Marshall McLuhan, one of the greatest thinkers of the 20th century, described how “electric-all-at-onceness” (he wrote before the Internet and died before the PC) would shred every structure known to man. He precisely portrayed our social media, how they would work and their impact on all of us.
The GOP had its McLuhan Moment on September 2, 2004, the day the Tea Party registered its domain name, thirteen years before Steve Bannon launched the latest GOP-shredding social media putsch. 9/2 was the day that the Internet imploded the GOP. With the Bannonista movement, it has split into four parties. We have a five-party system.
McLuhan’s logic was harsh. In 1968, Publius re-expressed McLuhan’s two-volume work, The Gutenberg Galaxy and Understanding Media, in a single sentence: The velocity of information is always increasing.
Fall off the Information Velocity Curve, Publius said, and you die. Doesn’t matter who you are or what your business is. Information velocity governs all.
The flip side of information velocity is information cost: faster is cheaper. And cheaper, as Bannon can tell you, cuts barriers to entry. But, the GOP did not study the half-century old maxim that dominates all its outcomes. For its failure, it must pay Bannon his price.
Can the Democrats avoid the same splintering? Publius’ Information Velocity Rule and his accompanying Iron Laws of Information say, emphatically, no.
The rules are simple: the media barriers to entry have collapsed just as McLuhan said they would. There is nothing about the Democrats that exempts them. McLuhan, who invited then University of Toronto freshman Publius to attend a couple of his graduate seminars in 1969, would rightly have viewed with utter contempt any belief in exception to "electric-all-at-onceness" (Internet not yet understood).
For the U.S., this is a staggering turn of events. Only a few years ago we could still talk of “bipartisan” solutions to political problems, of “both sides of the aisle” and of our “two party system.” With five parties and more to come, all that is gone. It can never return.
What is left of the GOP rump after the Tea Party and Freedom Caucus took their pickings is now being shredded by Bannonista opportunists. How easy is it for them? In Alabama, Bannonista Roy Moore floored GOP stalwart Luther Strange in the October primary there. Bannon made it clear that he has big plans for more such ballot line hijackings. In the world of electric-all-at-onceness, who, or what, is the GOP?
Democrats, are you listening?
A little history. Americans are terrified of third parties. The last time one was successful, Lincoln won the Presidency and the country exploded in a civil war. To avoid the re-occurance of such a calamity, Americans will do anything to prevent the rise of another party. Teddy Roosevelt tried and so did Ross Perot. No joy.
Publius notes the enormous cost of putting a third party on the ballot state-wide in New York. You must get signatures in each Congressional District from at least 5% of the number who last voted for governor. That takes real money.
What are state governments doing controlling federal elections? Article One, Part Four of the U.S. Constitution assigns this control to the states. Why? Because the centralized management of elections over such a large territory with so few roads in the pre-telegraph 1780s would have been expensive beyond belief.
The telegraph came but 1:4 was unchanged. Radio came, then TV and still 1:4 was not revised. But nothing can resist the electric-all-at-onceness of the Internet.
To get around 1:4’s very high cost of entry quickly and efficiently, the Tea Party simply set up a web site, launched social media attacks and hijacked GOP ballot lines.
This was a brilliant move. In the 2010 election, the Democrats secured 193 seats, the GOP 181, and the Tea Party 61, gaining the Tea Party the swing vote. Voila, three parties. And a massive constitutional crisis. The Freedom Caucus followed and now the Bannonistas.
Pay attention, Democrats: The GOP sat on its hands, ignored McLuhan and is paying big. How much are you prepared to pay?
Why did the GOP let this happen? Because the competing parties all use the GOP brand. Boehner, Ryan and McConnell were tricked by the common ballot line tactic into NOT linking the new parties in a formal coalition with clear policy parameters. This sent the GOP into 2016 fatally crippled—it came away with only 168 seats, down 14 from 2014—and allowed Dumb Don to walk right in and take over just as Publius said he would in February 2016 (see Our Constitutional Crisis).
But what did Don take over? A mess. And it shows. The Dumb Dude has become President Zero. Unable to accomplish anything with his four party slush he has turned to giving away things, like the TPP, for nothing and calling these great deals!!
The GOP Establishment must go into 2018 with a nonfunctioning four-party coalition and a fast failing Dumb Don Trump as President.
Such a re-ordering of the U.S. political structure has not happened since the rise of the Republicans and the fall of the Whigs over a century and a half ago. Lincoln never ran for election for the same party twice. Following the Civil War, Americans did everything in their power to restrict the political spectrum to two parties: Republicans and Democrats.
McLuhan would have said that these parties rose on the telegraph and fell on the Internet.
April 13, 2018
Paul Ryan. who replaced John Boehner as Speaker of the House, announced that he will not run again in the 2018 midterm elections. He was unable to pull an Angela Merkel and get his three-party coalition to agree to a common platform.
Between 2014 and 2016, the Democrats gained six House seats to 194. The GOP lost 14 seats and now has only 168. Between them, the Tea Party and the Freedom Caucus control the swing vote of 73 seats.
Ryan's resignation in effect dissolves the failing GOP Establishment rump and surrenders what is left to the Tea Party, the Freedom Caucus and anyone else who can grab a piece. As Publius wrote here over two years ago, the beneficiaries will be some combination of Trumpistas and business-illiterate populists.
For students of U.S. history, this is one of the biggest moments since Lincoln brought the GOP to power in the 1860 election. The GOP is going and we have no idea what will replace it or in what combination.
January 6, 2021
The social media-fired coup attempt in Washington today show how on the money McLuhan was nearly six decades ago. The GOP has collapsed into utter chaos. What is left of it? How will it reshape itself? Can it reshape itself? Is there any self left to reshape? Who knows?