After impeachment, bipartisanship is dead — and so is the immoral Republican Party
Category: News & Politics
Via: john-russell • 3 years ago • 70 commentsBy: PhillyInquirer ( httpswww. inquirer. com)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The Republican Party was born on March 20, 1854, the green shoots of a political spring. Unlike America's other parties that were often shotgun weddings of convenience, the Republicans burst forth around moral ideas that were so powerful — ending slavery and making America a world industrial power — that the tail of this supernova lasted for more than 166 years and inspired its eventual nickname, the Grand Old Party.
That GOP died — morally, if not officially — in the late afternoon gloaming of a grey and bitterly cold winter's day, Feb. 13, 2021. After 43 Republican senators who'd been given a green light to "vote their conscience" on Donald Trump's impeachment still managed to come up empty — thus enshrining the notion that an end-of-term president can foment a deadly insurrection to thwart a peaceful transition of power and not face any consequences — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell strolled to the well of the Senate. He was presumably holding the bloody knife with which he'd repeatedly stabbed American democracy for a dozen years hidden behind his back.
It turns out that McConnell's past moments of political shamelessness — the years of hurting America's recovery just to electorally thwart our first Black president, the theft of a Supreme Court pick from Barack Obama so it could be made by a dangerous demagogue whom the Kentuckian then helped pack the judiciary — were just an audition for Saturday's GOP eulogy.
"There's no question — none — that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day," said McConnell, referring to the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol that had endangered McConnell's colleagues, his staffers and himself. "No question about it." But his faux moment of moral clarity was all a sham, as shown by leading the Feckless 43 in acquitting Trump as well as his pretzel logic to justify his vote, a lie-based misreading of the U.S. Constitution that he'd already shredded into 10,000 pieces as he turned the Party of Lincoln into an authoritarian cult with no moral standing and no ideology beyond realpolitick to protect white identity politics.
But McConnell's effort to obfuscate was in fact one of the most revelatory moments in the long, muddled history of American politics. The unbearable nothingness of his failure — and that of most of his party — to hold Trump to account for a full-frontal assault on America's core ideals was the final flatlining in the long slow death of a political party that is no longer grand, just old. On paper, the Republican Party may live on — but the GOP as an idea and a moral force is deader than a parrot in a Monty Python sketch, nailed to its perch in a gross caricature of what it once was.
And it's time for the rest of us — the 57%, the rough number who support the launch of the President Biden era, equal to the percentage of senators who voted to convict Trump — to act accordingly. There is no place for bipartisanship when half of that proposed arrangement is no longer a functioning political party within a working democracy.
"I think our country needs a strong Republican party — it's very important," a visibly shaken House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Saturday, crashing a news conference of House impeachment managers to rebut McConnell and his intentionally misleading account of how the process went down. But Pelosi was only partially right. America will indeed need a vigorous two-party (if not multiparty) system to have real, honest debates about how to defend democracy and advance the interests of a forgotten working class. But today's Republican Party jumped the guardrails of that highway a long time ago.
In many ways, the buffoonery, corruption, and incitements to mob violence that was Donald Trump was just a gross symptom, a massive tumor that resulted from the disease that has been coursing through the Republican Party for decades. In the Nixon and Reagan eras, the GOP abandoned any and all former principles for a self-preservation ethos of tax breaks for a wealthy donor class and stirring up the social resentments of the white working class — an Ed Sullivan Show-level plate-spinning act called "the Southern strategy" that barely hid its white-supremacist roots.
The energy that was needed to keep spinning those plates — including a lie-based media infrastructure of talk radio and Fox News that eroded trust in fact-based journalism and eventually even the science needed to fight pandemics or climate change — was a road map to first demagoguery and, when unchecked, dictatorship.
Ironically, one of the last nails in the GOP's coffin came last week not from Trump or his weak-kneed enablers on Capitol Hill but from a Page 2 story about the implosion of the supposed anti-Trump elite of the Republican Party, the deep-pocketed Lincoln Project. This network of GOP consultants and higher-ups — who, after decades of implanting right-wing toxicity in the body politic, felt revulsion over the crudity of POTUS 45 — argued they were true conservatives with a conscience in raising $90 million to defeat Trump in 2020. Instead, revelations are showing the Lincoln Project was largely a grift of big-bucks self-dealing and covering up the sexual harassment of one of its founders. In hindsight, maybe the Lincoln Project embodied the actual Republican Party more than it realized.
Is it any wonder, then, to see the mainstream of such a Republican Party come up morally bankrupt, as in the acquittal votes by the likes of McConnell or Ohio Sen. Rob Portman? Portman is the epitome of the last era of "serious Republicans" as a former acolyte of George W. Bush (who, as Bush's budget chief, presumably at least believes in math) and yet the kind of politician who ultimately can't see past himself — famously supporting gay marriage only after his own son came out. Today, Portman is walking away from the Senate but is still too fearful of the angry mob that he helped create to vote his own conscience on Trump. His cowardice is typical of the Feckless 43.
To be clear, I have nothing but praise for the moral integrity of the 17 Republicans (10 in the House, and seven Saturday in the Senate, including Pennsylvania's own Sen. Pat Toomey) who voted to impeach or convict Trump for the most heinous high crime ever committed by a president. But in today's climate they are islands in the stream, not the makings of a new or revived Republican Party, whose implosion matches the slavery-tied collapse of the Whig Party in the 1850s. There is, arguably, a large opening for a completely new second political party — one that actually promotes the economic interests of a multiracial working class and some of its social conservatism, but embraces ethics and eschews racism — but the stench of the GOP's corpse may have to get worse before that can happen.
In 2021, the only hope for American salvation is not bipartisanship with a dead body but instead a Democratic Party that is every bit as bold as the Republicans are cowardly. That is easier said than done, as we saw again on Saturday when Democrats briefly won, with help from the GOP's last ethical holdouts, the right to call witnesses against Trump, only to give it up for fear that they'd hurt Biden's agenda, or miss their Valentine's Day flights, or ... something.
But let's look at this glass as half-full rather than half-empty. Since Biden took office, the push to use the controversial 51-Senate-votes reconciliation process to move full steam ahead on coronavirus relief for everyday Americans, and Democrats' bold move to strip GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of her committee assignments over her dangerous pro-QAnon statements, are signs that the Democrats know they must govern for the 57%.
Now, in the wake of the Republicans' blocking of accountability for Trump. Democrats must see the light and go even deeper. The failure to get 60 votes, let alone 67, in the open-and-shut case of the ex-president's insurrection incitement, should not only be the death knell for the GOP but also for the filibuster. Without the ability to represent the 57% of Americans who believe in a morally good and progressive nation on a straight up-or-down vote, Republicans will block voting rights reforms — which is their best hope for gaming the elections of 2022 and 2024.
What's more, a failure to enact laws backed by a majority of the public — most notably, the $15 minimum wage — will open the door to the ultimate nightmare enabled on Saturday by the Feckless 43, the return of Donald Trump. Beyond Capitol Hill, Saturday's vote — and McConnell's acknowledgement of likely criminal conduct by the ex-president — should be a green light for incoming Attorney General Merrick Garland to finally bring Trump to justice in our criminal courts.
That truth may be a hard pill for the likes of President Biden, who was raised on the quasi-sacred altar of bipartisanship. But the only way to save the country from the American carnage of 2021 is for the Democrats to use their narrow majority to push for what is right — politically, economically, morally — and invite any principled Republicans like Sen. Mitt Romney or Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler to join them. Real aid for struggling, regular folks, and the bloody shirt of Jan. 6, could help Democrats defy the political wisdom and gain more seats in 2022. And that would speed the inevitable — to declare the Republican Party legally dead, and move on with our lives.
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I think that Democrats should act on the presumption that Republican bipartisanship is insincere until proven otherwise. If Biden provides help to the American people his party will do well, even if that help is provided in a "partisan" method.
The Republicans need to atone for drowning us in the poisonous sludge of Trumpism for the past 5 years. I hope they do that atonement, but I have my doubts.
You just cannot resist the urge to tar all with the same brush can you? You know full well there are Republicans and right leaning conservative Independents that are/were not Trump supporters, but you cannot separate them and it seems you continuously find it convenient to lump all together.
About 3 weeks ago (after the attack on the Capitol) 79% of republicans approved of trump. It's hard to find the 21% that don't approve of him. Surely you can understand that.
If a conservative wants to distance themselves from the Trump/QAnon crazies/fascists... it's easy. Such a person need only say something like ''Trump is a fascist, and I want nothing to do with him!'' They may or may not go on to give details on the policies they promote.
www.ibtimes.com /gop-senators-who-voted-convict-trump-condemned-their-home-states-3145482
GOP Senators Who Voted To Convict Trump Condemned By Their Home States
KEY POINTS
The seven GOP senators who voted to convict former President Donald Trump of inciting the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 are now being condemned in their home states.
Republican Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Mitt Romney of Utah joined all 50 Democrats in voting against Trump .
Party leaders and local Republican officials hoping to curry favor with the pro-Trump voters have publicly condemned the lawmakers for breaking ranks. Cassidy was censured by his state’s party hours after he cast his vote.
Sasse also received backlash after the vote. Bruce L. Castor Jr., one of Trump’s defense attorneys, mentioned the Nebraska senator while on the Senate floor and accused him of being a “pretty smart jurist.”
“Nebraska, you’re going to hear, is quite a judicial thinking place, and just maybe Sen. Sasse is on to something, Castor said during an address that was at times confounding. “There seem to be some pretty smart jurists in Nebraska, and I can’t believe the United States senator doesn’t know that.”
Sasse, who has made prior comments critical of Trump, is now expected to be censured by GOP officials in the Nebraska counties of Hitchcock, Scotts Bluff, Sarpy and Lincoln.
Burr, a senior Republican who led the Senate’s Russia investigation, drew fire from North Carolina conservatives. Earlier in the week, the lawmaker voted that the impeachment trial was unconstitutional. However, Burr said he would put that aside and proceed with the impeachment trail after the Senate voted Tuesday that it was constitutional.
"As I said on January 6th, the President bears responsibility for these tragic events. The evidence is compelling that President Trump is guilty of inciting an insurrection against a coequal branch of government and that the charge rises to the level of high Crimes and Misdemeanors. Therefore, I have voted to convict," Burr said in a statement .
Michael Whatley, North Carolina’s Republican Party chairman, slammed Burr for voting to convict Trump, and called his decision “ shocking and disappointing .”
“North Carolina Republicans sent Senator Burr to the United States Senate to uphold the Constitution and his vote today to convict in a trial that he declared unconstitutional is shocking and disappointing,” Whatley said.
Of the seven Republican lawmakers who voted against Trump, only one, Senator Murkowski of Alaska, will face re-election.
Well then Ed, talk to me about the 44 senators that voted to acquit? Only 14% of elected senators in congress voted in favor of the constitution, rule of law, and with anything amounting to conscious. A full 86% stated that the GOP are still supporters of Trump and the authoritarianism he represents. Come talk to us when people like McCarthy and Graham are no longer traveling to Mar-a-Lago to kiss the ring.
Cannibals
The gop showed they have no spine at the first impeachment trial. the vote from the second trial proves that they will always put party and personal gain over country. In my opinion anyone that puts party or personal gain over their country is a traitor to said country, let alone if they SWORE and oath for their office.
Notice we haven't heard the word Benghazi out of our right-wing friends for some time now....
How many hearings did it take.....?
I never said anything about numbers, only that they exist.
So, are you trying to say conservatives have to conform to your rules only or they are not relevant? Sounds that way.
No
If for some reason Biden loses in 4 years, he should just declare martial law to stay in power. Or, he could call on a militia group to storm the capital and take power by force, since that's now totally ok to do.
I don't believe Biden will run again. Democrats will say it is Harris' turn.
Your dream may have to wait a while.
What dream would that be?
Biden running again.
Keep up!
"If for some reason Biden loses in 4 years, he should just declare martial law to stay in power. Or, he could call on a militia group to storm the capital and take power by force, since that's now totally ok to do."
Well you know that he, President Biden, and his supporters, could never, would never sink so low.
But but but
Whatabout...
True.
Graham is still out saying the trumps are the party future...
Obviously others disagree.
I just keep thinking donald must have something on Graham.
Graham used to be best buds with McCain. Given all the abuse Trump delivered on McCain (even posthumously) I do not see how Graham could possible align with Trump. I guess he really was meant to be a career politician.
A total lack of morality, maybe?
Yes. Basically a political whore who does what is required to continue as a career politician.
Add lack of conscious to that as there is no shame involved either.
Of course he does!
Like the dirt Roger Stone must have on him also. Did you know that Stone's bodyguards are white supremacists? Some of whom were there at Capitol insurrection at the former occupant of the White House's urging?
Anyone who still supports that scumbag is complicit.
Is the GOP really, really, really dead this time, or will it be just like every other time it was declared dead?
Like the Phoenix, the party of Trumpism will rise again, once it's cleansed of the unbelievers
You make it sound like a religious cult. "once it's cleansed of the unbelievers" What the hell is that supposed to mean? How are Trumpsters going to clean their party? Beat anyone who doesn't toe the party line? Shame/shun people those who disagree? And most importantly, what constitutes an unbeliever?
Yep..... Shit does float!
It has muted to become the
RepublicanNew Fascist Party.Perhaps in your fevered imagination.
Not in reality.
Oh! Gosh! How many times shall we dance this dance?
They are authoritarian.
They are xenophobe.
They are Fascist.
(Thank you for giving me so many opportunities to repeat myself. The message is simple, but so are the people to whom it is destined.)
Laughable drivel.
I mean, laughable if it wasn't just so damn sad and wrong.
Which is wrong? Are you saying that they
Asked AND answered, Bob.
Move on.
That's the problem when two threads run parallel. You answered in the other thread. You stated that you believe that:
⇒ Trump is not authoritarian,
⇒ Trump is not xenophobe,
⇒ Trump is not Fascist.
That's so clear that it really deserves to be recalled and repeated... often...
Why would anyone want to move on, to abandon such incisive descriptions? They have a limpidity that must make you proud.
And you asked about it in the other thread, I had hoped ONE answer would suffice for you, that you could use the same answer to the same question.
Moving on because you keep droning on about the same crap, which has been answered and answered.
Moving on because I won't engage in your fantasies.
Not to worry... I've kept a copy. For once you have been perfectly clear. That deserves memorization.
I wasn't in the least. Why would I be?
Glad you're a fan!
I'm always clear. It isn't on me if some choose to pretend otherwise.
Don't think you need to memorize it, I can always repeat it for you the NEXT time you ask the silly questions!
"It has muted to become the
RepublicanNew Fascist Party."That's exactly what they've become.
So true!
You are correct on all points!
only in a few fevered imaginations
What has disgusted me here, and i certainly predicted it anyway - just seek out my comments about the vote up until this point - is that 43 Republican Senators, lawmakers, representatives of the people, BETRAYED THE OATH THEY TOOK TO BE JURORS. What happened was not a technical defence, it was a case of total lack of morality and integrity.
When I look at the state of this nation sometimes I just have to hang my head. This isn't the America I served and fought for. I grew up in a conservative environment (Orrville, Ohio) and I'm even an Eagle Scout. Growing up I was taught about responsibility to my fellow man and my country. Above all in both civilian life and in the USMC I was taught to have personal responsibility and the "intestinal fortitude" to do what was morally correct. Todays Republicans have abandoned these ideals and travel down a path that I feel will ultimately destroy our reputation abroad and possibly destroy America as it currently exists. Without the RULE OF LAW we are nothing but another failed nation.
The trait I find lacking in today's republicans is conscience.
And yes, I use to vote across party lines regularly back in the 70s, 780s & 90s. The scorched earth approach adopted by Newt the Spoot put an end to that. Johnny Mac would have gotten my vote in 2008 if not for Caribou Barbie being on the ticket. I can't get through the Star Spangled Banner without tearing up, and it's been that way for decades. Makes me wonder if people like Hawley and Cruz even know the words....
Take care DH.
I have a lot more respect for the Stars and Stripes and the Star Spangled Banner than a lot of Americans, some even on this site, and The Battle Hymn of the Republic has a similar effect on me.
Buzz I think you just put your finger on a "Buzz Word" or in this case, words.
I knew something had been in the back of my mind about all of this. Your wording helped me see one of the questioning problems I have had with this impeachment. And I want trump permanently gone.
Senators and the representatives take oaths of office when they are sworn in.
Jurors take an oath of office when they are sworn in.
A senators and/of a representative's job is different than that of a juror.
Sounds like a conflict of interest within an individual if the oaths are not the same. And they are not.
I. The Oath of Office
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.”
Ii. The Oath to be an impartial juror in an impeachment trial
“I solemnly swear (or affirm, as the case may be,) that in all things appertaining to the trial of the impeachment of Donald J. Trump, now pending, I will do impartial justice according to the constitutions and laws: so help me God.”
Sounds like a conflict of interest within an individual if the oaths are not the same. And they are not.
IF any congressperson honestly felt they were not totally protecting the constitution I really can't fault them for voting with their feeling.
And I want trump permanently gone.
But in doing so I also don't want to set a bad precedence for America's future to get rid of one jack-ass.
I doubt many senators did either.
(I cant believe I'm defending anything that benefits trump) But that's the price I've paid over and over from being honest and being party neutral.
Have a good Day Buzz.
No fucking kidding; but it was dead long before the Democrat politically motivated impeachment attempt. It died the second Biden went to work signing how many EO's and counting since his first day in office?
Bipartinsanship does not mean capitulation; which is the only thing Democrats will accept.
Why should we negotiate with those that don't care about the rule of law, or the American people....? The history of how the GOP thinks negotiations should go is well documented over the last 12-13 years. Want to start with the ACA?
No.... there is no reason to negotiate with Trump supporters.
Exactly.
Compromise with evil is a bad idea.
IMO, and as everyone here knows I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat and in fact not even an American, I believe there was an urgency to get the nation back on track, painfully derailed by the one the Republicans continue to follow like the Pied Piper.
The Obstructionist Party, formerly the Republican party, will NEVER work in good faith toward bipartisan goals. They proved it from Bush and WMD until the present day and nothing has changed with them at all. Lie, blame a Democrat for anything they did, and use false flag arguments misdirecting everyone's attention to social issues rather than their own incompetence or direct malfeasance. COVID response was on Trump's watch and those lies are no different than the WMD lies that led to war. In both instances Republicans lied repeatedly while all Americans suffered. They are entrenched in a culture of lying regardless of how those lies hurt the American people.
Until their own base comes to grips with the fact that over 50 years Republicans turned a blind eye to immigration issues to satisfy border state big donors where Republican campaigns were happy to glad hand those donors in order to exploit cheap labor.
Until they come to grips with the fact that they have been lied to about everything from WMD to the economic crash to the smear campaign of opponents to the obstruction and lies over ACA.
Until they come to grips with the lies over many COVID issues and Republican response and lack of response to those issues, all the way up to the big lie over the safest voting year we have ever had with a paper trail confirming the largest win in history in a pandemic.
Nothing will change unless the Republican base has a come to Jesus moment and realize they have been the most used, the most scammed the most lied to base of followers in American history.
It pretty much started I think with Newt Gingrich.
We need to agree on vocabulary. After discussion with Tex, I think the
RepublicanNew Fascist Party is appropriate.As to when the party metastasized, there were probably quite a few important waypoints. Lots of cancers take time to develop, after all.
So we should try to think back to the last policy propositions from the
RepublicanNew Fascist Party. Sadly, my memory isn't good enough. I can't remember theRepublicanNew Fascist Party ever proposing anything... other than tax cuts for the rich, of course.It appears you have your entire timeline wrong. Let me help you get it straight.
This is your very first comment to me on this article:
You had your mind made up BEFORE any "discussion with Tex".
Please, at least, let's keep it honest.
Once again, your mind-reading talents... fail.
I had indeed thought of the
RepublicanNew Fascist Party before our conversation. But you made me certain!It isn't necessary for me to read your mind when your words--which I accurately quoted--are right there for the world to see.
I just don't like it when people "pretend" that something I said made their mind up when it is so clear it was already made up.
Your words, Bob.
Not mine.
Oh... Well...
If it wasn't your mind-reading talents that failed, then perhaps it was your comprehension of the English language.
There must be some logical explanation for your being so profoundly wrong.
Except your post is there with a time stamp on it for all to see. You had already decided to call it that before you posted to me.
Now I am curious as to why you choose NOW to deny it?
Probably a language-comprehension problem...
Tell me what part of my posts you don't understand and I will see if I can rephrase it so you may better understand it.
I wouldn't want your lack of understanding to be because of language.
I understand them... but they clearly show that you do not understand me. Like I said, probably a language-comprehension problem...
If it makes you feel better to pretend I don't understand, it's all cool!
Anything else you want to pretend about?
Like I said...
Yes, yes, I know what you said.
So, what else do you want tp pretend about today?
No. You've done well.
Great!
Then my work here is done!
You're welcome!
ummm..