Liberals often deride the GOP as a divided party, but the self-appointed champions of diversity should admire Republicans’ intellectual diversity, according to Fox News commentator George Will.
The ideological conflict between the moderate and the tea party Republicans, the ongoing government shutdown and overall partisan gridlock make passing legislation difficult — and the standoff between the parties seemed to have no end in sight, moderator Chris Wallace said on this weekend’s broadcast of “Fox News Sunday.”
“[L]eaders of both parties this week continuing to talk at each other while they fail to talk with each other,” Wallace said. “Relations between the two parties, I think it’s fair to say, were pretty miserable before the standoff… and all of the splits we’re seeing in the parties, between the parties — George, is any business get done over the next year?”
Will explained that while it’s unlikely that major legislation will pass in the upcoming election year, splits in the Republican party have historical precedent.
“I don’t see immigration getting done,” Will said. “It’s becoming axiomatic that you can’t get anything done in America during an election year or the year before an election year, which is all years taken together. But about the split in the Republican Party — I mean, what else is new? They split in 1912 between Taft, President Taft and Teddy Roosevelt. They split in ’64 between the Goldwaterites and the Rockefellers. It’s a big country and the Republicans now have what liberals are supposed to admire, which is diversity — except liberals don’t want diversity in thought, and that’s what the Republicans now have, and it makes them rather interesting.”