Stop trying to save the GOP. It's hopeless. - by Jennifer Rubin

[DonViejo]

Opinion by Jennifer Rubin
Columnist

Feb. 12, 2021 at 7:45 a.m. EST


The first three days of the impeachment trial have reminded us just how low the Republican Party has fallen. What should be open and shut — an airtight case of inciting an insurrection — has become yet another exercise in disingenuous denial. Most Republican senators have plainly decided to acquit the ex-president no matter what. No matter how dangerous and frivolous it would be to create a “January exception” for impeachable conduct, and despite overwhelming the evidence that he stoked the MAGA mob, they will let him walk.

This is a party that is immune to facts and bereft of decency. It has proved that it cannot function within the ground rules of our system — that candidates concede when they lose, that they respect a free press, that they stick to facts and embrace majority rule. Such a party cannot exist in our democracy.

The Republicans who rally around a pathological demagogue are not a “fringe” in the party. The 10 House and six Senate Republicans who have expressed the view that impeachment is not only constitutional but essential are the fringe. That is a mere 12 percent of Senate Republicans and less than 5 percent of House Republicans. Those people are the outliers.

We are not talking about a trivial difference over policy — or even a major one. It is a fundamental division over whether the party should become a right-wing populist cult willing to subvert democracy to keep power. That is too much for some to swallow, thank goodness. The two sides cannot coexist. Bloomberg’s Jonathan Bernstein writes:

The truth is that a lot of Republicans seem willing to let the party become more and more Trumpy. That means being comfortable playing footsie with white supremacist and other violent groups; eager to make voting more difficult and even to overturn election results when necessary; and generally less and less supportive of the rule of law and democracy. A party like that, with little aspiration to appeal to anyone beyond its strongest supporters, might still be competitive electorally thanks to the way two-party politics tends to work. And if it wins, it could put most of its efforts into tilting the rules more in its favor.

more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/02/12/stop-trying-save-gop-its-hopeless/

[Pantagruel]

1. It's all the GOP , every one of them.

It appears now even TLP has been found to be sheltering sexual predators and grifting their fundraising efforts. They simply can't help themselves?

[ooky]

2. Republicans need only to appeal to their wealthy contributors and the voters they

have propagandized. To this extent they have been the party of shit for a very long time. With Trump they have only added un-patriotism to their shit pile.

Nothing else about them has changed. Now they just openly admit they are the party of shit.

[TheRealNorth]

3. Clearly, instigating a riot that results in the death and injury....

Clearly, instigation a riot that results in death, injury, and destruction in order to overthrow the next President does not rise to the same bar of "high crimes and midemeaonors" like lying about a BJ does.

[dlk]

4. There is nothing worth saving with today's GOP

Wishful thinking, woulda, coulda, shoulda, is harmful. They live in an alternate reality and have stopped believing in the rule of law and in democracy, itself; and as they showed the world in January 6th, they are dangerous, very, very dangerous. Let’s not be naive.

[Lonestarblue]

5. I cannot name a good Republican president since Eisenhower.

I leave out Gerald Ford because he was president too short a time, but every other Republican president has been bad for the country and in a couple of cases have been outright crooks. Trump has been the biggest criminal of all. Nixon was a crook, but he didn’t try to dismantle the whole federal government. One would think voters would notice that Republicans do nothing for the country. They just stir up hatred and try to take away rights from women, minorities, and LGBTQ—all the while giving as much money as possible to the ultra wealthy.

[robbob]

13. "Stir up hatred, take rights away from women, minorities

and LGBTQ communities”? As the saying goes, that’s not a bug, it’s a feature. Suppressing votes and stoking fears among middle class white America is all they got. They’ll ride that pony into the ground. Let’s hope this is their last gasp...

[Bernardo de La Paz]

6. GQP. Greedy Qooqy Party. RepubliQons. Qonservatives. Let them keep tRump. He is a spent force

... only a few like Nikki Haley realize that.

Unless tRump has Russian kompromat on them for blackmail.

[raising2moredems]

14. She doesn't realize it

She's just playing both sides against the middle. She's more like trump than she'd ever admit - right down the demanding loyalty to her, one way street. She's trying to have it both ways and will bend to the most expedient side as needed.

[WestMichRad]

7. January exception? I call BS

The Republicans of the Senate are clearly showing us - again - that impeachment is not a viable means of addressing a clear abuse of power, when the corruption permeates government. I don't know what the remedy for this is. Lowering the threshold for conviction to a mere majority would open up the process to abuse, so that wouldn't work.

IMO, they're essentially torpedoing our republic form of government and setting the stage for seizing power permanently when they next win the White House.

[Hekate]

8. KnR

[bucolic_frolic]

9. Someday

I hope Jennifer Rubin is correct about something.

[Aussie105]

11. The GQP has a tradition of seeking power above all else.

They cannot let go of it, the pursuit of personal power, a feeling that they have an entitlement to the best the USA has to offer, and damn those not in their sphere of influence.

Power. Real or perceived, it is their one reason for existence.

Their one reason for clinging onto their poster boy, DJT, Failed#45.

Instead of it being a political party, it is a club where members give each other permission to seek personal power over everything else.

It is an Evil Church, a Cult, in other words. Not a political party.

[SleeplessinSoCal]

12. Trump has no soul and they are Zombies looking to make more Zombies.

Hard being an Evangelical Zombie, but they manage somehow.

[Nitram]

15. I don't want to "save" the GOP I just fear that, like the cockroach, they will survive any crisis to

multiply and make subsequent attempts, some of them successful, to control this country and substitute their brand of fascism for democracy.

[badboy67]

16. Putin smiles.

[BobTheSubgenius]

17. "...immune to facts and bereft of decency... " is a wonderful turn of phrase.

Succinct, eloquent and descriptive as hell. It also has the benefit of being true.

It is just not a bumper sticker, sadly.

[durablend]

18. It's a Qult

And sadly, just one election away from taking over short of a miracle.