The GQP: Trumpist Death Cult

[Francisco 2.0 32590]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-drunk-republicans-are-choosing-russia-over-the-constitution?ref=home

 

Quote

How did this happen? How did the Republican Party descend from the moral heights of Ronald Reagan’s “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall,” to this apologist sewer filled with the weak trying to reassure the weaker that weakness is a virtue? 

For the first time in American history we have meticulously detailed evidence that a hostile foreign power attempted to influence the choice of an American commander in chief, and the collective Republican response is apparently, “Our side won, move on.”

 

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The beating heart of America is courage. This is the nation born of the courage of a few who made the impossible appear inevitable. The 75th anniversary of D-Day is upon us, and yet Republicans don’t seem capable of summoning some mix of courage and decency to put country over their next primary. Courage is not standing up to Donald Trump. Courage is getting out of the boat when the man in front of you was just shot. That’s the legacy these Republicans are squandering and it should be called out for what it is: shameful.

 

Quote

The congressmen and senators of the party whose unofficial slogan is now “Lock her/him up” have a constitutional duty to defend our country and they are failing. It’s not an elective they are auditing for no credit at night school, it’s a sworn oath:

 

Spoiler

"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.”

It baffles me that any member of Congress or senator can read the Mueller Report, describing how the Russians referred to their campaign to help elect Donald Trump as “information warfare,” and not respond as if America was under attack. The modern Republican Party that has pushed the Pentagon budget to over $700 billion a year, that supports American military personnel in over 150 countries, those same Republicans have suddenly decided that Lenin’s “useful idiots” are their new role models.

Why? These are not stupid men and women, though more than a few do a fair imitation. Each will have their own justifications that amount to a personal Faustian bargain predicated on the self-delusion that some particular issue or cause is more important than their oath of office. But equally powerful will be the reinforcing group mentality that Rep. Justin Amash describes:

“My colleagues tell me all the time—in fact, you wouldn’t believe how many phone conversations I’ve had, or conversations in person with colleagues... A lot of them think I’m right about the Mueller Report. And they just won’t say it. A lot of Republicans. What they’ll say to me is, Justin, you know, going out publicly with that, you know the Democrats will never support you. You know that they’re hypocrites on this stuff. And I say, you know, some of them are and some of them aren’t. It doesn’t matter to me. Because you have to look at what you’re doing first. You have to care about what you’re doing. If you have a society where all we care about is that the other side is bad, and therefore we don’t have to do the right thing, that society will break down, and you will have no liberty. I refuse to be a part of that.”

At the heart of the Trump presidency is a lie: almost every Republican elected official in Washington knows Donald Trump is unfit to be president. They knew it on Nov. 9, 2016, at 7 p.m., when they were planning on how to rebuild the party from the disaster of a nominating a know-nothing racist for president; and they knew it at midnight, when they were all frantically calling the oddballs and kooks Trump had assembled into a campaign to lavishly praise their brilliance. 

The Republican Party stood by a candidate who ran on a religious test to enter the United States. They knew it was unconstitutional and indecent, but they were silent. All through 2016 I had conversations with what passes for leadership in the Republican Party on the need to stand up to Trump. Most of their responses went like this: “Trump is a disaster and a disgrace. But we have to let him lose on his own. If we, the Establishment, put our thumbs on the scale, when he loses it will be our fault and not the fault of his racism, the alt-right, those idiots at Breitbart. We will have elected Hillary Clinton. We have to let him lose and rebuild.” 

To which I always responded, “But what if he wins?” Truth was, though, I didn’t think he would win, and I wasn’t great at making the case for something I didn’t believe. What these Republican leaders were saying wasn’t crazy. It just proved to be wrong. And in that miscalculation began the surrender of any sense of self to Donald Trump. So now the nation is in full possession of the reality that Russians—Russians, for cryin’ out loud—worked on the same side as every Republican volunteer, donor, elected official and Trump voter. When you learn that the bank you borrowed money from was actually owned by a drug cartel, should your first reaction be, “Well, we got a good interest rate”? The simple reality is that the Republican Party was in business with Russian intelligence efforts, what used to be known as the KGB, and precious few leading the Republican Party seem to give a damn. 

“My question to all those Republicans who are more worried about defending Donald Trump than defending America: is this why you went into politics?”

I’ve spent decades waking up every morning eager to fight Democrats, trying to gain every bit of advantage for every battle. God knows we made mistakes and played too often on the Dark Side. But I never woke up knowing that somewhere out there a Russian agent was waking up with the same job I had. 

My dad was in the FBI when Hoover ordered the roundup of Asian Americans. He hated it and quit, joined the Navy and spent the next three years fighting in the South Pacific. Like so many, he didn’t talk a lot about the war but when it came to leaving the FBI, he told me once, “You can always say no.” 

And that’s my question to all those Republicans who are more worried about defending Donald Trump than defending America: Is this why you went into politics? Is this why you put up with all the bullshit and stupidity that is integral to our political system, so you can be on the same side as the Russians? 

You can always say no. Try it.

 

[Horn Under a Bad Sign 20917]

Devastating new analysis by the non-partisan congressional research office:  the Republican Tax Cut has done no benefits for the U.S. economy or the average American:

 

Quote

You may remember all the glowing predictions made for the December 2017 tax cuts by congressional Republicans and the Trump administration: Wages would soar for the rank-and-file, corporate investments would surge, and the cuts would pay for themselves.

The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service has just published a deep dive into the economic impact of the cuts in their first year, and emerges from the water with a different picture. The CRS finds that the cuts have had virtually no effect on wages, haven’t contributed to a surge in investment, and haven’t come close to paying for themselves. Nor have they delivered a cut to the average taxpayer.

The negligible (at best) economic impact of the cuts shouldn’t surprise anyone, the CRS says. “Much of the tax cut was directed at businesses and higher-income individuals who are less likely to spend,” its analysts write. “Fiscal stimulus is limited in an economy that is at or near full employment.”

https://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-tax-cut-effects-20190529-story.html?fbclid=IwAR2xOLBulBu0x5TX43BE7VRV-httw9uXtgFp67G5MEFPYbZ53YKW-_PGnxQ

Edited May 30, 2019 by Horn Under a Bad Sign

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

Why tho? 

[Biff Tannen 46166]

20 minutes ago, Horn Under a Bad Sign said:

Devastating new analysis by the non-partisan congressional research office:  the Republican Tax Cut has done no benefits for the U.S. economy or the average American:

 

https://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-tax-cut-effects-20190529-story.html?fbclid=IwAR2xOLBulBu0x5TX43BE7VRV-httw9uXtgFp67G5MEFPYbZ53YKW-_PGnxQ

Won't even be a blip on the radar.  

[Horn Under a Bad Sign 20917]

4 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

Won't even be a blip on the radar.  

 

You may be right. We're not in "post truth" times, we're in "post reality" times. 

[Patrick Bateman 3975]

1 hour ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

Why tho? 

Why not?  Because they were ordered to do so by their master.

 

[Js1 87182]

NC GOP is the most corrupt and outright racist state GOP in the country.

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article230995293.html

Quote

Cheri Beasley, who earlier this year became the first African-American female chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court, will have her staff cut in half under a plan supported by Republicans in the N.C. Senate.

The state had a multi-million-dollar budget surplus this year, but Senate Republicans decided to eliminate funding for three of the six staffers who work for the state’s top judge.

Read more here: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article230995293.html#storylink=cpy

 

Quote

Lowe’s failed attempt to amend the budget also would have prevented different cuts to the state court system that Senate Republicans want to make — to the the Judicial Standards Commission, which investigates accusations made against judges.
 

The commission has four professional staff members, and the Senate budget would eliminate funding for two jobs, including the executive director.

Read more here: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article230995293.html#storylink=cpy

 

 

[Horn Under a Bad Sign 20917]

This fucker no doubt votes Republican.  This is the preacher who said he doesn't fly commercial because he doesn't want to fly with demons. 
 

 

[Pancho 46309]

https://splinternews.com/just-a-florida-republican-musing-about-killing-gay-peop-1835158491?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=splinter_copy&utm_campaign=top

 

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In audio released by the Pensacola State Journal on Friday, Florida Republican State Rep. Mike Hill can be heard casually discussing the possibility of introducing legislation to kill gay people.

The recording, taken during a May 24 forum held by the Pensacola-based Women for Responsible Legislation, features a man whom the Journal identified as Hill responding to a constituent who noted that “In 1 Corinthians, it says that a man who has an affair with another man will be put to death.”

“It says that in the Old Testament too,” Hill answered, before another person chimed in, asking if he could “introduce legislation.”

Hill, a self-described “Pro Life! Pro Guns! Pro Jesus!!” representative, could be heard chuckling along with several members of the audience before replying “I wonder how that would go over?”

Hill reportedly prefaced his comments by telling audience members that homosexuality is “a behavior, and it’s a choice,” and that “You can say, ‘But I was born that way.’ [...] but nobody’s forcing you to engage in that relationship, even if you were born that way.”

 

[Ted Lange 16413]

the replies are fun. 

[Anastasis 23718]

8 minutes ago, Ted Lange said:

the replies are fun. 

[Bama Chick 28596]

Looks like a dude that could use a class on fashion.

Iron your fucking shirt, ya fat slovenly ditch pig.

And he’s certainly getting dragged in the replies.

Ba Dum Dum

And the library apparently had to cancel the class after he and another disgusting Republican made a fuss about it and it resulted in the teens registered for it getting death threats.

And this guy has also been removed from office before because of a felony or somesuch?

Truly, this whole episode is Peak 2019 Republican. There’s even some kind of KKK event mentioned.

[atomheartbevo 90647]

On 5/29/2019 at 4:40 PM, Js1 said:

Stripped money from election services, including security. Suddenly because the SOS is a Dem

 

Arizona Republicans working hard to make sure AZ stays flipped to the Dems.  

[Ted Lange 16413]

1000% chance that fat ass Ohio republican slob ends up getting caught fucking a dude, or at the very least something of the Larry Craig variety.  Tap tap tap. 

Edited June 1, 2019 by Ted Lange

[Mole 4339]

2 hours ago, Pancho Negro said:

The recording, taken during a May 24 forum held by the Pensacola-based Women for Responsible Legislation, features a man whom the Journal identified as Hill responding to a constituent who noted that “In 1 Corinthians, it says that a man who has an affair with another man will be put to death.”

Can someone help me out with this reference? How do you even arrive at this? 1 Cor 5 talks about someone who slept with their stepmother being “handed over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh,” but it’s a real stretch to take this to mean anything other than disfellowship. And of course it’s a heterosexual relationship.

1 Cor 6 includes “men who have sex with men” as not inheriting the kingdom of God, but also includes idolaters, adulterers, the greedy, the sexually immoral, slanderers, drunkards, and swindlers, which reads more like an ad for the modern GOP. Setting aside the debate over what homosexuality meant in Paul’s day vs what it means now, the context of not inheriting the kingdom of God is in highlighting the redemptive nature of the Gospel. It’s not a manual for bigotry and exclusion. It’s certainly not one for murder. Offhand, the only thing that could be taken to mean killing or advocating of killing by the early church was the story of Ananias and Sapphira, whose sin was greed and deceit, not gay sex.

In other words, the theocracy they’re advocating for isn’t even consistent with the faith they proclaim. This isn’t news, but in light of the Franklin Graham GOP Matthew 6:5 prayer weekend, it bears pointing out.

 

[Post Oak 20566]

6 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Strong believer in the 1st Amendment and also common sense.  Why do I get the feeling he feels differently 2nd Amendment and common sense

[Jack Straw 2955]

18 hours ago, Horn Under a Bad Sign said:

This fucker no doubt votes Republican.  This is the preacher who said he doesn't fly commercial because he doesn't want to fly with demons. 
 

 

thank God we have men like this to lead us in our faith and protect us from the Muslims.

-Johnny Sack

[Patricio Swayze 17058]

Holy fuck, what a complete nut job.

[Red Five 41738]

5 minutes ago, Patricio Swayze said:

Holy fuck, what a complete nut job.

In this thread you're gonna have to be more specific. 

[Brisketexan 106898]

1000% chance that fat ass Ohio republican slob ends up getting caught fucking a dude, or at the very least something of the Larry Craig variety.  Tap tap tap. 

To be fair, be might have some epic restraint, and just stay home and masturbate frequently and furiously to gay porn online, crying in shame and self-loathing the entire time.

But it’s really one or the other - that’s a near-certainty.

[Bama Chick 28596]

1000% chance that fat ass Ohio republican slob ends up getting caught fucking a dude, or at the very least something of the Larry Craig variety.  Tap tap tap. 

ANY gay man is better looking than that wife of his.

[elfenix 34749]

On 5/30/2019 at 3:07 PM, Horn Under a Bad Sign said:

Devastating new analysis by the non-partisan congressional research office:  the Republican Tax Cut has done no benefits for the U.S. economy or the average American:

 

https://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-tax-cut-effects-20190529-story.html?fbclid=IwAR2xOLBulBu0x5TX43BE7VRV-httw9uXtgFp67G5MEFPYbZ53YKW-_PGnxQ

tHe DeMoCrAtS aBaNdOnEd ThE mIdDlE cLaSs

[ChiTownDoc 21345]

2 hours ago, Bama Chick said:

 

ANY gay man is better looking than that wife of his.

 

No shit.  Brown bag special?  Not even.  If I had to fuck that, please hand me a plastic bag.

Edited June 1, 2019 by ChiTownDoc
For myself, clearly.

[Bama Chick 28596]

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

These unhinged violent liberals are out of control. Eggs and milkshakes?  What’s next? Public breastmilking? 

[JimmyJames 12271]

Milkshakes? Why hasn’t Matt gaetz been tarred and feathered yet? 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

 

[HenryJames 67361]

 

[David Dennison 19541]

5 minutes ago, HenryJames said:

 

Because the Republican Party has never, ever been about morality or cultural issues.

The Republican Party is protecting the interests of capital. That's it. Everything else is bullshit designed to win elections. If that includes racism, sexism, anti-Americanism, Trumpism, so be it. Protect capital above everything else.

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

13 minutes ago, HenryJames said:

 

From the article:

Quote

It baffles me that any member of Congress or senator can read the Mueller Report, describing how the Russians referred to their campaign to help elect Donald Trump as “information warfare,” and not respond as if America was under attack. The modern Republican Party that has pushed the Pentagon budget to over $700 billion a year, that supports American military personnel in over 150 countries, those same Republicans have suddenly decided that Lenin’s “useful idiots” are their new role models.

 

This is the angle that really needs to be highlighted.  The absolute waste of taxpayer dollars on the military and the shallow hypocrisy of our elected officials that fund it.

We have a military to defend our population and institutions from foreign attack.  Our enemies are now bypassing our trillion dollar military in the physical world to destroy our democracy by attacking our population and elections directly in cyberspace. 

This is the whole ball game.  No tanks or guns is going to stop this and the Republican response is we need to buy more tanks and guns.  We are fucked if their attitude doesn’t change quickly. 

 

Edited June 2, 2019 by Hugo Stiglitz

[Welch 640]

Certainly not the most egregious thing in this thread, and I’m generally agnostic on the cameras myself.

But I love the fact that the party of “law and order”, the party that “backs the blue”, the party that’s “for immigration as long as it’s legal, but these people are illegal...” has such a problem with devices to aid in law enforcement.

Couldn’t be that their “law and order” stuff only applies when the targets are primarily people of color, could it?  And when cameras like this start affecting affluent white folks, suddenly they have to start looking for nuance and shades of gray?

[shnsajax 3607]

My local GOP.

https://amp.idahostatesman.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article231036713.html?__twitter_impression=true



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[horncyclist 1391]

3 hours ago, Welch said:

Certainly not the most egregious thing in this thread, and I’m generally agnostic on the cameras myself.

But I love the fact that the party of “law and order”, the party that “backs the blue”, the party that’s “for immigration as long as it’s legal, but these people are illegal...” has such a problem with devices to aid in law enforcement.

Couldn’t be that their “law and order” stuff only applies when the targets are primarily people of color, could it?  And when cameras like this start affecting affluent white folks, suddenly they have to start looking for nuance and shades of gray?

Yeah. The cameras weren't racist enough in their dispensing of law and order. Can't have that. Just give the technology a few years to identify the whities better and they'll be all for it.

[shnsajax 3607]

Yeah. The cameras weren't racist enough in their dispensing of law and order. Can't have that. Just give the technology a few years to identify the whities better and they'll be all for it.

One of the better episodes in tv history.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Pancho 46309]

We’’be been told numerous times it’s actually the Republican Party that is the party of diversity and equality for all....

 

[Bookman 4763]

22 hours ago, Welch said:

Certainly not the most egregious thing in this thread, and I’m generally agnostic on the cameras myself.

But I love the fact that the party of “law and order”, the party that “backs the blue”, the party that’s “for immigration as long as it’s legal, but these people are illegal...” has such a problem with devices to aid in law enforcement.

Couldn’t be that their “law and order” stuff only applies when the targets are primarily people of color, could it?  And when cameras like this start affecting affluent white folks, suddenly they have to start looking for nuance and shades of gray?

Or it could be that the people of this state didn't like such rules strictly enforced.

[Chad Fuck 18135]

On 6/2/2019 at 8:50 AM, shnsajax said:

My local GOP.

https://amp.idahostatesman.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article231036713.html?__twitter_impression=true



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Anastasis 23718]

LOL

Former GOP Idaho attorney general David Leroy represented Parker during the arraignment. Leroy told the judge that the incident was a “grand misunderstanding” and that Parker had been invited to a costume party at the apartment complex.

[henrygandorf 29225]

john oliver takes on the glen casada/tennessee situation - from last week tonight last night.

here's the only site that actually had video (sorry can't embed).

https://www.alternet.org/2019/06/john-oliver-reveals-the-most-vulgar-detail-about-the-tennessee-speaker-scandal-that-you-havent-heard-of/

my favorite part (of many) is "tennessee was recently called one of the 49 best states in the nation by 'obvious references to florida magazine.'"

[Bama Chick 28596]

I was looking for that earlier on YouTube to post here but it hasn’t been uploaded yet.

I’m an hour away from all of that mess and hadn’t heard anything about it.

I was laughing my ass of at the utter predictably of every character and happenstance in the whole sordid affair.

The cocaine in the office at 10:39 AM and minute man sex in a chicken joint bathroom were just perfect.

[henrygandorf 29225]

2 hours ago, Bama Chick said:

I was looking for that earlier on YouTube to post here but it hasn’t been uploaded yet.

I’m an hour away from all of that mess and hadn’t heard anything about it.

I was laughing my ass of at the utter predictably of every character and happenstance in the whole sordid affair.

The cocaine in the office at 10:39 AM and minute man sex in a chicken joint bathroom were just perfect.

i too was cracking up, although i disagree slightly with the "scheduling" issue of the blow in the office.

there's a big difference between doing blow before noon on a wednesday and doing it at 7pm on a friday (when presumably most everyone had gone home and you weren't technically on the taxpayer's dime).

the scheduling really shows the dirtbaggery of this dickwad, and the disrespect he shows for his position and responsibilities.

just one man's opinion.

[Captainant 28538]

17 minutes ago, henrygandorf said:

there's a big difference between doing blow before noon on a wednesday and doing it at 7pm on a friday (when presumably most everyone had gone home and you weren't technically on the taxpayer's dime).

For the sake of being pedantic, doing any coke in a government owned building is doing coke on the taxpayer dime. Air conditioning and lights aint gonna pay for themselves

[henrygandorf 29225]

1 minute ago, Captainant said:

For the sake of being pedantic, doing any coke in a government owned building is doing coke on the taxpayer dime. Air conditioning and lights aint gonna pay for themselves

oh, 100%. 

i just did not want anyone downplaying the absolute depravity of this knucklehead.

[Bama Chick 28596]

I meant perfect as shorthand for “perfectly fucked up and totally now normal Republican Chad behavior”.

Sorry if I wasn’t clear.

Doing any cocaine in the state capital at any time is definitely a no no.

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

 

[Doc Sam Beckett 5908]

3 hours ago, Bama Chick said:

Doing any cocaine in the state capital at any time is definitely a no no.

[bolverk 30323]

Yeah, it's David Brooks so it's only a surface level analysis (he's only allowed a certain word count though) from a conservative perspective, but he's not wrong.

Quote

 

The Coming G.O.P. Apocalypse

Stumbling blind into the age of diversity.

For much of the 20th century, young and old people voted pretty similarly. The defining gaps in our recent politics have been the gender gap (women preferring Democrats) and the education gap. But now the generation gap is back, with a vengeance.

This is most immediately evident in the way Democrats are sorting themselves in their early primary preferences. A Democratic voter’s race, sex or education level doesn’t predict which candidate he or she is leaning toward, but age does.

In one early New Hampshire poll, Joe Biden won 39 percent of the vote of those over 55, but just 22 percent of those under 35, trailing Bernie Sanders. Similarly, in an early Iowa poll, Biden won 41 percent of the oldster vote, but just 17 percent of the young adult vote, placing third, behind Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.

As Ronald Brownstein pointed out in The Atlantic, older Democrats prefer a more moderate candidate who they think can win. Younger Democrats prefer a more progressive candidate who they think can bring systemic change.

The generation gap is even more powerful when it comes to Republicans. To put it bluntly, young adults hate them.

In 2018, voters under 30 supported Democratic House candidates over Republican ones by an astounding 67 percent to 32 percent. A 2018 Pew survey found that 59 percent of millennial voters identify as Democrats or lean Democratic, while only 32 percent identify as Republicans or lean Republican.

The difference is ideological. According to Pew, 57 percent of millennials call themselves consistently liberal or mostly liberal. Only 12 percent call themselves consistently conservative or mostly conservative. This is the most important statistic in American politics right now.

Recent surveys of Generation Z voters (those born after 1996) find that, if anything, they are even more liberal than millennials.

In 2002, John B. Judis and Ruy Teixeira wrote a book called “The Emerging Democratic Majority,” which predicted electoral doom for the G.O.P. based on demographic data. That prediction turned out to be wrong, or at least wildly premature.

The authors did not foresee how older white voters would swing over to the Republican side and the way many assimilated Hispanics would vote like non-Hispanic whites. The failure of that book’s predictions has scared people off from making demographic forecasts.

But it’s hard to look at the generational data and not see long-term disaster for Republicans. Some people think generations get more conservative as they age, but that is not borne out by the evidence. Moreover, today’s generation gap is not based just on temporary intellectual postures. It is based on concrete, lived experience that is never going to go away.

Unlike the Silent Generation and the boomers, millennials and Gen Z voters live with difference every single day. Only 16 percent of the Silent Generation is minority, but 44 percent of the millennial generation is. If you are a millennial in California, Texas, Florida, Arizona or New Jersey, ethnic minorities make up more than half of your age cohort. In just over two decades, America will be a majority-minority country.

Young voters approve of these trends. Seventy-nine percent of millennials think immigration is good for America. Sixty-one percent think racial diversity is good for America.

They have constructed an ethos that is mostly about dealing with difference. They are much more sympathetic to those who identify as transgender. They are much more likely than other groups to say that racial discrimination is the main barrier to black progress. They are much less likely to say the U.S. is the best country in the world.

These days the Republican Party looks like a direct reaction against this ethos — against immigration, against diversity, against pluralism. Moreover, conservative thought seems to be getting less relevant to the America that is coming into being.

Matthew Continetti recently identified the key blocs on the new right in an essay in The Washington Free Beacon. These included the Jacksonians (pugilistic populists), the Paleos (Tucker Carlson-style economic nationalists), the Post-Liberals (people who oppose pluralism and seek a return to pre-Enlightenment orthodoxy). To most young adults, these tendencies will look like cloud cuckooland.

The most burning question for conservatives should be: What do we have to say to young adults and about the diverse world they are living in? Instead, conservative intellectuals seem hellbent on taking their 12 percent share among the young and turning it to 3.

There is a conservative way to embrace pluralism and diversity. It’s to point out that there is a deep strain of pessimism in progressive multiculturalism: blacks and whites will never really understand each other; racism is endemic; the American project is fatally flawed; American structures are so oppressive, the only option is to burn them down.

A better multiculturalism would be optimistic: We can communicate across difference; the American creed is the right recipe for a thick and respectful pluralism; American structures are basically sound and can be realistically reformed.

So far that’s not visible. My mentor William F. Buckley vowed to stand athwart history yelling “Stop!” Today’s Republicans don’t even seem to see the train that is running them over.

 

 

[HenryJames 67361]

 

[lemonlime 5503]

2 hours ago, HenryJames said:

 

Yeah, but Hillary didn't return a donation from Harvey Weinstein.  And hidden code from pizza parlors.  Or something.

[Bama Chick 28596]

I can’t help but give David Brooks all the side eyes since I found out he willingly appears on RT “news” shows.