Is this Presidents Day or Car Dealership Day?
Hard to tell, but by now sales are the real reason for all seasons, fulfilling Republican President Calvin Coolidge's blunt declaration: "The business of America is business."
Unfortunately for today's GOP, any invocation of Coolidge recalls the Great Depression wrought by his laissez-faire administration.
Hence, calls to end all regulation on business cite Lincoln instead:
"Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other right."
Fudging "its" to mean "all," GOPers never quote Lincoln's larger point: "Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed."
Much less: "I am glad to know that there is a system of labor where the laborer can strike if he wants to."
They love Lincoln's name, but not his legacy. Emancipation, after all, was the ultimate imposition on business and private property.
Ditto Teddy Roosevelt. Rough Rider in Cuba, yes! Big stick hammering corporate greed, no! And pay no attention to that Citizens United decision behind the Supreme Court curtain.
Neither would have any better chance at the 2012 Republican nomination than Jon Huntsman, the lone sane and honest voice in their race.
Come to think of it, only one Republican president before Reagan could gain the GOP presidential nomination today.
Not Andrew Johnson, a Southerner allied with the North and, therefore, willing to compromise. Nor Grant, who oversaw Reconstruction, the ultimate violation of the sanctity of states' rights.
Plus, Gen. Grant, always paternal to his troops, might have several thousand reasons to resent the Confederate flag so popular among today's Tea-publicans.
Hayes championed Temperance, as did his First Lady, "Lemonade Lucy," while Garfield spoke several languages, and Arthur was a tax collector. Can't have any of that.
Benjamin Harrison? No. He advocated public education. McKinley? Nada! He was reluctant to start that most profitable war with Spain. Yes, he came around, but only after the USS Maine conveniently blew up in Havana's harbor.
Taft, perhaps America's most underrated president, was as anti-trust as Teddy Roosevelt, so no go. Harding was pro-business, but always pliable on social issues, and Hoover was an outright internationalist, so no way.
As objectionable to today's Tea-publicans as Teddy Roosevelt — and even Franklin Delano Roosevelt — would be Eisenhower whom Reaganites, servants of the military-industrial complex, whispered was "soft on Communism."
Today's Tea-publican grievance, however, would be more about Eisenhower's dedication to public over private interest, making him an anathema to a party now pledged to privatization.
Check out this passage from Ike's letter to brother Edgar in 1954:
"Should any political party attempt to abolish Social Security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are ... Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or businessman ... Their number is negligible and they are stupid."
Today that last line is only half true, as the number is now enough to propel panderers (such as Mitt Romney), cranks (Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Herman Cain), ideological robots (Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann) and buffoons (Rick Perry, Sara Inc., The Donald) to the forefront of the Tea-publican presidential selection process.
So no Eisenhower, least of all Ike's youngest brother and closest adviser, Milton, who assisted John Anderson, a truly maverick Republican from Illinois, in a third-party bid against Reagan and Carter in 1980.
Nor is Nixon the one, due to his initiatives for environmental protection and — though never enough to satisfy Ted Kennedy-led Democrats — national health care.
Ford forever endorsed the art of legislative compromise, and he appointed moderate judges. Art, compromise and moderation to today's Tea Party are one, two, three strikes and Ford's out.
That leaves Coolidge, a man once praised by Gingrich as "our last aggressive, conservative president," a tacit approval of the laissez-faire limousine that drives all but the wealthy into the ditch.
What to do about the wreckage? Blame the guy who arrives with the tow truck, as they still do with FDR and now do with Obama.
And have yet another lemon with your tea.
• • •
Jack Garvey of Plum Island can be reached at hammlynn@yahoo.com.
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