.)
Months later, while perusing contribution records for local residents, I inadvertently noticed that the same individual had contributed $500 earlier in the year to our Democratic incumbent in Congress. (That incumbent is Rep. James Oberstar, the eleventh-most senior member in the U.S. House.)
In fact, he had contributed thousands of dollars to this Congressman over a period of twenty years. He had literally contributed more than any Democrat from the same area.
When our board called upon this individual to explain his contributions, his explanation was that they allowed him access to someone whom he would otherwise not be able to access. He was engaging in pork barrel politics at a local level.
It was another case of elitism putting itself before anything else.
This incident was far from isolated. Many complained, for instance, that John McCain was an inappropriate nominee for the Republican Party, given that he had considered switching to the Democratic Party as recently as 2004. They saw it as another case of an elitist putting self-aggrandizement before a larger cause.
But before anyone should worry about the elitism of candidates at a national level, they need to reflect on what they’ve done to extinguish it at a local level. If the answer is nothing, it is symbolic of what is wrong with our political system.
It is also symbolic of 2008. Democrats won because they offered a candidate who appeared to believe in something other than himself. Republicans will return to power when they are able to make the same offer. Until then, conservatives and elitists alike can expect to remain in the minority—even if only one is to blame.
© 2008 Rudy Takala - All Rights Reserved
