A More Perfect Union

A More Perfect Union

For nearly all of its history, the United States has been a two party country. Many of the founders were leery of partisanship and wrote against it, but America has mostly had a binary political construct.  There have been flirtations with third parties and even minor parties have won local elections.  For a period, we were electing socialists the election of 1860 was a real mess, some in the south tried to repeat that real humdinger of an election with the dixiecrats in the 20^th century but then all those racist ass motherfuckers became Republicans and created that cracker wall across the south and Midwest.

Part of me (well let me clarify, all of me) wants to see the Republican party completely routed in 2020, with the Democratic candidate winning 400 electoral votes, 54 seats in the senate and increasing control of the house.  I know due to the way our electoral system is set up, that cracker wall and small states that are overrepresented that fact is very unlikely if not impossible but for the sake of our game, bear with me.  What would happen again, what would happen with the spray tan colored wake behind the legacy of one Donnie Jay?

Even under the best scenario it will be no picnic.  The stain of Trumpism will last for generations,  can the GOP suddenly revert to it’s old conservative principles? (don’t get me wrong, a big part of the Republican party strength nationwide has been its racism and misogyny but since I’m already living the Democratic landslide fantasy let me have this fantasy as well)

I have known republicans that actually had principles.  And while not a majority I think there were a lot with principles.  Most of what that stood for actually is quite at odds with what Trumpist republicanism is.  They were free traders, free market, fiscally conservatives, pro-scientific development,  supportive of a strong defense and of law and order and particularly law enforcement.  Trump is none of those things and somehow to get the lower taxes and anti-choice/anti-regulation judges and policies have made these “Constitutional Clownservatives” lie in bed with all of the other wacky bullshit.

It’s not like all these crazy MAGA motherfuckas just disappear.  The GOP may begin to list slightly towards the center, ditch its authoritarian ways but they are going to still find votes among the red meat right and the crazier alt-righters. And what happens to these millions that hang on this moron’s every word?  Many Trump voters just found Hillary for what ever reason they had despicable (and she was a terrible candidate but let’s not relitigate that, you can be a very good possible President and not a good candidate) or just voted Republican because they a. thought that Trump was a lot of bluster and would just be a normal Republican or be controlled by other Republicans (see GW Bush, 2000, 2004) b. find the idea of voting for a Democrat repulsive.  I don’t worry about these people too much, they showed poor judgment electing a POTUS that was authoritarian, anti-democratic and basically the worst President of all time but aren’t total nutcases.  Where do the nutcases go under this best case scenario rout of the President.  Can they be marginalized and put back in a box, ridiculed by the vast majority of Americans like weirdo conspiracy theorists were in the past, or does Trumpism continue to stain politics, policy, and governance for the foreseeable future?

Does this period of history become forgotten as one tries to forget a weekend filled with bad acid and warm beer and Phish, that time you decided to date that girl from Hooters as your soulmate, or that time you thought that those skinny jeans and feathered haircut were the way to go. Or are these people the permanent part of the party of Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower? It seem like the leadership of the GOP has fully baked in Trumpism and it has wide support out of a few intellectual anti-Trumpers and some meek and mild Baker moderate republicans who sort of sit there quietly and react to the extremely ridiculous. I fear it is here to stay and from time to time, as the pendulum swings back and forth politically, we get a very hard swing to the lunatic right from time to time, supported by opportunists like Mitch McConnell, who take these chances to push a more traditional right wing agenda amongst the populist grievances of anti-immigration, racism and sexism.

I do fear we have lost more than just and election or two, America has lost part of its soul.