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(Republican angst - hand wringing is timeless)

As the election returns poured in proclaiming Harry Truman the surprise winner in 1948 (much to the dismay of the Mainstream Media, who had declared Thomas Dewey, the Republican candidate, the winner by a landslide, even before votes were counted), a stunned Republican Party wondered aloud if this spelled the end of the GOP.

Clearly, history proved otherwise, but in 1948 it was the subject of much gnashing of teeth, weeping and soul searching on behalf of pundits and party members alike.

On December of 1948, a few weeks after the stunning upset, The University of Chicago Round Table hosted a panel discussing the subject "Is the Republican Party Over?". The panel featured Senators Raymond E. Baldwin (R - Conn.), Ralph E. Flanders (R- Vermont) and Congressman Clifford Hope (R-Kansas). The moderator Robert Horn set the tone:

Robert Horn: “I am a Republican and I am disturbed about the future of the Republican Party. After the shock of the election, I am beginning to wonder like millions of others what the future holds for the Republican Party or whether it has any future. This year marked the fifth consecutive defeat for Republican Presidential candidates. This Presidential election was the closest one since 1916. But Governor Dewey in 1948 received fewer votes than he got in 1944, although more votes were cast this year than in 1944. And Republican Congressional candidates generally ran below Dewey this year. In fact, Governor Dewey received only 600,000 more votes than Herbert Hoover received in 1928, although there are many more million potential and actual voters now than there were twenty years ago. Moreover, this fifth consecutive defeat means that the Republicans by 1952 will be out of the White House for the longest time that either the Democrats or the Republicans have been out of power since the end of the Civil War. The Republicans can no longer claim to be the majority part of the country. Many people are saying that unless the Republican Party changes it will die. If I were a Democrat I would also be disturbed about the future of the Republican Party.”

The obvious difference between the Republican Party of 1948 and the Republican Party of 2009 is the absence of the lunatic fringe then, which today appears to be driving away all those sane and moderate voices that would otherwise aid in the healing process and perhaps steer the party in a constructive direction.

Nothing like that appears to be anywhere on the horizon I'm afraid.

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(Ode To The Eternal Bogeyman)

A little history - this time it's August 1949. Sixty years ago and the world, aside from the personalities, hairstyles, customs and technology is just about the same.

Only then it was corruption in Government (the Five Percenters), Free German Elections, Voice of America versus Radio Moscow, China, Polio, The Voodoo Murder Case, Herbert Hoover, John Barrymore and the Vanishing World of Burlesque.

It is probably all quaint by comparison, a curio of a deep-distant past. Most, if not all the people whose voices you hear are gone. The situations completely forgotten, and never brought up in any conversation.

Why is any of this important or even worth the half-hour it takes to listen to this? In each of these stories is some shred of what we're about today, this moment. Fear and apathy, for two, are with us constantly. In 1949 they took the form of the Soviet Union and The Red Scare. Today it's fear of the unknown - fear we won't get what we want and fear we will lose what we have. Fear based on someone telling us we should be fearful, but not knowing exactly why.

At least in 1949 you could point your finger directly at Russia and lay all blame on them. Today it's not so easy - the lines are intentionally blurred, the causes complex. People who should know better don't and people who don't know are blind and scared.

Strangely, it was always this way.

Even 60 years ago.

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(Interior Secretary Harold L. Ickes - Senator Alben W. Barkley - Message bearers)

1937 was the year President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a bill which would raise the number of Justices sitting on the Supreme Court bench from 9 to 15. He also added mandatory retirement at 70. Since many of the sitting Justices were at or beyond that age, Roosevelt foresaw a wholesale revamping of the court. Critics (among whom were former President Herbert Hoover) were hostile to the bill and its ramifications, calling it "Court Packing" and claiming it would would give FDR limitless power to enact more New Deal legislation.

Nonetheless, FDR set out to establish a series of "Townhalls" which were set up all over the country to get public support of his plan. Cabinet and Senate members who were loyal supporters of FDR and judicial revamping put forth the Presidents case for the bill.

Ickes: “ What have the President’s opponents been able to say to you? The Chief Justice and two other justices, the three averaging the age of 78, have told you that a court of nine judges is more efficient than a court of more than nine judges. But at the same time they serve notice that they would refuse to answer questions which might reveal whether a court of nine judges efficient in torturing the Constitution, might possibly be less desirable to the people of America than a court of more than nine willing to give men, women, children and democracy a chance to live.”

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From Late Edition Dec. 21, 2008. Ed Rollins slaps Bush pretty hard for the damage he's already done to our economy.

BLITZER: David Gergen, did President Bush do the right thing by bailing out Chrysler and GM?

GERGEN: Yes. He had backed himself into a corner and had to act and I think Dick Cheney put it well when he said had Bush had not done this, he would have been remembered as the Herbert Hoover of his era.

And it was unfortunate they had to come to this thing. But the real point is here, he's not only been forced to do that, but he has punted this to Barack Obama. Obama now faces a ton of huge decisions in the first 90 days of his presidency. BLITZER: There's no doubt, James, that he did punt in effect because by March 31st, if it doesn't look like it's working out, it is all going to be up to the president-elect and the new Congress to decide what to do.

CARVILLE: They're going to run out of money before March 31st. And right now, auto sales, everybody, doesn't matter, not just American carmakers, Japanese or European carmakers also are down 35, 40 percent. I don't think anybody thinks that is going to change between now and March and David is right, they have the ball and they're going to have to figure out what to do with this and it's going to be quick, very quick.

BLITZER: So Ed Rollins, the $14 or $17 billion in this initial bridge loan as it's called, that could escalate. That could go up to a lot more money given the overall state of the economy and the low demand for new cars right now.

ROLLINS: I think there's no question if you're going to try to save this industry, which is an industry in real problems, you are going to have a lot more money that is going to be thrown at him. I think that's a lot of the objections of the Republicans.

I think the problem the president made here is he let it go to Congress. The Congress, his own party, basically, didn't want it. There's a few weeks before the new president comes in and this president is trying to be relevant. He doesn't want to be Herbert Hoover, he is going to be Herbert Hoover. I don't care what he says, or what Dick Cheney says, this president has damaged this economy and is going to go out with a tarnished record. I think the critical thing here is let the new Congress take charge and let the new president take charge and move it forward. Unfortunately, it is on their watch and it is a mess.

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Rachel Maddow agrees with Dick Cheney:

Given what just happened to the emergency loan that didn't get made to the Big 3 auto makers, I owe a debt of thanks to Dick Cheney, not kidding for reminding us all why it is so important to keep Hoover in mind right now.

[snip]

And how does Hooverism or neo-Hooverism apply to us on this big full moon Friday night in 2008? Well last night Senate Republicans who spent the last eight years setting huge piles of taxpayer money on fire for nothing in return with two ill-advised endless wars they decided that they were the party of reduced spending and fiscal responsibility.

Hell, high water? Feh! Last night, with both hell and high water all around, Senate Republicans killed $14 billion of emergency loans to save GM, Ford and Chrysler. Why? Because they've apparently looked back at the Great Depression and decided that Hoover is their role model. Of course the government shouldn't spend money to shore up its economy and save jobs in a downturn! That might make economic sense. Couldn't do that!

The Senate Republicans are counting on our economic and historical ignorance to win short-term political points for refusing to spend government money on something that it hurts to spend money on. Nobody wants to bail anybody out. But sometimes, you have to. And frankly they are seizing the ideological opportunity to crusade against the unions and against the very idea of Americans making good wages at their jobs.

[snip]

So we're facing a looming three million job economic sink hole. Even if you don't care about those specific workers, those specific American lives, those specific American companies, those specific jobs. Even if you don't care about that everyone fears that a three million job sink hole could suck the world into a depression. Not just us. And in the face of that the Senate Republican caucus decided to block the rescue plan to make a principled point about how much they want to be like Hoover in the Great Depression. And how much they want to lower American wages.