Republican “Civil War”
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Great quote from Der Spiegel, a fantastic German paper, which is following the U.S. mid-term elections surprisingly closely:
“In the US, people … spend time and money supporting the Republicans. Unlike in Germany, in America, which never had a Hitler, being ‘right-wing’ is not taboo. ‘Right-wing’ represents Reagan, religion, the free market, individualism, patriotism and small government. In reality, it is an impossible mixture: National pride, God and tradition are conservative ‘us’ values. The profit motive, competition and a weak state are ‘me-first’ sentiments … . But this mixture of conservative values and neoliberalism works well in America, where it transcends social class — that’s the difference to Germany.”
I pointed out before on our forum that the Republicans are a “blue-orange” mix, to use Spiral Dynamics speak (a system which classifies developmental values), or mythic-membership mixed with early individualist liberalism. Rove was a genius for having the two sides get along so well, because they stand for really different things. The two factions broke apart post-Bush, and that fracturing is continuing. The Tea Party folks are actually not really all that individualist at all: they say they stand for things like small government, freedom, the free market, without really understanding the history behind those ideas or what they mean: what they really want is for you to value what they value, believe what they believe, keep America “pure,” and to hell with everyone else. So you see how you can have a mythic-membership rule/role mentality, but value seemingly non-mythic values, although in the end, those just end up perverted to mythic thinking.
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