Conservative Mafia values

“The essence of the story is family...It’s all catnip for conservative men.”

I have mentioned before that I was born and raised a Republican. This was when the Republican Party had leaders such as President Dwight Eisenhower, Sen. Mark Hatfield, R-Ore., Rep. Pete McCloskey, R-Calif., and Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, R-N.Y. These were moderate leaders who wanted what was best for America.

Back then, both parties worked for civil rights, labor rights, fiscal responsibility and other issues that transcended petty partisan politics. Today these leaders would be rejected as RINOs (Republicans In Name Only), because they believed government could do good things for people.

As Arianna Huffington and others have said, I didn’t leave the Republican Party. It left me. It became a party of selfishness and contempt for those who need help, seeing compassion as weakness. It became a party that mocks common courtesy and respect for others, sneering at those values as “political correctness.” And this was illustrated all too well in two recent columns in the LVN.

The above quote comes from the Jan. 1, 2016, column by Ron Knecht, Nevada’s Republican controller. The story he praises effusively in his column as being about family and espousing conservative values is “The Godfather.” You know, the story about a Mafia family that murders its enemies, including members of their family who don’t play by Mafia rules.

“...Pop assiduously mentoring Michael to become the new Godfather...it allows Michael to prevail.” Knecht praises the values the movie promotes, ignoring all the murder and mayhem involved. Maybe he thinks putting a horse’s head in someone’s bed is the way to close a deal!

“The Godfather” was a good movie, but I didn’t walk out thinking, “Boy, that’s how I want my family to be.” The movie’s values praised loyalty above all, no matter who was destroyed in the process. Common morality was just an impediment to the furtherance of the family’s fortunes. If you get a chance to read or reread the column, do so, and then decide if “The Godfather” is an example of the perfect Republican family, as Knecht seems to say.

The second column that perfectly captures today’s Republican Party was by Chuck Muth, March 16, 2016. He was praising former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for his “skewerings” of the press. He loves how Rumsfeld insisted that WMD existed in Iraq, despite the facts, and how Rumsfeld mocked the press when they kept asking where the WMD were.

In this column, Muth quotes Donald Trump as Trump mocks a reporter who was trying to ask a serious question. Of course, Muth thinks the press has a liberal bias, even though his column proves the opposite, so he was delighted that Trump adopted the maturity level of a seventh-grade bully in his manner and speech. I worked at a junior high for 10 years; I know what junior high bullies sound like. Trump treats anyone he doesn’t like the same way – viciously and cruelly — and Muth thought that was just great.

Muth has three children; I hope he hasn’t taught them that mocking people and using foul language is the way to behave. Most of us learned common courtesy as children. Our mothers taught us not to use bad language, not to make fun of people, and to treat others as we want to be treated. But perhaps Muth agrees with Knecht, that Godfather values are the way to go and being vile and vicious is the mark of a strong person. From what his column says, that’s what he believes. Apparently a lot of Trump Republicans agree with him; the fact that Trump is close to becoming the Republican presidential nominee confirms that these are modern Republican values.

If you don’t agree that the modern Republican Party has come unhinged from its moorings, read the 1956 Republican platform, written the year Eisenhower ran for re-election. It’s a thoughtful document; if you didn’t know, you would think it was written by modern-day Democrats.

I have many Republican friends who are decent, compassionate people. They don’t fit the greedy, heartless stereotype; they are genuinely nice. But if they want this stereotype to die, they need to work on the message the Republican Party is sending out. Praising vulgarity and Mafia practices as good conservative values does not enhance their brand. The moderate, rational base of the party needs to speak up and reassert its influence. If it doesn’t, this may really be the end of the Republican Party.

Jeanette Strong, whose column appears every other week, is a Nevada Press Association award-winning columnist. She may be reached at news@lahontanvalleynews.com.