Stop saying Republicans are acting against their own interests. [View all]

[gulliver]

The argument that Republicans act against their own best interests is a loser. It actually makes them feel better. Acting against their own interests is what Republicans like to think they are doing. It's what they wish they were doing. It's what they want other people to think they are doing.

They are so not.

The real tragicomedy of middle and working class Republicans is that, through the magic of psychology, their bone deep frustration, vanity, and selfishness transmutes into an inner drama of selflessness and dignity. Dostoevsky would love them. Republicans feel like heroes and martyrs. Their suffering only sanctifies their inner anger, and tickles their vanity no end.

The only way to get middle and working class Republicans to stop creating George W. Bushes, unnecessary wars, job-exporting corporations, and Great Recessions is to stop playing into their broken inner drama. Republicans aren't hurting themselves in some long-suffering act of selflessness. They are gorging on heaping doses of self-worship and self-pity. They are acting selfishly and vainly, and in a way that can no longer be hidden from themselves and others.