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I'm so sick of these headlines.
They remind me of the endless headlines over the years (decades, actually) of how the Republican party is ready to collapse or implode or explode or insert-other-ominous-word-here.
As with all those failed predictions of the GOP going the way of the dodo bird, until I see Trump in an orange jumpsuit I won't believe any of the shit they claim will happen.
@Hazdaz I kind of feel like the GOP has imploded, though. Since Trump especially (and really I think this strain of anti-democracy conservativism dates back to the 2000 election where they saw that they could just bully their way into stealing elections), there doesn't seem to be much of the Republican Party that preceeded him left. Now it's all antidemocratic fascists and nutjobs. Just because they call themselves Republicans and win elections doesn't mean their politics really has anything to do with what their party stands for on paper.
I think it's more a case of being careful what you wish for. Yes, they imploded. Yes, they don't really exist anymore. What has supplanted them is so much worse
@YoBuckStopsHere
I really hate this perspective. It's just plain wrong.
Trump DID NOT change the Republican party. He only made them think the mask was no longer necessary. They've been pro war, pro tax cuts, pro business, pro rich, pro racism, and anti-democracy... for literally decades.
Now that they're not using platitudes and not couching their rhetoric in obvious lies it's suddenly evil?!
Hell, he wasn't even the first time they rioted after losing an election. That happened in 2000, when paid republican operatives disrupted the recount that would have confirmed al gore as president long enough for the supreme court to step in and award the state (and, therefore, the presidency) to dubya without counting the votes at all. Google 'brooks brothers riot', several Republican staffers openly acknowledge that they were there to use violence in order to stop the votes from being counted despite initial claims that they were only there to observe the process and ensure that it was fair. This includes congressman John Sweeney, who said "What I essential told my people was 'You've got to stop them.'" Trump thought he could get away with this because Bush already had gotten away with it. They even planned copycat riots in Arizona and Nevada in 2020 because it worked the first time.
In the last 30 years Republicans have won the presidency 3 times despite having only gotten more votes than the other guy once. They have had two riots after elections, one of which successfully delayed counting votes long enough for the Republican to be installed as president, and one which failed to delay certification long enough to install the Republican. They are against democracy and in favor of violence. They consistently act with those values in mind. They are enemies of democracy and freedom.
It just completely blows my mind that this happened and, more so, that it was allowed to stand after the fact. I think I read somewhere that Gore decided not to contest it in order to not mess with the peaceful transfer of power, but man...
Just imagine how world events had played out if Al Gore had been president on and after September 11th, 2001. Imagine the progress we could have made on climate change 24 years ago. I understand that it's pure speculation, that he could have been a lukewarm president. But come on, he would have been loads better that GWB even if all he did was twirl his fingers.
MLK Jr DID warn everyone about the complacency of the comfortable... Too bad people suck at listening to difficult but good advice.
Absolutely based post. I've recognized what they truly were 20 years ago. There is a slight distinction - the republican party always had 4 stools (people used to say three stools but I never agreed).
First stool is the wealthy just wanting to make more money (tax cuts, tax welfare, regulation capture, etc). This is the true stool in power pulling the strings of all the other stools. They know they can never win a popular vote (why would the workers vote to lower their own wages?). They ride the Santa sled with the big bag of money, the reigns are connected to the lesser stools, and they ride that sled into the bank
Second stool is the religious vote - really captured by Reagan I believe with the invention of the abortion issue, but they go as far back as Goldwater I believe, because he warned about them. These are the reindeer of the money sled
Third stool is the racists, the KKK types in the south. These are also the reindeer
Fourth stool is what I consider the conspiracy theory crowd - they sort of share the stool with the uneducated morons who can't seem to figure out what their best interests are ("get gobernment off my Medicare, vote republican"). This stool might fall under the "undecided" crowd by some metrics, but they fall victim to the usual right wing lies and propaganda all the fucking time, so I don't see why we can't just label them as they truly are, the useful idiot voters of the republican propaganda arm
As a whole, these groups are the same pieces of shit that love Trump because he's talks to them with a bullhorn, not through dog whistles like previous republicans, that's the difference some of you might not appreciate
Edit - one distinction I think is needed is the people who fell for the dog whistles were usually of the authoritarian/fascist type. For example, There were pretty decent religious people or business people who felt the wrong message was being presented by the republican party, but the authoritarians/fascists always fell in line behind the republicans/conservatives. Still the case today
Your fourth stool I think probably should be combined with gun owners & 2nd amendment folks as well. There’s been a persistent conspiracy theory that gets trotted out every year or so that Democrats are coming for their guns, though it’s not exactly a conspiracy, but the way it’s portrayed is as if it’s the first stage of Democratic Socialist Fascists kicking in your door and raping your grandma.
Yes, I think the 4th stool is shared by the single issue voter crowd - it's sort of an umbrella, but it still in major part are the people who fall for the propaganda; say 2nd amendment issue, or trans bathroom issue, or Critical Race Theory (although that might be more of a 3rd stool strategy), or whatever the next wedge issue the right wing media industrial complex thinks of - these people will fall for it EVERY SINGLE TIME. Just major inability to understand nuance and complete lack of critical thinking, whatever the case may be (I'm sure we can talk about this 4th stool a lot. I would love to find a way to cogently sum them up)
He killed their euphemisms
Yeah, I feel like the Republican Party has evolved (or devolved) into what they are now, but it’s not like they hadn’t already been moving in this direction anyways, he accelerated it if anything. Trump took advantage of a Party that wanted a “strongman”, he brought the racism, billionaire businessman background, toxic masculinity and performances you might normally see in wrestling back room drama or talk radio, and a feigned devotion to the Church (that was probably his weakest trait, thus Mike Pence). He brought together a lot of elements of the Republican Party that were already all there, just not really ever focused in one person with such a shitty moral compass and motivation to take advantage of the GOP. Pre-Trump, the GOP has mostly had boring business people like George Bush, Mitt Romney, Bob Dole, and Newt Gingrich and others, nobody really “inspiring” to them like Ronald Reagan.
Please use Satan's full title, Ronald "Genocidal Astrology Fascist" Reagan.
I... I think you both are mostly saying the same thing. Just OP considers the "mask removal" a pretty big event (which I would agree with - we likely wouldn't have gotten such extremist behavior with the alt-right if they hadn't felt empowered by their figurehead).
They don't seem to be defending pre-Trump republicanism - just saying that Trump caused a lot of really bad party puzzle pieces to fall into place, and effectively caused the party to implode, which IS shown by infighting, their abysmal midterm results (relative to how everyone expected them to perform), their inability to get on the same page with literally anything and, most of all, their donor money running dry
They would've done the same things, especially if they got the supreme court stacked like Trump did but without the extra drama.
It'd just be Mitt Romney spouting about protecting marriage and family values from erosion by all those miscreants instead of ol' Marge TG spouting off about the drag queens grooming your kids at the library.
If anything, it's actually a blessing Trump pulled the mask off. Now, only the truly dense or selfish fail to understand or admit how vile the Republican "leadership" is.
Whne you say same things, are tou also talking about January 6 and the increase in alt-right domestic terrorism? Because that would be where we disagree.
The countless headlines of trump being indicted?
This past few weeks were the first time he is actually having any legal consequences. Nothing like the headlines of old.
And yet, he still walks free and his allies still sit in power.
Do not mistake the shadenfreud for actual justice being served. That ship sailed years ago.
He is not as free as you might think. For example: If attempted to leave the country right now, he would be arrested. He cannot go anywhere without a secret service detail and he isn't legally allowed to drive himself anymore. He is being watched and monitored all day, every day.
Hopefully, when he sentenced he will actually be put behind bars and not on "house arrest" in a mansion.
He is more free and privileged than any person in the entire country who works a job and pays rent. House arrest for him is a vacation to 98% of Americans.
That should never be acceptable so long as anyone else would suffer in a cement cell prison until they were executed for this.
The GOP absolutely imploded. That's why they went from "compassionate conservative" to full on fash.
They were never compassionate about anything other than money, guns and jebus.
Just because they have shifted their branding doesn't mean squat about them supposedly imploding. That couldn't be further from the truth.
Not trying to be an asshole but how old are you?
McCain vs Obama to Trump vs Biden is a much different landscape now. Republicans are a mess, stand for nothing and most voters who aren't die hard Trumpers are lost looking for christo-fascists or "libertarians" but ideologically all these groups have no platform, plan or face in the US.
And on top of that despite what media sells, people are sick of the clearly fake culture war. It might get the baboons screeching but most people do not care anymore
It's the same goddamn bullshit. How do you people not see this?? Since Reagan the GOP party is the same worthless piece of human garbage. They might fly a "compassionate conservative" banner this year, or pretend to be "tea party" lunatics the next, but they are the same scumbags pushing essentially the same awful policies for decades now. Pro-business, pro-ultra rich, anti-worker, anti-consumer, pro-military, anti-education, anti-abortion, pro-jebus, pro-guns, pro-limited-government-except-for-things-they-care-about-and-then-in-that-case-the-sky-is-the-limit.
NOTHING HAS CHANGED. They can put lipstick on a pig or horse or anything in between, but the core of that awful party stays the same and in the end they vote in unison nearly every single time.
No way. Look at Bush. Protection of marriage act? The patriot act that created the NSA? They were just more polite about being the same judgemental authoritarian assh*les.
This is like a child finding out what hotdogs are actually made of.
The hotdogs haven't changed no matter how grossed out you are by the truth of the matter.
This is just ignorant man. The GOP, especially prior to the late 90s, was a coalition party the same way the Dems are. They now are not.
You don't have to agree with anything the old GOP stood for to recognize this fact.
You need to realize: Republicans were lying back then, too. Those are talking points for them, not fundamental beliefs.
The only difference now is they're just telling you what they mean instead of couching it in dog whistles, like "urban" (black) problems, or the Satanic Panic of the 80s and 90s...
They're the same judgemental pricks. They're only using meaner words these days.
They kinda did though. The tea party wackos took it over.
This..
I've been hearing "This isn't fascism these are the death wails of a dying party" Since Bush's second term...