The Elephant (and Donkeys) In the Room

by Dennis Cuddy, Ph.D.

A the recent CPAC convention, over two-thirds of the attendees indicated they would like to see former President Trump run again in 2024, which the former president when he was at CPAC said he would do. Many of the supporters of Trump are more loyal to him than to the Republican Party, so one could say that for the foreseeable future, he will be the dominant “Elephant (Republican) in the room.” There are enough Trump supporters in each state to determine who will win or lose their elections, and without Trump’s support/endorsement, a state candidate will find the withholding of his supporters’ votes will assure the opposing Democrats’ victory.

The same is true of Democrats. On ABC’s “This Week,” host Martha Raddatz asked if Biden or West Virginia Democrat Senator Joe Manchin is the most powerful man in Washington, DC. ABC’s Jonathan Karl answered “Biden,” but he is only technically correct. Manchin was able to demand and get what he wanted in the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill. The British newspaper, THE GUARDIAN (March 7), headlined its relevant article, “Joe Manchin’s stimulus stand exposes dangerous fissures in Democratic ranks.” The article noted that “Biden and Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, refused to criticize Manchin, the senator slapping his podium and emphasizing the need for “unity, unity, unity’.” Manchin then declared, “I’m not going to change my mind on the filibuster, and I’m not going to go to reconciliation until my Republican friends have the ability to have their say also.” Biden and Schumer realize that all Manchin has to do is change his Party affiliation to Republican, and the Democrats will lose control of the Senate immediately and the Biden and radical left’s agenda will be dead! Also, if Manchin can force concessions from Biden, can other moderate Democrats’ demands be far behind? This makes any of those moderate Democrats on any given issue the “Donkeys (Democrats) in the room,” and donkeys have a lot of kick!

Not only is there a problem for Democrats in the Senate, but the left wing of the Democrats in the House will not be pleased with any compromises (e.g., the increase in the minimum wage to $15 an hour was dropped from the relief package in the Senate) in their own version of bills. With Speaker Pelosi’s losses in House seats on November 3, House Democrat moderates will be able to make their own demands for their legislative support. These “dangerous fissures,” as THE GUARDIAN called them, could spell serious trouble by the time of the 2022 midterm election because the loss by the Democrats of only a few seats could return the Republicans to control of both the House and Senate. Moreover, the Democrat Party cannot count on President Biden bringing the Party together, because he has his own troubles. The Rasmussen polling organization keeps a daily record of what is called “Biden Approval Index History,” which indicates that on February 16, President Biden’s approval was 53% and disapproval 44%. However, on March 5, his approval had dropped to 49% and disapproval had risen to 49%!

In addition, Biden’s and the Democrats’ support among Blacks could drop in the future. African-Americans counted on President Obama to help them dramatically with his promised “shovel-ready” jobs, but the jobs didn’t materialize. In the 2020 election, Biden and the Democrats owed their victory once against to African-American voters, but Blacks are not stupid and are quite aware of the fact that while the March 5 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed white unemployment went down from 5.7% in January to 5.6% in February, Black unemployment increased significantly from 9.2% in January to 9.9% in February! Many African-Americans will remember that according to ROLLING STONE (June 19,2019): “Biden rejects calls to apologize for praise of segregationists.” Shortly thereafter, NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE (June 25, 2019) noted that “Joe Biden’s record on integration and mass incarceration is worse than any other Democrat candidate’s.”
And the leftist publication JACOBIN (March 2020) reminded African-Americans that “Joe Biden has built a career on betraying black voters.” This does not augur well for the Biden-Harris, Pelosi, Schumer leftist agenda going forward, and when Biden’s immigration reform opens the southern border to millions of additional Hispanic immigrants, that will further negatively impact Black employment.

With Trump forcing support from Establishment Republicans, and moderate Democrats coercing compromises from liberals in their Party, “the Elephant (and Donkeys) in the room” will be in control of what happens between now and the 2022 election, when traditionally the Party in the White House loses Congressional seats anyway. This might seem as though Trump and the Republicans are well-placed to win the presidency in 2024, but remember that Republicans are not just running against the Democrats, but also against the liberally biased press.

In 2024, for the Republicans to win, they will have to correct the mistakes of the past. For example, they will have to demand that the press explain how Biden on November 3 could underperform Hillary Clinton in 2016 in every metropolitan area (e.g., New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, etc.) EXCEPT the 4 critically contested metro areas of Philadelphia, Detroit, Milwaukee and Atlanta, which are all controlled by Democrat political machines and where in all 4 areas the number of votes cast was larger than the number of voters registered!? Also, Republicans will have to publicize things the American people will find objectionable about Biden political appointees, such as his campaign director and top White House adviser Anita Dunn said the Communist butcher Mao Zedong is her “favorite political philosopher.” And Biden appointed Kristen Clarke as head of his Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division even though she enthusiastically endorsed Tony Martin, author of THE JEWISH ONSLAUGHT who, according to Israel National News (January 12), “trashed the Torah and and Talmud” and said “there was a Jewish monopoly over Blacks being cursed”! Lastly, they will have to keep emphasizing bringing American jobs back home, but also come up with new initiatives.

For example, in education they can call upon all school districts and states to request that teachers on a voluntary basis submit any new teaching methods and activities they have developed, which can then be compiled by subject matter and/or grade level for other teachers around the districts, states and nation to share. I have been calling for this in newspaper and journal articles since the late 1970s, and when I introduced such a new method to public school students whom I taught (1968-1972), an ancillary benefit was that discipline problems decreased as well ! And when I was in the Reagan administration, we produced a research-based booklet titled WHAT WORKS (in education) , which should be made available online to every teacher in the nation.

E-Mail Dennis Cuddy: recordsrevealed@yahoo.com