Something Other Than RINO

Republican In Name Only. RINOs. Sounds like rhinos. But it does not carry any stigma for those whom we call RINO. There is good reason for this.

America is ostensibly a constitutional republic. There are other forms of republic, of which America was never intended to be, but into which it has always been in danger of transitioning. The most favorable sounding is a Platonic republic. It is, in short, a republic ruled by the best and brightest of its citizens -- the true elite. There are downsides to such a government, because of arrogance that too often overcomes the best of intentions of people who think highly of themselves and are being flattered about their status regularly.

But what if we have people who think of themselves as elites primarily because they associate with other members who also think of themselves as elites? A mutual admiration society at the highest levels of power. They would lack most of the true accomplishments that an elite force might have, but have all of its arrogance. It's bad enough to have American school children who score near the bottom of the world's students in math and science, while scoring the highest in self esteem. It's much worse to have politicians sitting at the top of the most powerful nation on earth who have the highest self-esteem and are dolts.

Well, I maintain we'd have some Republican representatives who think exactly that they are Plato's dream come to fruition, but are, in reality, some of the most deluded souls in all of America. They bridle at having their self-assessed good intentions limited by a piece of paper known as the constitution. Yeah, they took an oath to protect and defend that constitution, but oaths are for subjects, not rulers. Everybody knows that.

Anyway -- isn't it that sort of person at the highest levels of the GOP who we conservatives consistently call RINOs? We are hoping to be derisive and inflict at least a bit of pain so that they might notice. Here's a news flash: It. Doesn't. Work.

Get this straight. We conservatives think of the Republican Party as the party of limited government. Ronald Reagan even said that. And we're pretty sure that's a major plank in the party's platform, but we could be behind the times.

The reality is -- and it should be as plain as day after 30 years or so of using the term RINO -- that when we call Progressive Statist Republicans RINOs, they think we're simply too dumb to understand. In their own minds they are elitist Republicans, and they have their friends who agree that they are the elite.

"So who are these lowly conservatives to say that we are republicans in name only? It is to laugh. They have no sense of history, or of Plato, or of our importance in the great vision of Plato. Let's just ignore the ignorant fools."

What I am asking in this post is for conservatives to put on their thinking caps. Come up with a new nickname or acronym that will be derogatory, nasty, and insulting enough to penetrate these self-assessed elites thick skulls.

We live in an age where the corrupt and powerful are shameless. Still, if scorn is heaped high enough, it reveals their thinking that the rest of us are stupid. No despots can withstand such exposure for long. Help penetrate the pomposity of Statist Republicans and maybe save this great nation.