The Republican Party

What’s the difference between a Republican and a Democrat?

The liberal, of course, will tell you that the Republicans are for the greedy rich while the Democrats are the valiant champions of the poor and oppressed.

The reality, however, is altogether different. The distinctions extend quite beyond traditional notions of rich and poor. Indeed, when you consider the very crux of the matter, notions of rich and poor become wholly irrelevant.

The fundamental issue at stake is a conflict that has been waged for generations. It is an enduring debate that will not be resolved for generations to come. Indeed, it may never be properly resolved.

That conflict is this: the individual versus the state–independent, self-reliant free will or collective paternal determinism.

The liberal Democrat, for example, believes that man is not in control of his own life; that he is subject to many “structural” outside forces; that man is a victim requiring
generous government assistance, whether that help comes in the form of food stamps, racial quotas or foreign aid.

The Republican, by sharp contrast, believes in the vast potential of individual achievement. He does not believe that man is ruled by race, religion, color, creed, or national origin. He believes that men are responsible for their own actions and that they operate best in a climate of maximum economic freedom.

The official Republican party creed, in part, reads as follows: “I am a Republican because I believe free enterprise and encouraging individual initiative have brought this nation opportunity, economic growth and prosperity.”

The Republican believes that the government “must practice fiscal responsibility and allow individuals to keep more of the money they earn.” The Democrats want to take that money away and redistribute it toward social causes.

The Republican, on the other hand, believes that “the proper role of government is to provide for the people only those critical functions that cannot be performed by individuals or private organizations, and that the best government is ‘that which governs least.’”

That is why the Republicans in the US Congress remain our trusted friends: because House whip Tom DeLay and others believe in protecting our local self-government and restraining the predatory tactics of the intrusive, expansive federal government.

In the CNMI, of course, there is essentially no difference between a Republican and a Democrat. Which probably explains why we have so many of the problems that we have: good or bad, nobody seems to consistently stand up for much of anything.

It is time that we did. It is time that we returned to the party of Abraham Lincoln, who declared: “You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot help the wage-earner by pulling down the wage-payer. . . You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.”