There's No One Left

[DFW]

62. There is a fundamental difference between the Weimar Republic and today's USA

The government of the Weimar Republic was in chaos because every tiny splinter party that could elect one member to their parliament got in, and held things up with their grandstanding. People were hurting badly economically still from the after-effects of World War I and the reparation payments the victors had imposed. Post-war West Germany wisely instituted a rule that no party got representation in the Federal or State parliament unless they got at least 5% of the vote. This prevented "Die Republikaner," a Neo-Nazi movement in the 1980s, from gaining any solicitations as a coalition partner. They couldn't manage to get 5% of the vote where they ran. Today's mildly watered-down far right movement, the AfD does manage to get over 5%, but still, no other party in Germany (so far, anyway) will have them in a coalition, even if it means being out of power. It is a line no other party in Germany is willing to cross.

The Nazis basically offered the same things the Trumpanzees did 80 years later. You need us to save you from the chaos, we will make our country great again. After all, "Nazi" is nothing more than an abbreviation of the German word for "nationalist," or "National" as in "National Socialist," the official name for their movement, "Nationalsozialismus."

Although the signs are there, in the end, I don't see the Republican Party breaking up. To do so means they lose Senate and House seats right and left, and thus their relevance. My guess? They will continue to flirt with extremism for as long as it keeps them powerful. When and if their financiers should decide that there is no longer an incentive to do so (if that moment ever comes!), they will go back to the Javits-Dirksen-Ford-Dole mode of days of yore. They aren't conservative--not as the word is defined in English, anyway--by any stretch of the imagination. They just hijacked the term, as if going inside a garage really DOES turn you into a car. To the current crowd of crazies, we are "libbruls" and they are "conserv'tives," and if pressed, they couldn't give you an accurate description of what either term means. I'm quite confident that if Charles Koch suddenly decides that his influence will be enhanced by having the Senate Republican Caucus led by Mitt Romney or Lisa Murkowski lead their faction rather than Moscow Mitch, it would be so within weeks of his decision. We'd marvel at the turn of events, and we'd never find out why. The crazies out in the hinterlands would follow, because that's what they do. They do not lead, never have.