GOP: What's in an acronym?

The acronym "GOP" has stood for decades as the "grand old party". That's because of the party's historical roots, its tradition of being … well … traditionalist.

But today's GOP is hardly that. It's far more radical — radical in the sense that its young progenitors want to reverse-revolutionize America — that is, the new GOP wants the U.S. to return to a bygone era of closet racism, closet sexism, closet religiosity, and closet … er … closetness, except for expanding U.S. presence abroad under the not-so-subtle philosophy of American exceptionalism.

Republicans — the GOP — did not exist at the founding of this country. In fact, their roots tap from both parties at that time: John Adams's Federalists and Thomas Jefferson's Democratic-Republicans. Today's GOP activists draw from the Federalists for a strong U.S. presence abroad and from the the Democratic-Republicans for a weak central government at home (except for their special issues: abortion, immigration, voting rights, etc. — i.e., the limitation of all of the above.)

What they don't understand is that the democratic process in this country has been based on compromise. The Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, the original Amendments were all the products of compromise. While political campaigns were often dirty — just as ours are today — the decision-making in Congress and between Congress and the Presidency was predicated on finding common ground.

Today's GOP has rejected compromise, the result being a political party appealing only in a negative sense. Too bad. Because GOP history is replete with many compromises that have created positive steps forward for this country: The end of slavery, the establishment of our National Parks and protected lands, protection for the environment, just to name a few milestones.

The Whigs, by their embracing outmoded ideas and philosophies, became irrelevant in the mid-19th century. But political realities were different then: Money was not such a big player.

Given all the ideological realities, the GOP of today should be as irrelevant as the Whigs in the mid-19th century. Yet because of money and the intellectual stupidity of a large number of the American populace,  today's GOP is being propped up to a position far greater than it deserves.

In short, instead of "grand old party", "GOP" should stand instead of some other moniker. Here are a few suggestions:

• gone overboard presently
• gifted omniscient putzes
• grating omnipresent prattlers
• gullible opinionated polemicists
• goofy obstinate partisans

Oh heck! We could have a lot of fun with this. Does anyone have any suggestions?

— LP