Confronting the denialism of rank and file Republicans

[markpkessinger]

The sheer ugliness of the last two GOP debate audiences, one that cheered a Governor who permitted 234 executions to go forward without ever "struggling at all" with the question of the possible innocence of any of the condemned, and the other that shouted "Let him die," about a hypothetical young man without health insurance who suddenly finds himself in need of six months of intensive hospital care, leaves me so profoundly disturbed about the state of this nation as a nation that I hardly know where to begin to try to process the implications of it all.

But I have begun to think about what might be the best way to begin to make people realize just how destructive it all is. Like (I suspect) many here, I do know some rank and file, lifelong Republicans who are decent folks -- some of them among my own family even -- who would want nothing to do with the sentiments expressed by those audiences. Yet I also know that unless these folks are forced to confront the reality of what is going on in the GOP, they will slide right back into their same old comfort zone of denialism, telling themselves these folks aren't really representative of most Republicans, or hiding behind assertions of false equivalence, preferring to avert their eyes to the extremism that has taken over their party rather than confront the painful reality of what their party has become, and of the wider ramifications of their continued support.

In the years since 9/11, whenever I have reminded some of my more conservative family members and others that the events of 9/11 were the work of a small group of extremists and that we should not judge the entire Muslim community by the actions of a few, I have typically received a response of, "Well, then why aren't more of these moderate Muslims speaking out more forcefully against the terrorists?" (The truth was, many did speak out, but let's leave that aside for now.) Unless I see a major repudiation by the GOP of the responses both to Rick Perry in the last debate, and to the question in this debate, I intend to throw that standard right back at them, asking why they, and other purportedly "less extreme" Republicans haven't spoken out more vigorously against such extremism; or why they have permitted such extremism to pass without challenge. I suspect the reaction to that kind of pressing will not always be pleasant, but I really think it's important to push people to take a very hard look at what they are really supporting.

I'd be really interested to hear what others' thoughts are on all of this.