Marilyn Monroe: 'It's My Life'

Source:Inspiration Boost-

Source:The New Democrat

Marilyn Monroe is not known for saying a lot of intelligent things. Not saying she was dumb or anything because I believe the opposite is true but how she presented herself in a lot of ways gave a lot of people the impression that she was a less than an intelligent person. Who may of had more than just depression issues, but she did have the ability to put things exactly as they should be put. Like when it came to life and her point in this photo is poetic and perfect.

That your life is your life and only yours and of course we all have people who care about us and want the best for us and all of that and that none of us live in a vacuum. But at the end of the day our lives are exactly that and we and only we are responsible for all of the decisions that we make and have to live with all of the consequences of all of the decisions that we make and if we only live our lives to fit and be cool. And not to stand out and never live as individuals and always as members of groups, then we aren't living our lives, but we are living in order to please others and just to fit in.

I wrote a couple of blogs last week talking about that I believe that people have the right to make their own beds in life and then are responsible for living in their own beds that they make for themselves. And I meant a lot of that from a liberal political point of view and I meant every word of that. But this can also be used as a way of looking at life as well that we all have the right to make our own beds. So the beds we make for ourselves better be beds that are comfortable for us and beds that make us happy.

Doing what we want to do even if others do not approve of the beds that we make for ourselves. People shouldn't be afraid to standout in life especially if they are happy and are productive with what. They are doing and are good caring people and so forth. Just because how they live, think or speak may be different from whatever the so-called popular will. At the time thinks different of how we are living our own lives.

Life has followers and leaders, people who follow the leaders and people who lead the followers. And that is generally how life works out with people who set trends. People who follow trends and people who may seem different but aren't necessarily bad people. Or unproductive people, but good successful people who are simply different from how the establishment lives, speaks and thinks. But at the end of the day the followers, leaders, rebels and establishment all have at least one thing in common. That they all are responsible for their own decisions in life and are held accountable for them. 

William Shanley: The Made-For-TV Election Starring Martin Sheen

Source:The New Democrat

Comparing the presidential election of 1980 to the presidential election of 2012 is like comparing today's culture and lifestyles of that of the 1950s. Or NFL football from the 1970s to the NFL of today, two completely different eras. And even though TV and especially TV news is no longer as dominant medium as it was back in the late 1970s and 1980, it is still crucial today and politicians still need to do well on it to be successful. Especially is they hope to be President of the United States.

TV and videos we can see off the internet either off of YouTube or even videos we upload ourselves from our own laptops are the closest thing that we have to seeing someone in person. You can see what someone looks like and how they are feeling and doing simply by how they present themselves on TV. And even though the internet and even social networks are a huge factor in how we get our news, TV is still critical in how we are presented as people.

David Von Pein: Meet The Press: U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy (October, 1960)

Source:The New Democrat

The early 1960s was one of the hottest periods of the Cold War (no pun intended) and spending the first ten minutes of Meet The Press talking about China and other communist activities in Asia should be no surprise to anyone familiar with this period. Senator Kennedy who is a political hero of mine and perhaps my number one political hero and a big reason why I am a New Democrat. But he sounded on the defensive on the issue of Asia and China's influence in Southeast Asia. And seem to want to move past that issue by saying that "Richard Nixon and I agree on this issue".

The Jack Paar Show: U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy (1960)

Source:The New Democrat

Jack Kennedy running for president in 1960 because he thought it was the most important job in the world. And that if he was going to be able to do the most for his country, serving in Congress even both in the House and Senate that he did for a total of fourteen-years in Congress was not going to be good enough. That he needed to be President of the United States and that America needed to be an example in the world when it came to freedom and take the lead in showing the dangerous effects of communism.

There are more reasons why Jack Kennedy ran for president in 1960. He thought the country was starting to fall behind Russia in some key areas like with exploring outer space and perhaps in technology and influence in the world. And that the Eisenhower Administration had felt satisfied with how things were going in the country, which is how Senator Kennedy felt. And that America needed to get moving again and he believed he was the person to get America moving again.

Any Given Sunday: Al Pacino- The Game of Inches

Source:Any Given Sunday- From Any Given Sunday, from 1999.

Source:The New Democrat

"Al Pacino - Any Given Sunday - Peace by Inches" 

From Any Given Sunday

Al Pacino from Any Given Sunday playing Miami Sharks head coach Tony Damato, which I believe was the name of his character, explaining to his football team that life isn't just a game of inches, but football is as well. And that every inch and every play is important and can end up being the difference between losing a game and winning the game. And the most important games are where each play in the game are that much more important. "What if  I only made that tackle, or made that block, or made that catch, saw that defender before I threw the ball and get it picked off".

Life and football perhaps especially is a game of inches and plays. Not one inch, or one play, but you add them all up and they become crucial. And the bigger the game is, or the situation in life, the better you have to play and the fewer plays you are able to take off. Because every mistake and come back and bite you in the ass and leave asking a bunch of what ifs. Which is why you have to play every play like it is not just important, but crucial. The difference between winning and advancing and losing and going home. And that was Tony Damato's message in this scene.

Conan O'Brien: White House Correspondents Dinner Featuring President Bill Clinton (1995)

Source:Conan O'Brien-

Source:The New Democrat 

To write a blog about 1995 or even a satire about it I really have to go deep into my memory bank to remember what I think about that year. I was only nineteen at the time for most of that year. President Bill Clinton and Bill Maher touched on Vice President Al Gore's reinventing government program that looked to save money in the Federal budget by making programs work better and consolidation. The OJ Simpson murder trial of course was big and if you watched anything on cable news that year, you would think that was the only story that year.

House Republicans wanted to gut PBS which the President touched on by saying that "PBS could only afford to send Jim Leher and not Robert McNeil because of the budget cuts". They were the co-hosts of the PBS NewsHour in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s. The 1996 presidential campaign was already going on with Bob Dole the Leader of the Senate already the GOP frontrunner for president. And the Leader proposing to move Congress's Senate sessions up to New Hampshire and Iowa so Leader Dole wouldn't have to fly back to Washington as much.

I could go into the government shutdown that happened in the fall of 1995, the Oklahoma City bombing that happened in April 1995, but those things happened after this dinner and the people who performed that night performed before those events happened, so I'm not going to go into that. But just the first few months of 1995 with a brand new Republican Congress the first one since 1953 and House Republicans donating their lives to passing their Contract For America, you knew this was going to be a fascinating year.
Source:Conan O'Brien

Mike Gardner: Democratic Response to President Ronald Reagan's 1985 State of the Union

Source: Mike Gardner & NBC News-

Source:The New Democrat 

This is where we start to see the Democratic Leadership Council the New Democrats in the Democratic Party starting to take over the Democratic Party after the Democrats had just lost 4-5 presidential elections starting in 1968. The McGovernites the New Left took over the Democratic Party in the late 1960s from the liberal and progressive establishment in the party. And as a result Democrats were seen as tax and spend, government can do everything for everybody, people shouldn't have to work and support themselves, soft of welfare, soft on defense, soft on crime. All the stereotypes that killed the Democratic Party at the presidential level in those four presidential election losses.

What the New Democrats were saying is "that we won't win the White House back and perhaps even come close until the change the image of the party and how we are presented. So we don't look like we want to spend most of the money that people make for them. That we will do what it takes to defend the country from domestic and foreign predators within the Constitution. That we'll use Welfare and other public assistance to help move people out of poverty instead of expecting nothing from them as so many other Americans struggle to just pay their bills through working and not collecting public assistance".

And by 1992 we saw the results with Bill Clinton being elected President of the United States with large majorities in Congress and by 1996 we saw most of the negative stereotypes disappear to the point that Americans trusted Democrats more than Republicans when it came to taxes, the economy, fiscal responsibility, crime, foreign policy and national defense. Because the New Democrats took control of the Democratic Party from the Mcgovernitegs.
Source:Mike Gardner

Sun News: Marc Emery Talks to Marissa Semkiw SUN NEWS

Source:The New Democrat

Marc Emery arguing that he's supporting Justin Trudeau the Leader of the Liberal Party in Canada because of marijuana and he believes the Federal Liberals in Canada are the best avenue to getting marijuana legalized in Canada. Leader Trudeau to me at least from what I've heard and read about him sounds like a centrist or a mushy middle moderate. So for someone like that to take a strong stance on marijuana legalization as in favor of it would be a big step for someone of that type of political background.

Jim Heath: ABC News: American Hostages Day 444

Source:ABC News- James E. Carter (Democrat, Georgia) 39th President of the United States (1977-81)

Source:The New Democrat 

"January 20, 1981.  Ted Koppel reports on the last minute efforts of president Jimmy Carter to secure the release of American hostages in Iran prior to the Inauguration of Ronald Reagan." 

From Jim Heath

The final insult from Iran to President Jimmy Carter was Iran not officially releasing the American hostages in Iran until the second or minute that Jimmy Carter was no longer President of the United States. And then the hostages were allowed to leave Iran for Algeria and then to Germany and then of course back to America. The Iranians kept these innocent American hostages who were only guilty of working at the American embassy in Iran longer than they had to just so Jimmy Carter who and his administration did all the work to get the Americans free and deserve all of the credit, but so they weren't officially released under their watch.

ABC News: Special Report: Iranian Hostage Crisis (12/03/1979)

Source:The New Democrat

The Shah of Iran was a major reason for why the 1979 Iranian Hostage Crisis came about in the first place. Because the Shah was a dictator and at times a brutal dictator even though he was moderate in other areas like in economic and foreign policy. But he used his vast powers to keep the opposition that was democratic and theocratic down with his Secret Police and arresting people without charges. And holding them indefinitely without trial. And as a result the Islamists in Iran woke up and fought back and took over the country.

ABC News: Iranian Hostage Crisis (11/11/1979)

Source:The New Democrat

The 1979 Iranian Hostage Crisis was the final nail in the coffin of a very horrible year for America and President Jimmy Carter. With all the bad economic news with the high cost of living due to the energy crisis, high interest rates and inflation, high unemployment. And an administration led by President Jimmy Carter not seeming to be able to adequately respond to any of these issues in an effective way and President Carter's approval rating taking a beating as a result.

The Hitchens Archive: Christopher Hitchens & Eric Alterman (2008)

Source:The New Democrat

Just to comment on Eric Alterman's first point about Christopher Hitchens. Hitchens was never a Conservative, but perhaps a Neoconservative on foreign policy at least after 9/11. And as they both said neoconservatism and conservatism are two very different things. Because Neoconservatives tend to be in favor of reform, where Conservatives are interested in, well conserving, which is the whole point of of the label.

Hitchens and Alterman are both what in at least Europe would be called Social Democrats especially on economic policy and I'm sure on social issues. They both wrote for The Nation and Alterman still has a blog there. They both are big believers in the welfare state and wealth redistribution and not allowing for individuals to become very wealthy at least on their own. I think Alterman was taking a shot at Hitch by calling him a Conservative with his support for President Bush during the War on Terror.

PBS: 'The Clinton Administration - Early Struggles'

Source:PBS- President William J. Clinton (Democrat, Arkansas ) 1993-2001.

Source:The New Democrat 

"From the PBS documentary series "The American Experience"

From E. Elder

The early days of the Clinton Administration were very rough for several reasons. One had to do with the White House staff that for the most part came from political backgrounds, instead of government backgrounds. So they were trying to govern for the first time ever together with not a lot of experience, at least in the Federal Government to begin with. Outside of Vice President Al Gore, OMB Director Leon Panetta and a few others.

They also had several controversies that they were dealing with. Like Gays in the military, Blackhawk Down in Somalia, a refugee crisis in Haiti and a few others. Like struggling to get their own deficit reduction plan and broader Federal budget proposal through a Democratic Congress that had a large majority in the House and a clear, but not super majority in the Senate. Which made President Clinton look like he couldn't govern, at least early on.

But despite all of the troubles that President Clinton had in 1993 and to a certain extent 1994 with the failure to reform health care the Clinton Administration and that Democratic Congress was very productive as far as the legislation they were able to pass. Like free trade with NAFTA and GAT, deficit reduction, gays in the military, the 1994 Crime Bill, Family and Medical Leave and a few other things. So they were very productive even early on even though they weren't very popular.

Charlie Rose Show: Christopher Hitchens On Bill Clinton (1999)

Source:The Charlie Rose Show- Christopher Hitchens, on the Charlie Rose Show in 1999, talking about President Bill Clinton.

Source:The New Democrat 

"A conversation with journalist Christopher Hitchens about his book "No One Left to Lie To", which investigates the Clinton presidency and his criticisms of Clinton's political compromises and personal scandals." 

Originally from The Charlie Rose Show

This just in- Christopher Hitchens does not like Bill Clinton. Now we return you to your Insomniac Nightly Movie: The Attack of the Killer Popcorn. Ha, ha.

This is no secret and as Chris Hitchens said early on in this interview that he strongly dislikes Bill Clinton. He is also an admitted Democratic Socialist back before Senator Bernie Sanders made that term somewhat cool in America. And represents the Far-Left of the Democratic Party whether he is officially a member of that party or not. And is way to the left of American Liberals and Americans in general. As Hitchens said himself in this interview.

Bill Clinton represents the Center-Left of the Democratic Party and for a long time led that wing of the party that brought the party back to power at the national level in the early 1990s. The New Democrat liberal wing of the party, the wing of the party that I come from as well. The wing of the party that made the party mainstream again on fiscal and economic policy as well. Along with crime, social insurance, national security, trade and you can go down the line. Democratic Socialists in the Democratic Party if not hate New Democrats come damn close to that for taking the leadership of the party away from them.

Not saying these are the only reasons that Chris Hitchens does not like Bill Clinton. But I'm also not saying these are not the main reasons either. What I'm saying is that you have to take that in account when you hear charges that Hitch and his allies make about Clinton and other New Democrats. That they call corporatists and sell outs and un-compassionate towards the poor and everything else.

HSN: The List With Colleen Lopez

Source:Facebook- HSN's Colleen Lopez and a friend. 

Source:The New Democrat

At Colleen Lopez’s best, not saying she’s as attractive as Raquel Welch. But when she wear's here hair a certain way she reminds me of Raquel Welch. As a beautiful, adorable sexy woman who also has more than just great looks. The lets say short-haired, but not butch tomboy dykish lesbian look, but where the hair goes down to the woman’s shoulders or so, when Colleen wears her hair like that, she’s beautiful and very cute, but in a sweet grownup sexy way. Not like a little baby-faced cutie little girl who several HSN hosts look like right now. 

In some ways Colleen reminds me of the gorgeous Deidre Hall on Days of Our Lives. But not as pretty or as cute as Deidre, but with similar qualities. Tall, curvy, great body, beautiful and very cute. I just like Deidre more, but Colleen is a very attractive woman.
Source:HSN

Report All News: President Obama: 'To Setup New Federal & Local Job Training Programs'

Source:Report All News- President Barack Obama: in Wisconsin talking about job training.

Source:The New Democrat

"President Obama to Setup New Federal and Local Job Training Programs
President Obama will visit General Electric's gas engine facility in Waukesha, Wis., Thursday to emphasize the importance of strengthening the nation's job training programs.
The plant -- which has operated here for 106 years and was acquired by GE in 2011 -- produces gas engines for oil and gas field operations as well as factories and utilities in the U.S. and overseas. The company has invested $35 million in the operation in the past three years and increased the number of hourly employees from 270 to nearly 400, according to spokesman Gary Sheffer."

"Waukesha is a staunchly-Republican part of the state -- Gov. Scott Walker (R) held his election party here in 2012 when he defeated Milwaukee mayor Tom Barrett, and every Republican presidential candidate since 1980 has won the country by double digits.
But the president is venturing here anyway, to highlight GE Energy's job training efforts. The firm works with a state workforce program to bring together employers, colleges, labor unions, and other community-based groups to train workers in advanced manufacturing, construction and other industries, according to White House officials."

"As he did in West Mifflin, Pa., on Wednesday., the president will tour the facility, make remarks and then sign a presidential memorandum. This directive will kick start an across-the-board review of how to best reform federal training programs, which Vice President Biden will oversee, to help Americans get the skills they need for good, in-demand jobs. Obama will also announce that he is directing Biden, along with the White House policy councils, the Office of Management and Budget, the Council of Economic Advisers and the secretaries of Labor, Commerce and Education, to consult with experts from both parties on how to ensure training programs address the needs of employers. In addition, the president will launch a competition for the final $500 million of a community college training fund."

"President Barack Obama turned his focus here Thursday to efforts to improve job training programs nationwide, as he continued his efforts to show he is doing what he can on economic issues without Congress's help."

"The president's stop here kicked off the second day of his post-State of the Union tour meant to continue the momentum of Tuesday's speech, which focused heavily on executive actions.
Obama reiterated his desire to work with Congress but said he's willing to act "with or without" legislation. "I want to work with 'em, but I can't wait for them," he said on the floor of a General Electric plant here, just outside Milwaukee."

"The president then signed a memorandum directing Vice President Joe Biden to lead a "soup to nuts" review of job training programs with the goal of making the system better serve the demands of employers.

"With the economy shored up from the depths of his early presidency, Obama said, he's now turning his focus to efforts to expand opportunity for all Americans, which will be a priority "until I wave goodbye" when leaving office."

"In a letter sent to the president on Thursday, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) argues that the House GOP has already passed legislation, the SKILLS Act, that includes a similar overhaul of job training programs and that the president's executive action is duplicative of a 2011 Government Accountability Office review of federal job training programs. "income inequality"  technology science  Syria " gun control"  terrorism Obama "minimum wage" "state of the union address" "state of the union 2014" "human rights" "abc news" "cbs news" "nbc news" "bbc news" 

"Wall street digital" "rt news"  "breaking news" "world news" "global news" "latest news" "scientific news" "24 hour news" "apocalypse news" "job training" "white house" "jay carney" biden "jake tapper"

"community college training fund" White House press secretary Jay Carney didn't comment on the GAO report but did say that the president's decision to have Biden lead a review means that it will be done "and it will be effective and that's what the president expects."
Obama heads next to the McGavock Comprehensive High School in Nashville, Tenn. Before he leaves Waukesha, Obama will sit with CNN's Jake Tapper for his first interview since Tuesday's address to the nation. "

From Report All News

There are plenty parts of the Federal budget that I would like to cut back on and reform. Like in defense, agriculture subsidies, corporate welfare, red tape, but one area where I would like to see America spend a hell of a lot more money on as well as reforming the system would be in the areas of infrastructure, job training and education so we are more competitive with Europe, Brazil, China and Japan in these areas. Not to spend a lot more money on a bad system, or just to spend a lot more money. But to reform the system and invest whatever it takes in it to make it as effective as possible.

We could literally have a public education system in America not run by the Federal Government and still run by the states and locals primarily where every student is able to go to a good school. Where none of our teachers are underpaid and where none of our schools are underfunded including in very poor urban and areas. Where educators are paid based on how well their students are learning, not by how long they've been teaching. Where parents would have the choice to send their student to any public school in the district including a charter school. And where schools are funded based on need, not by where they are located.

We could do this by still having the states and locals be the first financial resource to funding schools. But where the Feds step in to provide the financial resources for schools that are in low-income districts so they have the resources that they need to be successful as well. This would require a huge investment probably in the hundreds of billions of dollars and would sort of look like a Marshall Plan but it would be domestic. And it would need to be paid for by not borrowing the money, but is something that we can afford to do.

As far as job training for low-skilled low-income adults. Whether they are working or not if they are collecting any form of public assistance I would make job training a requirement for them in order to receive public assistance. Public assistance would become an investment in human capital and investment in the economy. And no longer public charity, but money spent on improving the economic lives of people in need so they have the skills and freedom to be able to support themselves. Instead of staying on public assistance indefinitely with very little if any hope at becoming successful in life.

I would make job training and education universal not just K-12 or through college, but lifelong. And set up job training centers all over the country including in ever low-income urban and rural area in the country including for United States territories and commonwealths. And make it public-private partnership and bring in the non-profits in the private sector and reward them with grants to set up job training centers and offices for low-income low-skilled adults. Where these people would be their clients and their job would be to find them the right school and educational program for that client so the client can get the education they need to get themselves a good job. 

Poverty is not something that we have to accept and put up with. You have to know why people are in poverty and them empower them based on that knowledge to work their way out of poverty. And the person them self has to take advantage of those opportunities that they need to get themselves the skills that they need to get out of poverty. And not just live in poverty with a few extra bucks from taxpayers and private donations.

C-SPAN: Washington Journal- Steve Scully Interviewing Christopher Hitchens

Source:The Film Archives-President William J. Clinton.

Source:The New Democrat 

I'm not a mind-reader obviously, but Chris Hitchens was an admitted Socialist and was his whole life. Even though late in his career he became more of a Neoconservative on foreign policy and national security. He supported the War in Iraq and admitted that 9/11 changed his take on foreign policy and national security. If Hitchens was a Democrat he was from the McGovernite wing of the Democratic Party, the New Left that came into existence in the party in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The McGovernites that are Occupy Wall Street today are Social Democrats who probably had as much influence over the Democratic Party as the Christian Right has over the Republican Party today. And the McGovernites essentially ran the Democratic Party from 1968 or so until Democrats lost their fifth out of six presidential elections in 1988. Bill Clinton is a New Democrat and comes from the New Democratic wing of the Democratic Party that now runs the party today.

New Democrats believe in using government to empower people. Not support them indefinitely without expecting anything from those tax dollars. New Democrats believe in foreign trade, a strong but limited liberal internationalist foreign policy. Infrastructure, education and job training over government dependence. Smart on crime, not soft on crime which means punishing hardcore criminals and not blaming society for their crimes.

Social Democrats believe in the central state and that the job of government is to take care of people. Not empower people to be able to take care of themselves. Welfare to Work was kind of the last straw for Social Democrats in the Democratic Party after trade, the 1994 Crime Bill and deficit reduction. And not expanding the Federal state as it related to the economy and creating a welfare state for the country. And instead moving away from those traditional Democratic policies.

Again I'm not a mind-reader, but I believe a lot of the criticism that Chris Hitchens has for President Clinton has to do with President Clinton's politics. Instead of the man's personal behavior as President and that Hitchens is still angry over how Clinton transformed the Democratic Party and made it a center-left party again. And no longer a social democratic party that it was pre-Clinton that is common on the Left in Europe.
Source:The Film Archives:

Slate Magazine: Jamelle Bouie: 'John Fund's Distorted History of the Democratic Party'

Source:Slate Magazine- Lyndon B. Johnson (Democrat, Texas) 36th President of the United States (1963-69)

Source:The New Democrat

"Writing at National Review, conservative journalist John Fund promises to “set the record straight on Jim Crow.” And what does he offer? A column’s worth of warmed-over partisan pablum that begins and ends with the idea that, as far as civil rights are concerned, Democrats are the real racists. Some choice passages:

Even as the nation celebrates the passage of the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act, some liberals are using the occasion to bash Republicans as inheriting the legacy of Jim Crow—ignoring the fact that a higher percentage of Republicans in Congress voted for the Civil Rights Act than did Democrats. …

[T]he political enforcement of Jim Crow was entirely in Democratic hands. The Ku Klux Klan functioned as the paramilitary wing of the Democratic party, and it was used to drive Republicans out of the South after the Civil War. Before he took up the cause of civil rights as president, Lyndon Johnson acting as Senate majority leader blocked the GOP’s 1956 civil-rights bill, and gutted Eisenhower’s 1957 Civil Rights Act. Democratic senators filibustered the GOP’s 1960 Civil Rights Act. 

First, an observation: It would be nice if Fund had reckoned with National Review’s early defense of segregation, including William F. Buckley’s assertion that “the cultural superiority of White over Negro” is a “fact that obtrudes” and that “National Review believes that the South’s premises are correct. … It is more important for the community, anywhere in the world, to affirm and live by civilized standards, than to bow to the demands of the numerical majority.” But to borrow from Donald Rumsfeld, you engage with the pundits you have, not the ones you want.

In any case, none of this is inaccurate. As Geoffrey Kabaservice shows in Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party, Republicans were a driving force behind the civil rights bills of the Eisenhower and Kennedy eras, and supported the 1964 Civil Rights Act at a much higher rate than Democrats in either chamber of Congress. What’s more, Democrats were the political beneficiaries of Jim Crow governance, dominating federal elections on the strength of a Solid South. And Fund is right: The defenders of Jim Crow—from Woodrow Wilson to Theodore Bilbo—were Democratic politicians. 

The problem with Fund’s argument is that he takes these facts, divorces them from historical context, and spins them into an unconvincing indictment of the modern Democratic Party and a disingenuous exoneration of its conservative counterpart.

The simple fact is that, despite surface similarities, the Republican and Democratic parties of midcentury were vastly different beasts than their contemporary counterparts. Unlike the ideologically coherent parties of today (i.e., most Democrats are liberals and most Republicans are conservatives), the Republicans and Democrats of the immediate postwar period were heterodox coalitions of interest and historical circumstance. Liberal Northeastern Republicans like Nelson Rockefeller and William Scranton shared influence and power with “stalwarts” like Gerald Ford and Everett Dirksen and hard-right conservatives like Barry Goldwater and Joe McCarthy. And on the other end, New Deal liberals in the mid-Atlantic and industrial Midwest were yoked to a huge faction of Southern segregationists.

It’s not too reductionist to say that civil rights—and more broadly, the Civil War and Reconstruction—were responsible for the general outline of this alignment. Even as the parties expanded westward in the 19th century, Republicans remained the party of the Union (and thus black Americans) and Democrats maintained their allegiance to the South." 

From Slate Magazine 

"Signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on July 2, 1964, the landmark Civil Rights Act outlawed discrimination and segregation regardless of race or color. It was originally introduced in congress by President John F. Kennedy before he was assassinated in 1963. 

Among those present at the signing were:

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy 

Sen. Everett Dirksen

Sen. Hubert Humphrey

F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover" 

Source:Major Kong- Lyndon B. Johnson (Democrat, Texas) 36th President of the United States (1963-69_

From Major Kong

I mostly agree with what Jamelle Bouie here. I would just say that hyper-partisan Republicans today (regardless of what their political ideology actually is) like to blame people they call Liberals and the Democratic Party, for Jim Crow and say that's it's the Republican Party that ended Jim Crow and passed the civil rights laws. 

But the fact is, Far-Right Republicans would like to see those civil rights laws overturned today and go back to the way it is (so to speak) pre-1960s civil rights movement and the laws that were passed thanks to that movement. So are they Liberals today because they don't support the civil rights laws? Of course not. But they sort of suggest that they might think they are with their dishonest arguments about the civil rights laws. 

Today, the Democratic Party is primarily the center-left, progressive party in America, with a center-right New Democrat coalition in it (that I'm part of) and a left-wing that the Jamelle Bouie's of the world are part of, America's version of the Social Democrats or Euro Democrats. 

And the Republican Party is now home to people who were Dixiecrats in the 1960s, people like Strom Thurmond and many others in Congress back then, who were Democrats, until the passage of the civil rights laws. And the Republican Party has a center-right, classical conservative faction it as well today, people like Senator Jeff Flake, Senator Mike Lee, and other classical conservative Republicans in Congress today. 

But in the 1960s and go back 100 years earlier, the Republican Party was the party of progress. Or at the very least where you were more likely to find Progressives in it, even though it's always had a center-right, conservative faction in it. 

And the Democratic Party was the home of the Neo-Confederates, people who knew they lost the Civil War, but thought they would win the cultural war of the time by forcing African-Americans, as well as other racial and ethnic minorities, and women of all backgrounds, to live as second-class Americans under law.