What happens to the Republican Party now? (2 Viewers)

[MT15]

This election nonsense by Trump may end up splitting up the Republican Party. I just don’t see how the one third (?) who are principled conservatives can stay in the same party with Trump sycophants who are willing to sign onto the TX Supreme Court case.

We also saw the alt right types chanting “destroy the GOP” in Washington today because they didn’t keep Trump in power. I think the Q types will also hold the same ill will toward the traditional Republican Party. In fact its quite possible that all the voters who are really in a Trump personality cult will also blame the GOP for his loss. It’s only a matter of time IMO before Trump himself gets around to blaming the GOP.

There is some discussion of this on Twitter. What do you all think?

 

[bird]

I don't disagree that there's nothing particularly patriotic about a professional sporting event, particularly one that pits two teams from the same country against each other. I think in the rest of the world, they only play anthems in international play (competitions between national teams of two or more countries) or championship games.

It has, though, become customary in North America and that's fine, it's a free country. But good lord compulsory national anthem playing is definitely fascist-y. Technically its a statutory contract requirement, if you don't have a contract with the state, you don't have to do it. But these days the state is entangled into all sorts of venue-management, incentive, and other deals. What legitimate interest does the State of Texas have in making the playing of the national anthem compulsory for its pro-team contractual partners? This is just more red meat bullshirt.

Query whether a new state requirement for state contracts can be written into existing contracts by statute, I suspect it cannot. In other words, the law only applies to contracts signed after the statute's effective date. It may also raise First Amendment issues, though the contract framework is different than a broadly applicable law, I'm not sure how that works.

The state of Texas actually has no interest in making the playing of the national anthem compulsory beyond red meat for the rabid, psychotic base. Of course everyone knows this. Even Republicans know this. After all, patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel. I would add that patriotism is a particularly powerful groupism by which much agitprop has been created to destructive ends. Thus it truly isn't the last refuge but far too often it is the first refuge. Wave your flag, wear your freakin' stupid flag pin on your lapel, "these colors don't run" (Oops, please see Ronnie Reagan and the bombing of the barracks in Lebanon) etc ad nauseum ad infinitum

 

[superchuck500]

It's almost as if these state legislators (Republicans) hate the Constitution.

Federal judge says Georgia’s anti-BDS law violates First Amendment

A federal judge said that a Georgia law banning the state from doing business with anyone promoting a boycott of Israel violates the First Amendment.In a ruling issued Friday, District Court Judge …

thehill.com

 

[Sandman]

It's almost as if these state legislators (Republicans) hate the Constitution.

Federal judge says Georgia’s anti-BDS law violates First Amendment

A federal judge said that a Georgia law banning the state from doing business with anyone promoting a boycott of Israel violates the First Amendment.In a ruling issued Friday, District Court Judge …

thehill.com

You have the Republicans that think this type of stuff is great. Then you have the group that think it is silly, but “the courts will take care of it.” It is dangerous as hell, but that is the states of the Republican Party. The ones with sense are letting the fools pass ridiculous legislation they believe will be overturned by the courts in order to keep the base happy. Then they decry “liberal courts!” and secretly wipe their foreheads.

As we saw on January 6th, it doesn’t take much for Frankenstein’s monster to turn on them.

 

[Dragon]

Either way that is ridiculous. Big government is bad? These people believe in nothing beyond authoritarianism. The anthem has no place at sporting events, period. There is nothing patriotic about a sporting event.

Isn't pro-sport a private business? What next?

 

[bird]

Isn't pro-sport a private business? What next?

Yup. Pro-sports are the quintessential example of socialized costs and privatized profits when it comes to stadiums/arenas.

 

[DaveXA]

 

[GrandAdmiral]

Good job on Joe for calling the hypocrites out for who they are...

 

[superchuck500]

Meanwhile at the Matt Gaetz rally. . .

 

[DaveXA]

Meanwhile at the Matt Gaetz rally. . .

I guess I can't be too surprised at an idiot saying idiotic things.

 

[MT15]

Could he be that stupid, or is that a dog whistle for political violence?

 

[brandon]

Could he be that stupid, or is that a dog whistle for political violence?

How else are we supposed to take that? That he meant to say first amendment?

Because outside of that, I don’t see how that’s not a call to use guns against Silicon Valley.

 

[B4YOU]

Good job on Joe for calling the hypocrites out for who they are...

 

[B4YOU]

Meanwhile at the Matt Gaetz rally. . .

These thinly veiled calls for political violence by elected leaders are going to lead to people getting killed. I know it doesn’t meet the “imminent lawless action” point for not being protected free speech. But the call to use guns to achieve political ends is very dangerous.

 

[SFIDC3]

Could he be that stupid, or is that a dog whistle for political violence?

I think he is a desperate entitled rich kid, who is used to getting what he wants, only now, he may be headed to a jail cell....I'm hoping they get him on the pedophilia, and he has to go to general pop....not sure how likely that is though....

 

[superchuck500]

The GOP Now Stands for Nothing

A party that doesn’t believe in anything ends up believing only in its right to rule.

www.theatlantic.com

The Republicans stepped forward in 1980 as optimistic warriors. Joined by some disaffected Democrats, they were certain that they had the intellectual and moral strength to claim victory over domestic chaos and foreign challenges. Reagan and the resurgent Republicans fought the narrative of an America in decline after years of “stagflation,” urban decay, and rampant Soviet aggression. (The Cold War was still raging then.) Republican solutions—including laissez-faire economics at home and a confrontational foreign policy abroad—were born from an ideological conviction that led a prominent liberal Democrat, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York, to warn his colleagues in 1981 that the GOP “has become a party of ideas.”

The self-assurance of the Republicans who emerged from the post-Watergate wilderness might seem impossible to comprehend now that the modern GOP is rife with know-nothings and apocalyptic hysterics. But their confidence in their own ideas was unassailable—indeed, often to an unhealthy degree.

All of that is gone. Today’s Republicans exist only to stay in power, not least so that their elected officials can avoid what they dread most: being sent home to live among their constituents. The conservative writer George Will is right that the Republican Party in 2021 has become “something new in American history,” a “political party defined by the terror it feels for its own voters.”

Republican legislators should be scared. Their base is an angry white minority that cares nothing about government; its members want their elected officials to rule by hook or by crook, the Constitution and democracy itself be damned, and they don’t want any guff about namby-pamby ideas or policies. They want the elections controlled, the institutions captured, and the libs owned. The rest, to them, is just noise.

The survival instinct that this white-minority rage has triggered in craven Republican politicians is how the GOP mutated from a party championing individual liberty into a movement pushing monstrously statist authoritarianism. It is how the party of limited government began agitating for government truth ministries. It is how the party of exuberant free marketeers became a cabal of crony capitalists and knee-jerk protectionists. It is how the party that once fought Kremlin expansionism provided top cover for Russian intelligence attacks against U.S. institutions.

 

[GrandAdmiral]

Interesting move here. Wonder how long before Trump calls him out.

Idaho governor repeals "irresponsible" mask mandate ban issued while he was out of town

Idaho Governor Brad Little said the executive order signed by the lieutenant governor while he was away was "an irresponsible, self-serving political stunt."

www.cbsnews.com

 

[MT15]

Maybe those Oregon counties will change their minds about joining Idaho now, lol.

 

[nolaspe]

Ladies and germs, I give you, the GQP base of morons...