Silent Majority, Moral Majority, Silent Majority
From that moment in November of 1969, when former President Richard Nixon asked for a “silent majority” to support his ‘Vietnamization’ effort, utilizing the peace with honor strategy; America’s shotgun wedding to the GOP marriage of silent loyalty and moral obedience was consummated. Between the Nixon and Reagan administrations, Republicans have found ways to swing public opinion into either a silent fear or a culturally moral paralysis. What Conservatives quickly learned was that their voter base would conflate morality and religion with just a bit of prodding.
I have written in the past that FDR’s New Deal was about stopping the rampant inequality in America. There were no financial protections in the banking structure, and the lack of a safety net for the average citizen belied the promise by the country to promote the general welfare. Following Mr. Nixon convincing his base that silence was tantamount to loyalty and patriotism, Ronald Reagan maneuvered that same base into believing that a moral majority could overlook the crimes of drug smuggling and money laundering because moral certitude was how one defeated Central American communism, hence the power of the moral majority.
With the GOP’s opposition to Medicare to aid seniors, starting in the 60s, to opposing healthcare to revive the middle class in the 21st century, Republicans have been consistently playing tricks with religion and morality. One does not have to be religious to be moral but Democrats and liberals have allowed principled humanity to be mislabeled as anti-religious socialism, thus, an anti-American sacrilege. Donald Trump brought back what I had hoped was put to rest, the silent majority, but with a new twist; an unapologetic racism not seen since the advent of the KKK. Republicans have so deluded themselves, that any change to America that does not have the underpinning of a self-serving religion is anathema to their dogma. Nixon figured out how to silence his opposition from within, Reagan figured out how to do it from on high; Trump perfected religious hypocrisy and silenced his opponents by making himself the religion.
Reagan set about drowning the unions and fair wages, thereby sinking the lifeboats of the middle class, for the GOP it was God’s will. While they grieve the fetus, the next 20 children that are slaughtered because they refused to protect them by considering gun safety laws after Sandy Hook—I guess is just GOD’s will too. GOP pro-lifers march every year proclaiming the Lord wants us to protect the unborn. I suppose living children should pull themselves up by their Nike straps and figure out a way to run faster. Even in those times of horrific terror and mass shootings, by domestic terrorists, the GOP tells us silence is golden and real respect demands moral obedience to the rights of gun owners.
After Sandy Hook, it was not enough that GOP legislators whizzed on the graves of 20 children, and six administrators, they took time to dump on the surviving parents. In the midst of their unbearable grief, some of the surviving parents spent precious moments fighting against attacks of being called perpetrators of a false flag operation. Just yesterday, Donald Trump issued a vague threat against the officer forced to shoot a member of a violent insurrection against the United States of America. In light of that threat, the GOP has been silent but nowhere near moral.
Continue to Vote for Change.
