I think it’s more or less an open secret amongst his peers. He is shit scared of the deplorables who vote for him tho and they have no idea.
Can an establishment Republican candidate ever win if Trump runs as a third party candidate? He’s not going to suck votes from Democrats and he’s going to get more votes than the LOLibertarian. What’s the GOP path to victory if a Trump third party run gets 10 million votes?
Republicans can’t win the presidency without a coalition of Trumpers and anti-Trump Republicans. One side gets a candidate it likes and the other has to tolerate someone they dislike because they dislike Democrats more. It’s arguably easier to get such a partisan reaction from anti-Trump Republicans. The Trumpers include more people who have not had that sort of partisan reflex ingrained for so long and are more likely to be willing to vote for a third party or sit out an election, so it’s possible that catering to the Trump faction gives Republicans a better chance of winning a presidential election than shunning them.
Trump has the GOP by the balls and will be holding a massive grudge over the lack of support he got post-election. There’s also nothing the party can offer him that he wants.
Wouldn’t surprise me one bit if Trump devotes the next stage of his life to using his base to screw over the GOP.
2 Likes
Yea GOP really should have cut him loose when they had the chance. Sure, they would have taken a hit for 10 years, but Trump is basically going to split the GOP in half. Corporations that donate to politicians do not want the Qanon nuts in power.
I hope you’re right, but it seems likely to me that he’s shown that rank-and-file Republican voters will at least accept (if not celebrate) abject totalitarianism. And that was in the name of an obviously bloviating con artist, a slightly smarter/refined version of Trump is going to dominate.
2 Likes
Trump is going to be looked back upon by Republican voters as the man who showed them the way but didn’t go far enough
10 Likes
Trump has warped my brain so much that I just opened a “Mega-pack” of cold cuts and at first I thought it said “MAGA-pack.”
9 Likes
Trump is the GOP now
Only Trump and his ardent supporters/defenders will be able to win primaries going forward.
If you go against him at all, you will be booted out by the party and the voters. Even if you had no choice in what you did like Pence. Doesn’t matter.
Whoever he endorses while alive will be the winner of Republican votes.
When he dies, his disciples will be in charge going forward.
2 Likes
I think “smarter/refined version of Trump” doesn’t work. While perhaps not universally the case, Trump supporters are aware Trump is an absolute idiot and love it.
When fascism comes to America it will have a ketchup-stained shirt and an unzipped fly.
10 Likes
This cycle of doom only stops when Republicans either a) stop nominating absolute psychos or b) lose enough elections that they don’t have power.
The important thing for Democrats to do is fully internalize that no amount of shaming or appealing to common decency will have any impact whatsoever. The only thing they can do is govern effectively and mobilize their voters.
5 Likes
Trump endorsed people that lost in primaries in both '18 and '20. Not saying his endorsements don’t matter but I’d say going forward they will start to matter less, not more.
For all the talk of the Trump kids running for various Senate races, I’d bet against any of them winning (other than maybe Ivanka).
1 Like
Yes his endorsement doesn’t win every primary everywhere, but nationally and in many states, if you go against trump you are done.
This means the party will only become more of a Trump party, not less. The way they acted with the election results, the insurrection, the impeachment, and the various censuring of non-trumpets shows they are not moving on past him. Their base considers anybody acting against Trump to be a RINO and someone to kick out of the party.
But lets freak out about cancel culture run amok!
/idiot Musk-worshipping techies
Not sure if it means anything but my Mom and Stepdad seem to have converted to Democrats (moderate Rs, live in upper-middle class suburb - Johnson Co, KS - which flipped blue in 2020).
They’ve even started watching MSNBC and only switched over to FoxNews to “see what BS they were spinning the Impeachment trial with”. The truth does actually win out some of the time with some of the people.
My rich cousin in Jackson, Hole - exact same thing. Except he doesn’t care about abortion - which makes it even more likely to stick imo.
If Republicans keep going to down the party of Trump path, they’re going to lose some suburban moderates for sure. They already have. Whether that will stick remains to be seen.
Now if they nominate Romney all the suburban moderates come running back into the fold I’m sure. But they lose the Trumpkins.
Also will the psycho evangelicals like my two aunts stay loyal to a Romney run? Yeah probably. They just do whatever their pastor tells them. Fucking evangelicals. They believe in nothing. Most pliable people and reliable R voters in the country.
7 Likes
That’s more of a Corey Booker thing, allegedly.
1 Like
Are there any gay Republicans? Even if he comes out and claims he’s never acted on his gay impulses, I think he loses in a primary.
If you are talking about openly gay Republicans who actually win elections, there are a handful in state legislatures.
I was thinking more federal election. I could see a gay Republican winning some local elections in a purple area, where they know a good % of the electorate, but think winning House and especially Senate would be much harder.
Now that Trump is out of office does anyone have to really be against him? They’ll just ride the middle of never explicitly disavowing whatever non sense he says while also never explicitly endorsing it.
I think Trump’s going to be significantly diminished. There was a Daily Beast article that made the comparison to Palin. For a while she was Queen of the media and the Republican Party but after she left office and failed the VP bid she’s just a hanger on now while Trump’s the Republican darling. Same thing will happen to Trump. But whoever comes next is going to be the same vein of Trump just like he was a continuation of Palin.
1 Like
Andrew Sullivan
gay Roman Catholic conservative
2 Likes