Patience has run out
I held off as long as I could. I just can't do it any more. It's long past time to call a spade a spade. Most Republican Party elites (~95% ?) are full blown American-style fascist tyrants (Christian nationalist zealots and/or brutal brass knuckles capitalists). Most of the Republican rank and file (~85% ?) are either (i) full blown American-style fascist tyrant supporters, or (ii) horribly duped and manipulated into a false belief that they are innocent, terribly persecuted pro-democracy patriots valiantly defending democracy, the rule of law, civil liberties, mom, the flag, apple pie, inconvenient truth, etc. I don't know what the other ~15% might be, maybe mostly chronically pissed off people mad at the world and/or their plight in it. Regardless, both narratives are indisputably much more bullshit than truth.
Regardless, the false radical right narrative is much more bullshit than valid complaint.
Nobody ever seemed to consider that enabling the right wing to become more and more extreme over the course of many years might engender a backlash of its own. It appears as if that time may have finally come — and it's clear the Republican establishment doesn't know what to do about it. The question is whether the Democratic establishment does either.
The most interesting aspect of it remains the fact that the Republican establishment is circling the wagons around him once again while Republican voters seem determined to push him to the nomination.
Another warning
Republicans caught off guard by the left's ferocious backlash
The GOP is an authoritarian, extremist political party that is out of the mainstream of American life
Reacting to the counter-culture of the 1960s and the massive social changes it engendered, the left wing of the Democratic Party was always admonished by the centrist and conservative wings not to go too far or too fast. The media even blithely asserted that "America is a conservative country" as if it were an act of God. This article of faith hobbled progress for a very long time and empowered the Reagan Revolution through the Tea Party and Donald Trump's MAGA movement.Nobody ever seemed to consider that enabling the right wing to become more and more extreme over the course of many years might engender a backlash of its own. It appears as if that time may have finally come — and it's clear the Republican establishment doesn't know what to do about it. The question is whether the Democratic establishment does either.
Donald Trump has been dragging the GOP down for years but they just can't quit him. However, the party's rapid descent into extremism is bigger than Trump and the backlash is continuing to show itself in ways that are shattering the status quo.
The swing state of Wisconsin has been a battleground for years with a polarized electorate that has had power swinging back and forth between the two parties with razor-thin margins. It was assumed that the high-stakes election this week for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court would be similarly tight. The future of the outrageous gerrymander that makes Republicans massively over-represented in the state legislature was at issue but, most importantly, abortion rights were front and center. Abortion has been illegal in the state since last June when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and an archaic law banning abortion that had been on the books since 1849 was no longer moot. The hard right legislature and the conservative state Supreme Court wasn't going to fix that.
And then there was the grotesque display we witnessed in Nashville, Tennessee on Thursday when the Republicans expelled two Black lawmakers, Justin Pierson and Justin Jones, for staging a protest for gun safety legislation on the floor of the House. Here's an illustration of what took place: an odious, condescending comment delivered by a Republican House member who is clearly hard-pressed not to go full Bull Connor and address his colleague as "boy":
Rep. @Justinjpearson: “You all heard that. How many of you would want to be spoken to that way?”
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) April 6, 2023
Pearson responds to Rep. Farmer’s belittling, disrespectful rant. #TennesseeThree pic.twitter.com/5uWznU7atq
Yes, calling most mainstream Republican voters and most GOP elites full-blown American fascists is divisive. I get it.
But it is true. There is not one shred of good faith or good will left in among Republican elites, politicians, major donors, professional propagandists or most of the rank and file. Not one damned shred shred.
The radical right shows no willingness to reasonably compromise. No acceptance of inconvenient fact, true truth or sound reasoning. Almost nothing pro-democracy is there. America's radical right is a wasteland of lies, slanders, corruption, false narratives and pro-tyranny sentiment.
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