The Spirit of 1969—Part 2

So if the 1960s and 1970s were so formative and influential what happened to the Pat and Bay Buchanans, the Rush Limbaughs of this world? The latter two were in there 20s and Pat Buchanan was in his late 30s, an age not beyond redemption, despite the phrase that has become so associated with the times. Were they under a rock during this period, snoozing like right-wing Rip van Winkles for decades as the nine-pins thundered all around them?

While this question is a difficult one to answer, we are getting a glimpse into the way they and younger acolytes such as Ann Coulter think as they respond to—horror or horrors—the possibility of John McCain as the Republican Party’s nominee.

To listen to them talk, McCain is the second coming of George McGovern, the liberal Democrat who went down to defeat against Nixon in the 1972 Presidential campaign, a man more dangerous than a serial child molester. Coulter said recently that if McCain is the party’s nominee she will even campaign for Clinton. Limbaugh spends his days whipping his moronic listeners into a frenzy, bellowing that McCain represents the end of the Republican Party and all that it stands for. And Bay Buchanan thunders that if McCain doesn’t pander to conservatives by at least featuring Romney prominently as a speaker at the Republican convention (the dead horse she was advising until his recent withdrawal), they’ll make him pay by undermining his campaign and not voting for him.

It is really something to see the Republican unity, and Republican values, isn’t it? The “if I don’t win, I am taking my marbles (or pet candidate) and going home” crowd. In addition to the sour grapes expressed by Buchanan, et. al., someone on conservative talk radio inanely said the other day that sometimes it doesn’t hurt to lose an election, so that people will see just how terrible things can be (under a Democrat). Fine values, all, to teach the youngsters. Because George Bush and his administration are also spiteful, selfish, and mean-spirited, it appears that the right-wing fringe has made the mistake of thinking that it is mainstream, that its views are, in fact, as Bay Buchanan furiously croaked, the “pillars” of the Republican party.

And so the real answer, it seems, to the question, “where were these neanderthals in the 1960s and 1970s,” is that they were exactly where they are now--looking out only for themselves, oblivious to what is going on around them, and trying mightily to show their relevance to a party that has never needed them and which may be moving on without them.