Am I good, or what? My tentacles spread through the government and political establishment, always striving to bring you only the newest and freshest political bullshit news of the day. And now I have my hands on an advance copy of the GOP’s upcoming Autopsy Report on the recently concluded 2020 general election. And here it is, in all of its pristine glory,
2020 OFFICIAL RNC AUTOPSY REPORT
- Open Lid
- Drop In Republican Party
- Close Lid
- Push Flush Button
The funny thing is, in the days immediately following the 2020 election, there was no real reason for it to read that way. True, Trump lost the White House, but in reality that was a mixed blessing/curse. The GOP did much better than expected in the Senate, and pending the results of tomorrow’s special elections, they may even retain control, ushering in at least 2 years of obstruction and frustration for Biden. And rather than losing seats, the picked up seats in the House, likely putting a leash on how progressive Pelosi’s agenda can be for the next two years. One could almost say that the GOP had actually dodged a bullet, and was still on life support.
But in the weeks following the election, Trump’s selfish, reckless, and irresponsible behavior has done what people normally accuse the Democrats of, Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. His childish attempts to interfere with the individual state results made him look immature, and the party writ large appear incompetent for yanking on his leash. But the death knell will come on Wednesday.
A day or so ago, a guy with more GOP brains for breakfast than I have all year, veteran GOP campaign strategist Steve Schmidt, wrote a lengthy Twitter string in which he forcefully demonstrated that with the GOP Senates insistence on falling in with the maniacal House in contesting the election results, they have ensured the destruction of the GOP, and the end of the two party system for the next little while at least. He predicted that the GOP will go the way of the Whigs and disappear into history. And he’s right.
The proof of this is in the numbers, and they ain’t pretty for the GOP. In 2010 the GOP reclaimed the House for the first time in quite a while, and with them they brought a political oddity called the Tea Party. There were about 15-20 pf them, and they made Speaker John Boehner’s life a living hell, since his majority wasn’t big enough to survive their defection on issues, and they were incredibly ideological. But at their zenith they only totaled about 32 members, and as the bloom fell from the rose quickly, more moderate members were elected over the next couple of cycles, but not soon enough to save Boehner’s job.
But look at the numbers now. In the Senate, there are currently 12 GOP Senators who are willing to dynamite the basic foundation of our democracy on a cheap stunt that is already doomed to failure. That’s just over 1 in every 4 GOP Senators. And it’s even worse in the House. There are right around 120 GOP House members who have signed on to this nonsensical flapdoodle. But that still leaves 75+ House members who are resistant to the rule of Trump And that’s just too damn many. Because Trump has a stranglehold on about 30% of the GOP base, which will make it impossible for either side to gain a true upper hand. And Trump’s base lives for trouble, so as long as they can cause it, they ain’t going nowhere.
Which is what brought Schmidt to the same conclusion that I came to a while ago. The current iteration of the GOP as we know it is toast. Burnt. Traditional GOP conservatives will never wrest control of the party back, and Trump’s base is too small and disorganized to win effective numbers.
Schmidt believes, as do I, that starting as quickly as possible, traditional conservatives such as Schmidt, Rick Wilson, George Conway, Ben Sasse, Jeff Flake, Jennifer Horn, and the others will need to begin the process of creating a new conservative party. And it’s certainly possible, after all, it’s been done before, and there are more than enough traditional conservatives who have fled the GOP to be viable, with the expectation of more fleeing the current GOP if they have a new home.
The hardest part will be certifying their ballots in the first elections they slate candidates in. They will have to get signatures on petitions for every office they run a candidate for, since they have no incumbent But that will be a one time process, because election law allows a party to get automatic access to the next election cycle ballots as long as they grab a minimum of 5% of the total vote. And there are plenty of conservatives to pass that threshold, as long as they field a fairly full slate.
That’s where Steve Schmidt thinks we’re going, and so do I. The current iteration of the GOP is irretrievable, the Trump stench alone will last for decades. And a new conservative political party, created by like minded people like Schmidt, Wilson, and Horn, will allow them to do what most of them wanted to do all the way back in 2012, following that autopsy report. Create a new, more open and socially tolerant form of conservatism, one welcoming of alternate lifestyles, and minorities, and free of the shackles of far right religious zealotry and racism. It will take a while, but eventually the Trump GOP will start failing to automatically qualify for the next cycles ballots. And the nightmare will finally be over.
Follow me on Twitter at @RealMurfster35
Hmm. A third party…in honor of Calvin and Hobbes I’m going to suggest G.R.O.S.S. (Get Rid Of Slimy republicanS)…would make sense, but how the heck does it compete in this climate?? If the GOP base were the size of Bernie’s coalition, then maybe write them off. (No offense to Bernie, just as a coalition that’s about 10% of the electorate)
But the GOP Trump base is huge(ish). Ejecting them makes it hard to see where the new party gets enough voters to compete. Maybe it would be enough to run in GOP districts and win some seats and have that as leverage in Congress. Not sure.
But I agree…sorry, GOP, the cancer is terminal and we’ve done all we can do to save the patient.
actually, it’s easy, just step outside of the current “reality”…The Trump base is, at BEST. 30-32% of the GOP…Which means that a shit load of eople are voting for the GOP for the sole reason that they WON’T vote for Dummycrats!!! Give them a new, retooled, 21st century basic conservatism…One tolerant of gays and minorities, without the religious fervor or bigotry…Immediately, they would get the vast majority of GOP viters who ecame “Independents” when Trump took over, as well as a large chunk of current GOP voters who would welcome a new home…And properly marketed, they would attract voters that won’t tiuch the GOP with fire tongs right now…The current GOP would become a rump Trump party, largely irrelevant…
I agree, I think they just need a sane, viable alternative and they will go for it. If Schmidt stays to his newfound principles of not letting big corporate money and interests control them, it will be a good thing.
I think the sure effect of such a party at first would be their ability to prevent Trumpists from winning elections. And a by-product of that would be that Democrats would win more elections, at least for a while, as the new party would act as a spoiler to weaken the Trumpists. But what we just saw is that most never-Trumpers didn’t support down-ticket Democrats anyway. If “real Democrats”, these down-ticket Democrats would not be so endangered by the combined vote of Trumpists and the Never-Trumpers, since neither would vote for the other’s candidates. But with the loss of never-Trumper presidential votes and quite possibly some centrist democrats to the new party, Democratic leadership would (I hope) finally realize that that they MUST move to the left on economic issues. Otherwise in some races the three-way split could endanger Democratic incumbents. I think the new party would be quite viable, and would ultimately push the Trumpists to the fringes where they belong, but would present some dangers to centrist Democrats as well.
All of which underscores that the Trumpist GOP has owed its success not only to the degeneration of the GOP, but to the Clintonist “republican lite” direction of the Democratic Party and the weak support of the Democratic Party for the middle and working classes over the past 40-50 years.
The Tea Party folks (I still get a kick out of them initially calling themselves tea baggers!) didn’t just pop up out of nowhere. One thing you wrote I’d beg to differ on, and that’s the fact that the GOP had control of the House more recently than you suggest. Remember the 1994 midterms and the Gingrich Revolution? The Contract ON America? Pelosi didn’t become Speaker for the first time until Democrats retook the House in 2006. However, that class of slash & burn Republicans that Gingrich unleased provided the “farm fields” that led to those Tea Party folks. The rot was already deep when they started tossing turds into the punchbowl. I do agree they might well implode and that Trump might be the catalyst for that to take place. I hope it will happen but it will be ugly and there will be all kinds of collateral damage.
Schmidt and company may be right — a newly cleansed party might pull conservative chestnuts out of the fire, but a more likely result is that it will split the Republican vote right down the middle, since Trump followers will continue to follow him blindly in 2024. All that would be good news for the Democrats, so I’m all in favor of the New Conservative Movement!