There is a belief pushed by the mainstream media that there was a GOP before serial sex abuser Donald Trump (SSAT) took over the party and a very different GOP after SSAT. In this view, before SSAT, the GOP had a mix of so-called moderates and extremists but the extremists were a minority and the party establishment consisted of moderates who could keep them in check and fob them off with small favors. But that is simply not true.
To find that old GOP, one has to go way back, as far back as the Eisenhower days and even then we had the anti-Communist hysteria led by Joe McCarthy loonies who had considerable influence. But it was with Richard Nixon that the GOP started its rapid slide to the far right and in its racist attacks on the poor and minorities, disguised as the war on crime. Over time, that mask of moderate dominance began to peel away steadily with people like Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich, and the Tea Party becoming ascendant and the demonizing of government going into full swing. Sarah Palin’s ascendancy to becoming the vice-presidential nominee and her appeals to the ugliest sentiments of the electorate revealed the true face of the party. SSAT is the person who has finally and openly gloried in what the party has become. He is the word become flesh, to use a biblical metaphor.
Luke Savage says that the last GOP primary debate showed the lunacy of the current GOP even without SSAT.
The primary contest has also underscored the absurdity of thinking that the mainstream Republican Party would somehow be saner or less terrifying without Donald Trump. At last night’s debate in Miami, the five qualifying candidates spent the better part of two hours trying to one-up each other’s reactionary rhetoric and zealous commitment to militarism. Though peppered with the usual conservative boilerplate — Nikki Haley thinks America needs “an accountant in the White House”; Tim Scott is a big fan of Ronald Reagan; Ron DeSantis is worried about America’s national debt — much of the evening was focused on foreign policy and saw the candidates dial up “war on terror”–style jingoism to eleven.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, all five candidates were evangelical in their support for Israel’s relentless bombing of Gaza — the word “Palestine” not being uttered once over the entire debate. But what was most striking was the way the likes of Haley and Scott basically free-associated whenever they invoked a perceived adversary. Calling Israel “the tip of the spear when it comes to Islamic terrorism,” Haley proceeded to link Hamas with Iran and Iran with China and Russia. Not to be outdone, Scott pledged to “cut the head off the snake” and launch a direct strike against Iran, later insisting that America is currently home to “thousands of terrorist sleeper cells.” At one point, Christie seemed to improvise a new Axis of Evil on the spot, linking Russia (led by a “communist KGB dictator”), China, Iran, and North Korea as if they represented a unitary geopolitical adversary.
With the sole exception of Vivek Ramaswamy, who attacked neoconservatism while also spouting plenty of his own insanity, the vision of the world projected by the Republican presidential hopefuls was one where the United States should consider itself under existential threat at all times — facing a nonstop invasion on its southern border, sleeper cells consisting of Chinese agents and jihadists who are poised to strike at any moment, and an alliance of foreign powers so menacing that no amount of military spending should ever be considered enough.
Given Trump’s iron grip on the GOP, last night’s debate will mean very little and will soon be forgotten by the few who remember it at all. Nevertheless, it stands as a useful reminder of how completely insane the Republican Party is capable of being in his absence — and the absurdity of liberal fairy tales about a righteous conservatism in exile.
By the way, Tim Scott, another contender for the nomination, has withdrawn from the race. Since he never made any impact at all, his withdrawal will not cause any ripples either.
Stephen Colbert discusses Scott and the ever-escalating unhinged rhetoric of SSAT, who is now straight-up appropriating the imagery of Hitler and Mussolini in his efforts to demonize opponents.
Putin is a lot of things, but one thing he’s definitely not is a communist. Also, aren’t the GOP pro-Russia these days? I lost track…
Reagan abolished tourist visas (although Dubya brought them back). For that alone, Reagan deserves respect.
JFK: “Ask not what your country can do for you . . .”.
The drive toward totalitarianism was already in full swing. The purpose of government is to facilitate meeting the needs of people, not the other way around.
Well, there’s your problem right there. They depend on short memories, on people forgetting that there was such a thing as Sarah Palin, for instance.
Similarly, there’s a belief I see amplified here that Trump is somehow the creation of the Republican party and an embodiment of what it stands for, rather than actually being in opposition to it and being an object of hate by the vast majority of people actually in position of power within the party. He’s popular with Republican VOTERS, but they’re obviously thick as pigshit. Republican POLITICIANS clearly can’t stand him and wish he was dead, and have done since 2015. Pretending Trump represents Republicans relies on people you’re talking to having no memories past Trump’s victory in the election and no critical faculties.
We hear a lot from “moderates” such as the Lincoln Project about how Trump took the party off the rails. Unfortunately, they’re wrong or more likely, lying. It’s the same track, just sped up a little. Every time they made baseless claims of voter fraud, called themselves “real Americans” (contrasting themselves with Democrats who were not), or showed a map indicating where Democratic voters lived in order to explain why a newly elected Democratic President or Congress had no mandate to rule, they helped promote fascism. All of those strategies served to delegitimize the political opposition, a key component of fascism. None of them spoke out about any of those things, so they now reap what they sowed. So Lincoln Project,why is the current Republican party acting the way it does? To quote a famous “war on drugs” PSA spot, they learned it from watching you.
@4 sonofrojblake: You are right that Trump represents a good part of the Republican voting base while the Republican party would like to get rid of him now. Still Trump is a creation of the Republican party though they certainly didn’t intend to. The Republican party intentionally built a huge gap between what the voting Republicans believe and what much of elected Republican officials believe. The Republican elected officials and party officials pushed things like abortion, stupid nationalism, disrespect for government and such. What they actually did was cut taxes for the rich, cut regulation on corporations, reduce social welfare and other pro-super rich policy.
After enough time people who actually bought into the populist part of the Republican dogma ran and won, creating the tea party/maga right and paving the way for Trump. Trump talked a populist game and played into the dislike for government that the Republicans had pushed while saying privately to the donors he would cater to them. Once he was elected he ticked elected Republicans and donors because he catered only to himself and lacked the skill and discipline to actually implement the things he had promised. He could still appeal the Republican voters though by putting the blame on Republican officials around him and on Congress.
Trump is the hatred of DC and government coming back to bite the Republicans.
“The Republican party intentionally built a huge gap between what the voting Republicans believe and what much of elected Republican officials believe.”
Good point. I hadn’t thought of it in those terms. Some would call Trump a genius for so successfully inserting himself into that gap. I feel a bit tinfoil-hatty for suggesting it wasn’t his idea, but I just can’t credit him with that much wit.
Then again, i need to remember -- Trump didn’t win. Clinton lost. He’s not a genius, nor was he being controlled or manipulated by one. He was lucky to be up against such a complacent, entitled opponent.
Pretending Trump represents Republicans relies on people you’re talking to having no memories past Trump’s victory in the election and no critical faculties.
Trump ran as a Republican, in Republican primaries, where he won lots of votes from Republicans, and many high-level Republicans actively supported him while many others chose not to oppose him. That’s pretty much the very definition of “representing Republicans.” So yes, he does represent the Republican Party, and MANY Republican voters.
@8:
How old were you in 2015? Do you even remember how it went down? Did he run as a Republican? Really?
Bear in mind the guy was a registered Democrat for more than eight years, this century.
Bear in mind that pretty much his entire schtick when he ran was that he was NOT a politician -- by which he didn’t mean “I’m not a Democrat”, he meant “I’m not a politician, like all these other corrupt bastards” -- a sentiment very very clearly aimed not just at Democrats but at OTHER REPUBLICANS. “Drain the swamp” wasn’t aimed at just Democrats. You do remember that catchphrase, right?
I mean…
I have to give you that, fair enough. But he had to run in SOME primaries, if he was ever going to be President (you don’t have to be that bright to realise you’ll never be President as an independent candidate) -- and there was a gap between what the Republican party was saying and what it was doing, a gap he was able to insert himself into. Then and now, I see the Republican party as his victims, not his allies. (Deserving victims, don’t get me wrong, but victims nonetheless).
Republican VOTERS, sure. Not Republican politicians, though.
Jeez memories are short. The entire Republican Party (not the voters, the actual party) lined up to ridicule and trash him for months. They didn’t even take the hint to get the fuck in line when he dismantled Jeb Bush, surely the shoo-in candidate to face Clinton in any normal universe. They did everything they could to stop him being their candidate, and only started getting in line when they utterly failed to do so. Can you name ONE high-level Republican who was supporting Trump before Jeb Bush stepped down? Honestly interested, I can’t remember one.
Don’t you remember?? All this shit happened IN PUBLIC, less than ten years ago.
The point being made here, which I think you’ve missed, is that Trump represents (as in, looks after the interests of) Trump, Donald J., and nobody and nothing else -- crucially, not even other rich people. That’s why the Republican party fucking hate him. They know he’s only in it for the personal grift, and that he’s terribly short-sighted even at doing that.
Yes, he’s able to get people -- presumably mostly Republicans -- to vote for him, but he for damn sure isn’t doing so by actually representing them in any normal sense -- or even really promising to, in any normal sense. It’s baffling. “Make America Great Again” is the ur-example of the empty campaign promise -- what does it mean?
I think there’s a element here of semantics: obviously Trump “represents” Republicans inasmuch as that’s what’s written next to his name when they describe his Presidency. What I was getting at was that, as in so many other ways, things don’t apply to Trump the way they usually apply to other people -- in this case, the word “represent” has been twisted well away from its usual application.
Bear in mind the guy was a registered Democrat for more than eight years, this century.
Yes, and the Democrats never took him seriously, so he started running as a Republican. Your point…?
ear in mind that pretty much his entire schtick when he ran was that he was NOT a politician…
So what? Lots of politicians do that, many of them Republicans pretending to run against the “Washington establishment” or “Washington elites.”
I have to give you that, fair enough. But he had to run in SOME primaries…
Yes, and he ran in the Republican primaries, repeating a lot of Republican blither-points. And lots of people who vote in Republican primaries — like, you know, Republicans — voted for him. How does all that together not make him a Republican?
…and there was a gap between what the Republican party was saying and what it was doing, a gap he was able to insert himself into.
So he was in a zone between Republican words and Republican deeds. That’s still pretty much a Republican zone. It certainly isn’t a Democratic, Green or Socialist zone. Your point…?
Then and now, I see the Republican party as his victims, not his allies. (Deserving victims, don’t get me wrong, but victims nonetheless).
They actively supported him, and many times voted with him when they could have done otherwise. That makes them his allies. (Why else would you call them “deserving victims?”)
Jeez memories are short. The entire Republican Party (not the voters, the actual party) lined up to ridicule and trash him for months.
Until he got nominated, at which time they all dutifully fell in line and worked to get him elected. You do remember that bit too, right? I certainly don’t remember a huge Republican coalition publicly saying, with anything like a unified voice, that Donald Trump was fired from their party and they were endorsing Clinton or Gary Johnson instead.
Can you name ONE high-level Republican who was supporting Trump before Jeb Bush stepped down?
Why would that be relevant? They eventually chose to support him, which means they chose him to represent them.
The point being made here, which I think you’ve missed, is that Trump represents (as in, looks after the interests of) Trump, Donald J., and nobody and nothing else — crucially, not even other rich people.
Bullshit — plenty of rich people wanted, and still want, someone like Trump to destroy as much of our government as he can, so it won’t hinder them in their divinely-ordained quest for maximum power and wealth with zero responsibility.
That’s why the Republican party fucking hate him. They know he’s only in it for the personal grift…
It doesn’t matter if they hate him — they still support him, because they know fine well their entire ideology and policy platform has been a grift all along, and they NEED a really energetic grifter-in-chief to keep their business going.
Yes, he’s able to get people — presumably mostly Republicans — to vote for him, but he for damn sure isn’t doing so by actually representing them in any normal sense — or even really promising to, in any normal sense. It’s baffling. “Make America Great Again” is the ur-example of the empty campaign promise — what does it mean?
Well, yeah, getting people to vote for someone is “normally” how that someone gets to represent them. For better or worse, that’s pretty much how representative democracy works. And as for empty campaign promises, Republicans have had zillions of them, from “Family, Neighborhood, Work Peace, Freedom” all the way up to “protect biological sex,” “parental rights,” “school choice,” “War on Drugs,” “Keep America Safe,” ans surely dozens more I’m not remembering in the time I have.
Seriously, Donald Trump is a Republican, and he’s about to get their nomination again, full stop.
To be obvious about it:
It means he’s a genius at it, basically. That much is evident.
Cult leaders have this thing, he has it in spades.
(Hagiographies have and shall be written about him)
A bit like during The Apprentice he leveraged that thing about learning by teaching and became The Boss, at least in his own mind and that of his followers, and of course, ostensibly by the GOP constituency in general.
Ah well. Always have to remember sufficient leverage can cause upsets, because only roughly half of the overall eligible voters actually bother to vote.
(That’s a lot of slack in the system, no? Inflate a demographic segment here and there, and… bing! Electoral college win)
@10:
You missed my point -- you do at least realise that, so there’s something.
The Dems never took him seriously? You consider the Republicans DID? (before he took them to pieces and reassembled them in his own image, I mean).
My point (that you missed) was -- Trump is not and never has been aligned seriously with either party. The Republicans looked like the path to power, so he took that path. It wasn’t because he agreed with them, it was purely because he saw an opportunity to tap their supporters for money. And he was right.
So what? Well, the difference, which you seem to be ignoring, is that those guys are politicians. When Trump turned up with his “I’m not a politician” schtick, the biggest news is he wasn’t lying. He could legitimately point at all the Democrats AND Republicans and draw a clear distinction between them and himself, a person who had never held or even seriously sought elected office. You don’t think that makes him different? OK, whatever.
Yeah, you’re definitely missing the point. Again: he was able to dupe Republican voters (and others) into voting for him. He parroted Republican talking points, sure, but Jeb Bush could have done that, Ted Cruz could have done that -- they ARE Republicans. How about you stop knee-jerk responding to these posts for about five minutes and just sit and think about how Trump WAS and IS qualitatively different to the roster of actual Republican politicians he demolished in the primaries in 2015? Just… think about it. Because I mostly don’t disagree with you on much, really.
Because they created the conditions for his rise. They left the gap between promise and action. That’s why.
YES! YES! You DO remember! You do remember the whole party machine ranged against him, trashing him, ridiculing him, even after he took down their best financed, most experienced, most recognised candidate. And they kept ON trying to stop him even as he dismantled contender after contender. And they ONLY got the fuck in line AFTER they realised that voters -- the ignorant treacherous bastard voters -- couldn’t be simply ordered to vote for the establishment candidate and persisted in voting for this obvious clown. Then AND ONLY THEN did they start to realise which way the wind was blowing, and like the bunch of spineless creeps they all are, they lined up to support the guy they very clearly fucking hated. YOU DO REMEMBER.
Well of course you don’t, because the one thing the Right has been historically good at (unlike the Left) is shutting the fuck up and pulling together to GET POWER. They hated Trump, but people were voting for him, so hey, let’s get power and argue later. If only the Democrats were that disciplined, there’d never be a Republican president ever again.
Because YOU said “many high-level Republicans actively supported him” -- when the truth is NO high level Republicans supported him AT ALL until AFTER the last alternative had been beaten.
“Eventually” is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence. And “chose” is strained to breaking point. They got behind him ONLY AFTER the treacherous bastard Republican electorate persistently didn’t vote for actual Republican politicians that the party backed. And they didn’t even see which way the wind was blowing when Bush had to pull out -- they hung on right to the very end, only getting behind him when there was absolutely no alternative. YOU DO REMEMBER, right?
Again with the single critical phrase -- “someone like”. Yes, the rich want “someone like” Trump. But do they want him, personally? Pop quiz -- how many Republicans, so far, have thrown their hat in the ring to be the candidate for President? Never mind how pathetically poorly they’ve all done in polls -- how many?
I think you’re definitely half right (the second half).
I think the argument here is basically a semantic one about what it means to “be a Republican”, possibly additionally complicated by a different understanding of who “the Republican party” refers to. The fact that the US and UK party systems operate in quite different ways, despite using much the same terms, probably isn’t helping.
The Republicans looked like the path to power, so he took that path.
Yes, and that, plus the Republicans’ ultimately accepting and supporting him, makes him a Republican. QEDuh.
Sure. But it did, and thus so did they. He is Republican without the pretence of decency.
Dunc: this has gotta be among the dumbest semantic arguments I’ve ever got into. I have no idea why sonofrojblake is trying to get us to ignore such obvious facts — and no, it has nothing to do with different US/UK party systems. The only guess I can venture is that they have lifelong-rock-ribbed-Republican relatives, whom they’re trying to absolve of any responsibility or connection to Trump. Which I can certainly understand, since I have a few such relatives too — but facts are facts, and I’m not letting them off the hook, any more than I’m gonna deny or sugar-coat my more distant slave-owning ancestors.
Nope -- I am not aware of anyone I’m related to or am acquainted with who’s even eligible to vote OR lives in the US. But I agree this is a dumb semantic argument from which I’m going to withdraw, adding only that this kind of dumb semantics seems to be our only area of disagreement -- we seem to be entirely on the same side re: Trump, Republican pols AND Republican voters. So, yeah, OK.