The Log Cabin Problem

I heard an interview on C-SPAN with the President of the Log Cabin Republicans. After some discussion between the Log Cabin guy and the host, two people called in. The first was a Republican and the second was a Democrat, but they both agreed that because the Log Cabin Republicans are gay, they should really be Democrats.

It's interesting to me that this view of the Republican/Democrat divide is so pervasive that many in both parties really have bought it. The religious right has dominated the Republican party for so long that many people have lost sight of the fact that the Republicans once stood for limited federal government, while Democrats stood for a more powerful role for the federal government.

Nowadays, Republicans are the party of:

• prayer in school
• big military build-up
  
• limiting rights of gay people
• limiting rights of women who are confronted with certain intensely personal decisions
  
• the death penalty

I don't know how the Republicans got to this point, but I do think that their party is an unholy alliance between the religious right and the small government folks. The small government parts of the GOP should be ashamed of the pro school prayer, pro military, pro death penalty, big spending, anti gay GOP (for references to all of these statements about the Republicans, check out the Republican Party Platform.)

I wish the Log Cabin Republicans luck. Changing the culture of the GOP is an ambitious goal, but they are optimistic enough to see a small government Republican Party that is a world away from the current GOP.