How Donald Trump destroyed the Republican Party in 2015

[Scuba]

Really fun read, made me smile again and again. I sure hope the title premise holds true ...



https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/how-donald-trump-is-destroying-the-republican-party/2015/12/28/747668f6-ad9e-11e5-9ab0-884d1cc4b33e_story.html

History will remember 2015 as the year when The Republican Party As We Knew It was destroyed by Donald Trump. An entity called the GOP will survive — but can never be the same.

Am I overstating Trump’s impact, given that not a single vote has been cast? Hardly. I’m not sure it’s possible to exaggerate how the Trump phenomenon has torn the party apart, revealing a chasm between establishment and base that is far too wide to bridge with stale Reagan-era rhetoric. Can you picture the Trump legions meekly falling in line behind Jeb Bush or Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.)? I can’t either.

...

What Trump has done is call out the establishment on years of dishonest rhetoric. Progressives often asked why so many working-class whites went against their own economic interests by supporting the GOP. The answer is that Republicans appealed to these voters on cultural grounds, subtly exploiting their resentments and fears.

...

Enter Trump, who has the temerity to point out that the party establishment says one thing but does another. He launched his campaign by calling the GOP’s bluff on immigration: If the 11 million people here without documents are really “illegal,” as the party loudly proclaims, then send them home. Other candidates were put in the position of having to explain why, after claiming that President Obama was somehow “soft” on immigration, their position on allowing the undocumented to stay is basically the same.

[Gothmog]

1. Trump may be responsible for turning Texas blue ahead of schedule

[malthaussen]

2. True, Trump and Sanders have energized the miscreants.

The difference is that in the Democratic party, the radicals have had a long practice of swallowing their desires and yanking the lever for the lesser of evils, whereas the radicals in the GOP have been pushing their party around since they found voice, and are not used to sitting down and shutting up. So it is conceivable that the GOP would face a mutiny if they anointed a candidate not preferred by the majority, whereas the Democratic party faithful will just hold their noses and mutter, like a Brooklyn Dodgers fan, "Just wait 'til next year." Or next election, as may be.

-- Mal

[WinkyDink]

3. I wouldn't give that eulogy quite yet.