If you ignore the generation after yours, you will become obsolete very quickly. – Brad Paisley
Last week we discussed the complete collapse of the Kane County Republican Party, and even though the national GOP isn’t subject to a similar implosion, particularly in those bright red states, they are embracing the kind of obsolescence that’ll relegate them to peering through the White House front windows for years to come.
There are three primary reasons (pun intended) for this developing phenomenon, with the second and third being somewhat more subtle than the first:
1. The MAGAists ru(i)n the Party
And that ultimately self-destructive dynamic comes, in great part, because the pond scum known as Kevin McCarthy sold his soul to those devils to realize his dream of becoming Speaker. So, now his rogue allies are trying to impeach Biden for failing to stop the flow of fentanyl from Mexico, and that rancor has become so virulent that even mental giants Lauren Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Greene got into it in a foulmouthed hissy fit on the House floor.
Any Republican with half a brain – and there are a few – knows this counterproductive move will only serve to fire up a Democratic base that isn’t too terribly thrilled with Uncle Joe to begin with.
Then there’s the reality that it would be far easier to list the Republicans who aren’t running for President than it would be to list those who are. And every time another no-name GOP knucklehead enters the race it virtually guarantees that Trump will be the nominee and we already know he can’t beat Biden.
Worse yet, Trump isn’t quite as Teflon as he’d like to think. Even I don’t put much stock in the 34-felony count New York indictment for allegedly paying hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels, but the 37-count federal felony indictment for mishandling classified documents will stick, particularly when Trump admitted guilt on tape.
But even that pales in comparison to Trump’s imminent Georgia election fraud indictment which, given his penchant for self-incrimination – “I just want to find 11,780 votes” – will be the slam dunk ashen stake that finally renders him unelectable.
Yes! Twenty-eight percent of the Republican electorate would vote for Trump if he “Shot a man in Reno just to watch him die.” That 28 percent may be capable of wreaking all manner of primary havoc, but without those coveted centrist swing voters, Agent Orange’s general election hopes will be forever dashed. And morality still matters to those moderates who won’t cast a vote for a soon-to-be felon.
But even if Trump manages to skirt the criminal charges to become the nominee, and he somehow mounts a coherent campaign against Biden, his singularly stupid statement, “After 50 years of failure, with nobody coming even close, I was able to kill Roe v. Wade,” will doom him to an eternal second place status. Which brings us to our second contention:
2. Be careful what you wish for on abortion
Put more simply, don’t mess with female voters because they’ll never forget it!
The more reasonable GOP voices like Nikki Haley, and even a few of the hardcore variety, have seen the writing on the election results wall and they’ve muted their no-holds-barred anti-abortion rhetoric. But the Party as a whole continues to profess a dream for an abortion free America which is more than hypocritical for a gaggle that consistently clings to their state’s rights theoreis.
And the abortion issue is causing some real problems in the Republican ranks, too!
In 2022, those deep red Kansans shot down a Constitutional amendment stripping any right to an abortion by a shocking 18-point landslide. A similar 2022 Kentucky amendment criminalizing abortion was also defeated in a GOP dominated state. Even Wisconsin elected Democratic Supreme Court justice Janet Protasiewicz shifting that body’s balance to the blue side for the first time in 15 years.
This surprising form of Party schizophrenia is making matters far more difficult for their more electable candidates, too.
Since the Republican base element continues to dominate their primaries, moderate candidates have to tow the anti-abortion line to make it through those preliminary bouts against the true believers. But then those dire primary proclamations are used against them to great effect in the general, and they’re losing elections because of it.
So, until and unless the GOP finally understands this issue is all but settled with a whopping 61 percent of Americans believing abortion should be legal, they will continue to lose elections in all but the reddest states.
We will continue this discussion in next Tuesday’s part two!
