Republicans - My American Life

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/32/republican-convention

Doing historical reports like this are interesting because you already know the winners, and so that suspense is non-existent, but that's a good thing because it leads you to see something more in these stories about the politics of the time that are slightly different or something new that you wouldn't expect on the first pass. The only problem with that is that I don't know what that special something should be.

I feel like there should be something that I should be pulling from these stories about the national convention of the GOP (Grand Old Party, just learned that a few weeks ago and I still can't believe that's what the GOP stands for).

The one thing that I think is interesting is that for the most part, the same arguments and the same drama is happening now that was happening back in 1996. It's been almost 20 years, and people are still arguing the same points. The more liberal republicans are at ends with the more conservative republicans, they're being offensive to people while thinking that they're not being offensive, and everyone hates everyone. There's no compramize, there's no trying to actually do something good for the people, there is only trying to do their own politics so that they can push their own message. It's frustrating to look back and see how useless the entire thing is.

Just look at things now. The same problems they were talking about in 1996, are still being talked about now, and are being addressed in about the same manner. Nothing has progressed, nothing has changed. The tea party wants super conservative views and they're pushing those on the rest of the party on threat of leaving the party and doing their own thing and ruining everything. The liberal republicans are trying to do things slightly less extreme, but everyone else is looking at them like they're crazy and need to stop acting like republicans who are doubling as democrats. There is talk about gender equality, sexual orientation, and family values, but they're so stuck up about their own political views that they can't see the people that are behind what they're talking about. Then comes the age thing, the republican party, although trying to say that they're young and new and progressive, hasn't done anything young or progressive on a national scale since ever. They try to move on and say that they're young, but then they come to the sad realization that the majority of their voters are retired or about to retire.

It's when I listen to specials like this that I feel even less of a connection to the political world. Nothing has changed, nothing will change, so what good will my one vote do? It's because of stuff like this that the voter turn out for the mid-term elections has been at an all time low since World War Two. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/2014-midterm-election-turnout-lowest-in-70-years/ You want to know why only a third of people even care about politics now days? Just look at specials like this - nothing has changed, so why would it matter? Until someone goes out on a limb and does something crazy like actually compromising and trying to form deals without grid locking the entire government, people simply will not care about the politics that we are in.

However, with that rant out of the way - Dan Savage's submission for this episode, best thing I have heard in a while. It was hilarious (and sadly still relevant, see above).

To spoil it, he, a gay liberal, manages to make it into a republican convention and bring up gay rights and trying to get equality for LGBQ community within the republican party. If anything, listen to this episode just for that one segment.