Will things ever be normal again?
What is going to happen to the GOP after November? Assuming Donald Trump is beaten decisively and apart from his usual outbursts of self-pity and incoherent ramblings he duly leaves the White House, it is definitely going to be a hard reckoning. But not an unexpected one. 4 months before the election, his polling numbers are so low that a humiliating defeat is the most likely outcome, which gives the Republican party members enough time to start seriously thinking about the exit strategy. United as they were in their submission to Trump, I expect some libertarian creativity in the ways of distancing themselves from the past 4 years. As much solidarity the GOP has shown toward its dissenting members, if I were one of them, I'd rather opt for "every man for himself" philosophy.
Let's try to guess what the most commonly chosen strategies will be.
First, there are the consummate politicians, aka weathervanes, who discover their principles by putting their fingers in the wind. The likes of Lindsey Graham or Mitch McConnell have been the most enthusiastic and self-abasing Trump lackeys. Their defense will be that they heroically defended the system from the inside by neutralizing the worst instincts of the president. Rude interviewers could and will cause them some embarrassing minutes by asking impolite questions about the impeachment or the 2016 nomination process, but these fellas are not known for their fragility and tender hearts. They will unquestionably tout the achievements of the administration, downplay the problems, and, if cornered, explain at length what disasters they personally helped to avoid.
This course of defense is only available to those on the top, who were close to the man. Lacking these more imaginative options, but at least having kept themselves outside of the limelight, most of the GOP will suddenly try to sell themselves as the I-don't-care-about-big-politics-I-just-get-the-job-done types. The middle-brow politicians, the pragmatists, the philosophically uninterested. There are some genuine ones, and there are some of them who actually get things done without offering articulate opinions on a daily basis. As for the rest, with the reliable assistance of the short memory of the electorate, most of them will succeed. In 4 years Trump will be just a bad memory, and someone must run the country.
And then there will be those who dig in. Trump had issues, but it was still better than the Left would have been! The cancel culture rage and the statue-breaking mob will give them the fuel to revive the myth of the Flight 93 election and keep wailing constantly about the persecution of Christians, the destruction of the American culture, the coming abortus-wave, and other overblown or purely imaginary disasters. The line will be blurry between this group...
...and the die-hard Trump-fans! They don't simply think all in all it was better than the left, but it was better than any other option because Trump was the great guy! The politicians who choose to go this way will ride the frantic support of the moral and intellectual sewers. QAnon, Charlie Kirk, OANN, Parler, white supremacists. When the president of the US publicly muses whether Ted Cruz's father killed Kennedy and tweets about how a talk show host killed his employee, every conspiracy-theorist nutjob and two-bit moron feels vindicated. The "elite" have suppressed us for so long, but now we've shown we have a voice, and we won't ever let them take it away again!
And finally, the few good men. The 43 Alumni, the Lincoln-project, the Never Trumpers, George Will, Max Boots, Charles Sykes, David Frum, Bill Kristol, to name a few. The ones that gave in their party cards the moment Trump secured the 2016 nomination, and the very few ones who had the balls to publicly challenge the president from inside the party. They can walk out of the woods with heads held high. There are some, like Mitt Romney, who resisted only half-heartedly, and some plain opportunists who jumped ship when deemed the old one sinking, or cleverly hedged their bets, but the few bad apples don't matter. This group proves that there are conservatives who hold principle over power.
Since in real life nothing is clear cut, most people if not all will be some mixture of these above. I think situational factors will weigh in the individual decisions at least as much character and convictions. If I were a Republican politician with flexible principles and little guts to stand up even for them, as I think most GOP members are, I would take my most important cues from the outcome of the election, the future prospects of Donald Trump, the current hyper-liberal hysteria, the character of the Biden presidency, white Evangelicals, and the fledging Nazi-crackpot bromance. I'm not sure about the order of importance here.
The more trashing the defeat will be, the greater the desire will be to wash off the stain of Trump, as at least to some degree, denouncing the past will be simply a matter of self-interest. If the GOP is beaten only marginally, the future looks very bad.
Donald Trump's influence on the future of the party is a very good question, and it depends almost entirely on what will happen to him after 2020. Will he have legal troubles? Will he try to build a media empire on his base (which seems to be 30-40% of the electorate)? Will he continue tweeting and growing ever smaller and - deprived of the office - ever more insignificant? Well, this is not much of a question. Tweeting he won't stop, that's for sure.
The Biden presidency's first and maybe biggest test will be its attitude towards woke insanity and cancel culture. If Biden manages to stand up to them firmly and decisively, he can gain the support of a vast swath of centrist Republican voters and principled liberals. If he bows, he will give the GOP a chance to pose as the steward of civilization and the American way. Please, Joe, don't screw it up!
White Evangelicals are unfortunately a force to reckon with. It's unlikely that they will confess their sin of selling out their values for the most unchristian president ever, and practice penance. After all, that's for the others. With marginal exceptions, they will dig-in and get ever more convinced that the end-time is near. Someone who shares their beliefs or is sufficiently cynical can build a strong platform on them.
Those who are even more crackpot or cynical can try to do the same with white supremacists and the believers in the conspiracies of the satanic-pedophile elite (I'm not joking. Just google QAnon). I don't think they will get very far but being visible is bad enough. Donald Trump did a lot of awful things. But forging an electoral force from plain idiocy and racist hatred will be his ugliest legacy.
This post could go on almost indefinitely, diverging into many directions and diverging further down. At one point I'd like to summarize what I think about why the GOP let itself hijacked by a malignant dilettante, why so few Republican chose principles over collaboration, what does it say about America, what could unite the nation again (the answer is China), what does liberalism mean, American exceptionalism, human irrationality, the power of feelings over reason, and so on and on... another time.
What is going to happen to the GOP after November? Assuming Donald Trump is beaten decisively and apart from his usual outbursts of self-pity and incoherent ramblings he duly leaves the White House, it is definitely going to be a hard reckoning. But not an unexpected one. 4 months before the election, his polling numbers are so low that a humiliating defeat is the most likely outcome, which gives the Republican party members enough time to start seriously thinking about the exit strategy. United as they were in their submission to Trump, I expect some libertarian creativity in the ways of distancing themselves from the past 4 years. As much solidarity the GOP has shown toward its dissenting members, if I were one of them, I'd rather opt for "every man for himself" philosophy.
Let's try to guess what the most commonly chosen strategies will be.
First, there are the consummate politicians, aka weathervanes, who discover their principles by putting their fingers in the wind. The likes of Lindsey Graham or Mitch McConnell have been the most enthusiastic and self-abasing Trump lackeys. Their defense will be that they heroically defended the system from the inside by neutralizing the worst instincts of the president. Rude interviewers could and will cause them some embarrassing minutes by asking impolite questions about the impeachment or the 2016 nomination process, but these fellas are not known for their fragility and tender hearts. They will unquestionably tout the achievements of the administration, downplay the problems, and, if cornered, explain at length what disasters they personally helped to avoid.
This course of defense is only available to those on the top, who were close to the man. Lacking these more imaginative options, but at least having kept themselves outside of the limelight, most of the GOP will suddenly try to sell themselves as the I-don't-care-about-big-politics-I-just-get-the-job-done types. The middle-brow politicians, the pragmatists, the philosophically uninterested. There are some genuine ones, and there are some of them who actually get things done without offering articulate opinions on a daily basis. As for the rest, with the reliable assistance of the short memory of the electorate, most of them will succeed. In 4 years Trump will be just a bad memory, and someone must run the country.
And then there will be those who dig in. Trump had issues, but it was still better than the Left would have been! The cancel culture rage and the statue-breaking mob will give them the fuel to revive the myth of the Flight 93 election and keep wailing constantly about the persecution of Christians, the destruction of the American culture, the coming abortus-wave, and other overblown or purely imaginary disasters. The line will be blurry between this group...
...and the die-hard Trump-fans! They don't simply think all in all it was better than the left, but it was better than any other option because Trump was the great guy! The politicians who choose to go this way will ride the frantic support of the moral and intellectual sewers. QAnon, Charlie Kirk, OANN, Parler, white supremacists. When the president of the US publicly muses whether Ted Cruz's father killed Kennedy and tweets about how a talk show host killed his employee, every conspiracy-theorist nutjob and two-bit moron feels vindicated. The "elite" have suppressed us for so long, but now we've shown we have a voice, and we won't ever let them take it away again!
And finally, the few good men. The 43 Alumni, the Lincoln-project, the Never Trumpers, George Will, Max Boots, Charles Sykes, David Frum, Bill Kristol, to name a few. The ones that gave in their party cards the moment Trump secured the 2016 nomination, and the very few ones who had the balls to publicly challenge the president from inside the party. They can walk out of the woods with heads held high. There are some, like Mitt Romney, who resisted only half-heartedly, and some plain opportunists who jumped ship when deemed the old one sinking, or cleverly hedged their bets, but the few bad apples don't matter. This group proves that there are conservatives who hold principle over power.
Since in real life nothing is clear cut, most people if not all will be some mixture of these above. I think situational factors will weigh in the individual decisions at least as much character and convictions. If I were a Republican politician with flexible principles and little guts to stand up even for them, as I think most GOP members are, I would take my most important cues from the outcome of the election, the future prospects of Donald Trump, the current hyper-liberal hysteria, the character of the Biden presidency, white Evangelicals, and the fledging Nazi-crackpot bromance. I'm not sure about the order of importance here.
The more trashing the defeat will be, the greater the desire will be to wash off the stain of Trump, as at least to some degree, denouncing the past will be simply a matter of self-interest. If the GOP is beaten only marginally, the future looks very bad.
Donald Trump's influence on the future of the party is a very good question, and it depends almost entirely on what will happen to him after 2020. Will he have legal troubles? Will he try to build a media empire on his base (which seems to be 30-40% of the electorate)? Will he continue tweeting and growing ever smaller and - deprived of the office - ever more insignificant? Well, this is not much of a question. Tweeting he won't stop, that's for sure.
The Biden presidency's first and maybe biggest test will be its attitude towards woke insanity and cancel culture. If Biden manages to stand up to them firmly and decisively, he can gain the support of a vast swath of centrist Republican voters and principled liberals. If he bows, he will give the GOP a chance to pose as the steward of civilization and the American way. Please, Joe, don't screw it up!
White Evangelicals are unfortunately a force to reckon with. It's unlikely that they will confess their sin of selling out their values for the most unchristian president ever, and practice penance. After all, that's for the others. With marginal exceptions, they will dig-in and get ever more convinced that the end-time is near. Someone who shares their beliefs or is sufficiently cynical can build a strong platform on them.
Those who are even more crackpot or cynical can try to do the same with white supremacists and the believers in the conspiracies of the satanic-pedophile elite (I'm not joking. Just google QAnon). I don't think they will get very far but being visible is bad enough. Donald Trump did a lot of awful things. But forging an electoral force from plain idiocy and racist hatred will be his ugliest legacy.
This post could go on almost indefinitely, diverging into many directions and diverging further down. At one point I'd like to summarize what I think about why the GOP let itself hijacked by a malignant dilettante, why so few Republican chose principles over collaboration, what does it say about America, what could unite the nation again (the answer is China), what does liberalism mean, American exceptionalism, human irrationality, the power of feelings over reason, and so on and on... another time.