(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .



Republicans Have Rejected the Twenty-First Century [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags']

Date: 2022-11-16

Since the 2020 election, election denialism has become part of the fabric of the Republican identity. In the midterms, 60% of Americans had an election denier on the ballot. Election denialism reflects a broader shift in the Republican party toward a post-truth philosophy. Republicans deny election results, they doubt climate change, and they deny the importance of vaccines and mask mandates. That is not the end to the list of things that Republicans deny: they deny abortion rights, they deny voting rights, they are, above all things, a party of denial and rejection. Republicans have become the post-truth party. In this election, voters stood up and rejected the party that has rejected the modern world. This election should not confuse us into believing that Republicans are on the cusp of a great awakening and seeing the error of their ways. Republicans have steadily denied the direction the country has taken, and sought to use other means to win elections. Rather than change, we should expect more of the same.

It is easy to reduce the election results to a rejection of Donald Trump’s candidates, and by extension, of Trump. This rings loudest when candidates like Kari Lake, supposedly a star of the MAGA world, have lost. Lake is charismatic, eloquent, memorable, and she lost. Republicans suffered from candidate quality, but some of their candidates were real stars. Lake didn’t lose because she was a dour, inarticulate candidate. She lost because of her MAGA agenda. While this is superficially true, it only tells part of the story. There has been a tendency, even among Democrats, of seeing Trump and the rise of MAGA as anomalous. Yet, this is a gross distortion of history.

The Republican Party has drifted away from truth for much longer than that. John McCain, lauded today, made Sarah Palin his running mate, a woman who was patently unqualified. He was prepared to risk the fate of the country in order to win power. He did this rather than accept the facts of American politics: Republicans are becoming a permanent minority party. Republicans have denied the reasons for their growing unpopularity, and chosen to weaponize electoral maps, draw upon racial resentment, deny election results, and use war to distract from domestic ills, all to win and keep power.

Republicans have not won the popular vote in a presidential election since George W. Bush in 2004. In the last 21 years, a Republican has been president for 12 years, and yet only managed to win the popular vote just once. rather than try and retune Republican philosophy to mirror that of the country, Republicans have instead chosen to reject changes in America and instead, lean upon the Electoral College to continue winning. if you have some kind of nostalgia for the old Republican party, a statement by House Republicans in 2020, authored by Reps. Thomas Massie (Ky.), Kelly Armstrong (N.D.), Ken Buck (Colo.), Mike Gallagher (Wis.), Nancy Mace (S.C.), Tom McClintock (Calif.) and Chip Roy (Tex.), highlights Republican tactics:

From a purely partisan perspective, Republican presidential candidates have won the national popular vote only once in the last 32 years. They have therefore depended on the electoral college for nearly all presidential victories in the last generation. If we perpetuate the notion that Congress may disregard certified electoral votes — based solely on its own assessment that one or more states mishandled the presidential election — we will be delegitimizing the very system that led Donald Trump to victory in 2016, and that could provide the only path to victory in 2024.

This statement, written by House Republicans at odds with the election denialism and attempts to eliminate the Electoral College, tacitly admitted that their only route to power is the Electoral college. Republicans are not interested in listening to what Americans want. The results of these midterms will not lead to some kind of great awakening on the part of the party. Republicans are a party of denialism, and they will deny the fundamental lessons of this election. What they will do is bend the law to suit their designs, and to ensure that they can win the presidential election in 2024, without bothering to try and win the popular votes. Republicans are the party of denialism. They will not try to adapt to modernity.

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/11/16/2136662/-Republicans-Have-Rejected-the-Twenty-First-Century

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/

You are viewing proxied material from magical.fish. The copyright of proxied material belongs to its original authors. Any comments or complaints in relation to proxied material should be directed to the original authors of the content concerned. Please see the disclaimer for more details.