Whatever happened to moderate Republicans?

We were reading a column the other day in which this statement was made -- "It's no longer your father's Republican Party?"

How true that is.

As the Rush Limbaughs of the world continue to gain traction in the Grand Old Party, one wonders if the institution will survive at all in the face of obvious changing demographics in America.

Limbaugh and Cheney now appear to be forming something of a tag-team in an effort to take over the heart, mind and soul of the party.

Moderates such as Colin Powell are openly forced out in this new era, as rigid "party line" beliefs seem to be enforced on any and all who have even the faintest wish to be Republicans.

It hasn't been so long ago that there actually was a moderate wing of the Republican Party -- but those days (and memories) are quickly fading away in the era of Cheney, Limbaugh, Coulter, Hannity, etc.

When we look back at history, and think "Moderate Republican," the face we most often envision is Dwight D. Eisenhower.

As years pass by and we learn more about this great American hero, the more impressed we are with his legacy -- and, in a word, his moderation.

What better way to capture the essence of this concept than in the words of "Ike" himself:

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

"Here in America we are descended in blood and in spirit from revolutionists and rebels -- men and women who dare to dissent from accepted doctrine. As their heirs, may we never confuse honest dissent with disloyal subversion.

"How far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without?

"I despise people who go to the gutter on either the right or the left and hurl rocks at those in the center.

"I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.

"I have one yardstick by which I test every major problem - and that yardstick is: Is it good for America?

"If the United Nations once admits that international disputes can be settled by using force, then we will have destroyed the foundation of the organization and our best hope of establishing a world order.

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

"Only Americans can hurt America.

"Some people wanted champagne and caviar when they should have had beer and hot dogs.

"We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.

"We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security.

"When people speak to you about a preventive war, you tell them to go and fight it. After my experience, I have come to hate war."

All we can say is that we wish "Ike" were here today to help keep us all on the moderate course that served our nation well for so many years. His type currently is rare in our nation -- and virtually extinct in the GOP.

--REK