Friday, October 14, 2016

I STILL SAY THE POST-TRUMP GOP WILL BE A LOT LIKE THE PRE-TRUMP GOP

The New York Times invited Erick Erickson, an early #NeverTrumper on the right, to imagine the GOP's post-Trump future. At first it seems as if Erickson wants the party to move in Trump's direction:
Republicans first must acknowledge there are legitimate concerns that fueled Mr. Trump’s rise. Both parties are more interested in listening to check writers than voters. Many Americans see their neighborhoods being overrun by addiction and poverty, but see neither help nor recognition of the problem from Washington. It is not hard to conclude that Republicans and Democrats alike value cheap, imported labor and could not care less about the heartland.
But the policy proposals Erickson offers are ... the same old same old. Not only are they pre-Trump proposals, they're Trump proposals, because Trump agrees with the mainstream GOP on all of this:
... Republicans should empower individuals by making school choice a priority. Education must be treated as a civil right, and parents should be allowed to pick where their children go to school. Education dollars should then be allowed to follow those students to those schools.
Donald Trump also favors school choice.
The Republican Party must be the party of religious liberty. When beliefs clash, people and government need to accommodate those differences. To force people of faith to adhere to secular standards is as much an imposition of a religious viewpoint as forcing secular people to adhere to the standards of a religion.
This isn't about Muslims or Sikhs or atheists. It's about conservative Christians not baking cakes for same-sex marriages or rejecting insurance for employees that includes birth control. Trump is completely on board with the notion that Christians are being persecuted in America.
The party must also get government out of the marketplace, except to ensure a level playing field and protect against fraud. It must support innovation and creative disruption, lower taxes and reduce regulation....
Trump wants to deregulate Wall Street and eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency.
Lastly, Republicans should establish themselves as the party of heterogeneity, opposed to one-size-fits-all morality. Different communities should have the freedom to be different in the public square.
That means states should be allowed to ban same-sex marriage and place restrictions on the use of public bathrooms by trans people. Trump pledges to appoint Supreme Court justices who'll overturn the nationwide legalization of same-sex marriage.

If Erickson really is pointing to the GOP's future, that future looks almost exactly like the party's past -- and present. It's just Trumpier than the pre-Trump past. It'll be more hard-line about immigration (though the congressional GOP was rather hard-line already, apart from the leadership). Otherwise, nothing new here.

But will the rank-and-file go along with that? Erickson is basically describing the party of the GOP establishment -- of leaders like Paul Ryan. Harry Enten notes that the rank-and-file prefers Trump:
Trump is more popular among Republicans right now than Ryan is. In the most recent YouGov poll, for example, Trump’s net favorability rating (the percentage of respondents who rate him favorably minus the share who have an unfavorable opinion) among Republican primary voters was +36 percentage points. Ryan’s was just +16 points. Perhaps more telling is that Trump’s “very favorable” rating among this group is 34 percent, while Ryan’s is only 13 percent.
But Ryan is still in positive territory, even after all the hits he's taken from Trumpers. And I remain convinced that Trump is going to leave the political stage not long after his defeat. He'll move on to something else. He won't even want to try to do the slow, long-game work of systematically driving the old guard out of the GOP. That effort isn't about him. He'll want something more immediately ego-gratifying.

Ed Kilgore notes that Trumpism is more popular than Ryanism in the GOP right now, but he notes one advantage Ryan (and the rest of the anti-Trumpers) might have after the election:
If, for example, Republicans lose the presidency and the Senate but hang on to the House, Paul Ryan will be the natural focal point for party-wide resistance to the Clinton administration, and 2018 midterm gains (statistically very probable if Democrats continue to control the White House) will make him look successful (that’s assuming, of course, that Ryan could again cobble together the votes to retain the gavel, and would want to). Other would-be successors to Trump as party leaders -- notably former rivals Cruz, Rubio, and perhaps Kasich -- will be around to help with the anti-Trump heavy lifting.
The rank-and-file will focus on how much they hate the new president. That gives Ryan et al. a natural advantage that Trump, who'll be wandering in the wilderness, won't have.

So I think Erickson's shiny new vision of essentially the same old GOP will prevail. I think the press will, idiotically, treat it as a breath of fresh air after Trump. A year from now, we really might be right back where we were two years ago.

16 comments:

Lit3Bolt said...

*sits down with coffee to read Steve M's article*

*finishes reading*

*gets up, adds whiskey to coffee*

*siiipppppp*

Jimbo said...

All that wonderful "heterogeneity" in school choice means local taxes would skyrocket as everyone tries to get into expensive charter schools and the public education system disappears. Ditto for other public services. The problem with extreme individualism as the main driver of public policy is that it is simultaneously extremely expensive, very inefficient and widely variable in quality. But so-called "conservatives" don't actually care about any of that.

Unknown said...

My prediction for the Repubs post election is another rebranding effort, with Trump assigned to the dustbin of history, right next to GWB. Trump supporters will be as hard to find as cockroaches in bright light. The odds of this outcome increase in proportion to the size of Trump's defeat. Bullies reveal themselves as cowards when you can stand up to them.

The white nationalist misogynists will still be white nationalist misogynists, but their revolution will now mostly take place inside their own minds.

Anyway, that's what "if the future resembles the past, then . . . " looks like to me.

Victor said...

First, about "Privatizing" Ryan:
He's a lying, hypocritical sociopathic blow-hard, and media whore, who's about as starved for attention, as t-RUMP.
He's not any sort of a "wonk" - he's a WANKER!
So, FUCK HIM!!!

Now, about t-RUMP and his sociopathic band of not-merry bigoted thugs:
t-RUMP will blame everyone and everything when he loses. He'll absolve himself of any stench of losing.

He'll probably try to start a media empire - t-RUMP STDD (Sociopathic Troglodytes, Dupes, and Dunces).

Like t-RUMP, his Chump-a-loon-pas will blame the media, women, minorities, Jews, Muslims, gays, and, most of all, liberals!

This presidential run has been t-RUMP's greatest grift EVAH!!!
He followed his (shitty) business MO:
-Blow a lot of hot air while preening, and pronouncing his bullshit schemes with energy.
-The rubes fall for the grift.
-t-RUMP makes a cesspool out of whatever he pitched.
-Jumps out just ahead of disaster.
-Leaves the chump's holding the bag, and responsible for the losses and damage.

But this time, he conned a bunch of lesser grifters:
The GOP, conservatives, "Christian" Evangelicals, and angry white men.
The GOP is badly damaged, and torn apart.
And the angry mobs will continue to be mad, and lash out for years.

And yeah, the GOP will have to find a way to survive, and that will be to become even crazier, and more psychopathic.
Conservatives never admit defeat - they just double-down.

t-RUMP will leave a America a legacy of nation-wide damage like a Cat 5 hurricane.


Pragmatic Idealist said...

The crucial thing I would add to what you wrote is: with less women, college educated, Asian/African/Hispanic-Americans. This dip in support in the face of demographic trends is turning them from screwing us to jacking off.

Anonymous said...

As a side note, Erick Erickson lives in my town. He's had a rough year;both he and his wife had and have serious health issues and with young kids he's publicly confronting his own mortality. As with lots of people with serious health challenges earlier in life, he's become very very religious and that element is pervading his posts at his new website.

Aside from all that, his kids have been yelled at and ostracized in their respective (private schools most likely;they're a lot of them here) elementary schools for their father's anti-Trumpism.

Agree that his policies are the same old same old. But he did get a lot of support in this town. Obviously the verbal ones have turned on him.

Anonymous said...

I don't think Trump will ever voluntarily leave the political stage. Nothing before has ever fed his ego with such gusto. He will shift blame for his campaign on any and every target he can find.

After perhaps months of rage-blaming he will seek a new pedestal upon which to place his ego for worship. I expect a new TV reality-political punditry show with Trump as the primary figure will support his ego quite nicely.

CH said...

I expect Trump himself, if in fact he does lose convincingly as seems now likely, to go the way of Glenn Beck within a year or two - not absent, not (lord knows) silent, but much faded. I expect the R's to remain what they've basically been for the best part of 40 years - and why wouldn't they? They'll still have a large majority of the state govts, most probably the House, and possibly the Senate. They'll find some "new" frontmen/women and some "new" bogus crusades, and be right back in business. (I refrain from predicting what the D's will manage to do with their partial victory.)

Anonymous said...

I am afraid I'll have to concede, Steve, you may well be right: we are not witnessing in painful slow motion the death of the Retard Party. We are witnessing its realigation to third party status.

Breaks my heart
Ten Bears

Jim Snyder said...

I don't think Trump is the brains behind the Trump campaign; that's Steve Bannon. Trump read his Florida (West Palm Beach?) rant off a teleprompter. Who put in all those anti-semitic dog-whistles? Sure, Trump is a bigot and a misogynist and a conspiracy theorist, but dog-whistles aren't Trump's style ... too subtle. Probably didn't originate with Kushner, either.

Imagine Bannon as Trump's Rasputin ... then ask yourself what Bannon wants, not what Trump wants, because it sure looks like Trump is easy to manipulate if you have the right levers.

One guess is as good as another, but as long as we're guessing, I'll guess that Trump, under Bannon's tutelage, will attempt to take over the GOP as an institution. I'm not sure what that means in practice, but everyone is saying "Ryan's in trouble", and RNC PR BS won't be around as RNC chairman for much longer. Perhaps Steve Bannon as the next RNC chair?

rclz said...

Some of you have hit on a Trump media venture. If this comes to pass and I were Paul Ryan I'd be a bit nervous. Trump is one of the most vindictive, petty, mean, you name it. He's not going to forget who didn't support him, especially in the GOP. I can see him using his 39%ers as a cludgel to hammer the media, Dems, Minorities and yes the GOP. He has no real party affiliation so I can even see him backing Dems just to stick his finger in the eye of the GOP.

Jim Snyder said...

@Victor: tell us what you really think ...

Jim Snyder said...

@rclz: 27%-ers. FTFY.

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