I have repeatedly insisted that the MAGA cult currently operating as the Republican Party isn’t just a far cry from the party of Lincoln, but an equally far cry from the once-respectable political party of my younger days. As regular readers of this blog know, I spent some 35 years in that earlier GOP–met my husband and made many lifelong friends while serving in a Republican administration, and won a Republican Congressional primary with an agenda that included support for reproductive choice and gay rights.
I still have that husband and those friends. None of them vote Republican these days. All of them are appalled by the racism and viciousness of what has replaced a once-respectable political agenda.
Recently, the Contrarian focused on the vast differences between the MAGA/Trump cult and the political party it has displaced. The article began by agreeing that today’s GOP is more properly seen as a cult than a political party, finding it composed of “Trump idolaters, followers, zealots, sycophants, or devotees” who lack not just a concrete policy agenda “but all other fundamental elements of a political party.” Today’s iteration is “an empty political shell based exclusively on fidelity to a decrepit, unhinged autocrat.”
A political party is properly defined as a group of persons “organized for the purpose of directing the policies of a government”. As the article asserts–and as any sentient American can see– the GOP members of Congress have shown zero interest in discharging their constitutional duties or entering into serious debates over policy.
What about a governing agenda? The article notes the complete absence of a consistent ideology.
“States rights”? Well, they rail against federal regulatory overreach, but they condone federal troops’ invasion of U.S. cities. Indiana’s right-wing governor has threatened his own Republican state lawmakers for not capitulating to Trump’s gerrymander demands, just as MAGA Texas Governor Greg Abbott leaned on his state legislators (at Trump’s behest) to pass a redistricting grab that Texas lawmakers disliked. And while the MAGA contingent nominally supports “law and order,” it cheers the pardon of Jan. 6 felons and the dismissal of those who prosecuted them. Invariably, policy inconsistencies (e.g., America First but start a war with Argentina, fiscal hawkishness but run up the debt) swallow any cogent dogma. The only consistency is subservience to Trump. (Recall that the “party” platform boiled down to “whatever Trump wants.”)
Likewise, unlike normal political parties, the MAGA crew has no minimum standards for membership. Racists, misogynists, xenophobes, conspiracy mongers, criminals, antisemites, insurrectionists, and adjudicated sexual assaulters are all welcome—indeed, they can rise to highest rungs of the party! The days when conservatives ejected the John Birch Society are long gone.
The article went on to describe the party of Lincoln, and the historic elements of the party platform–especially a provision in the platform of 1856 pledging to uphold the principles of the Constitution and the rights of the States–and contrasted that agenda with today’s Trumpers who have essentially signed on to “anything Trump wants,” irrespective of constitutional constraints.
Today, the formerly Grand Old Party has substituted White nationalism for the Declaration’s “all men are created equal.” It no longer respects the limits on executive power extolled in previous platforms. The party that decried “judicial activism” now celebrates a corrupt Supreme Court. The party of free markets has abandoned competition and genuine capitalism for corporatism and crony capitalism. And the party that once opposed Russian aggression cheers as Trump betrays our allies, commits war crimes and makes the world more dangerous.
I know that several of my more partisan readers will post comments to the effect that the GOP was always on the wrong side of liberty and equality. They’re wrong. As the linked article notes,
Let’s face it, the current crowd bears no resemblance to the party with a policy legacy that includes such achievements as the Emancipation Proclamation, the post-Civil War amendments, the Land Grant Colleges and Homestead Act, civil service reform, the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, the National Park system, the first food and drug safety act, the interstate highway system, the EPA, the peaceful integration of Germany at the end of the Cold War, and the Americans With Disabilities Act. Indeed, no doubt Trumpists would condemn all that as part of a “woke,” communist agenda.
We need to face the fact that America does not currently have two political parties. We have the Democrats and today’s iteration of the KKK.
In hindsight, two things come to mind that should have warned everyone that the GOP was becoming something quite different than the party of Lincoln. First, there was the Milton Friedman idiocy about supply-side economics and the lie about trickling down. Then, there was the infamous, secret memo from Powell to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that was actually the precursor to Project 2025.
These two factors were actually the engine to drive American capitalism into the arms of fascism. And here we are. Karl Marx saw it coming. He knew that greed and corruption were NORMAL to “conservative” politics.
And here we are. Merry Christmas.
“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction and the distinction between true and false no longer exists.” – Hannah Arendt (“The Origins of Totalitarianism”)
T*ump and his handlers are nothing more than the most recent avatar of the same forces of greed, anger, and delusion that gave rise to totalitarian regimes in history, and that have never gone away.
The question is, what are the conditions that have brought this evil into existence now? And, what are the conditions that will overcome them if we want to live as free people in the future?
The death camps and the concentration camps of Nazi Germany, and the gulags of Communist Russia, are the ultimate expression of that period of totalitarian rule, the point being that human beings have no intrinsic value whatsoever. Now, imagine the power of that mentality, which is the true MAGA mindset today, coupled with the impersonal force of AI in the hands of those who brought us Q-anon, “alternative facts”, etc., and you can get a glimpse of what the future holds for us if we do not find a way to change the consciousness of humanity.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, tried to bring us the Beloved Community, based on love, and he was murdered for that. Love is dangerous to totalitarianism. He learned from Thich Nhat Hahn, the Vietnamese Zen master, that it is not any person who is the true enemy, but the forces of hatred, greed, racism, etc. Only love will overcome hatred.
If I had not been so ignorant of what I was really supporting I’d not have stayed in the GOP for 40 years. I left when it became clear the party was sliding head long into fascism as evidenced by both my state primary vote handing trump his first primary win and the behavior of “republicans” in the closing years of President Obamas term. MAGA is clearly a cult, not that cultist recognize that they are following a Jim Jones kind of creature.
Good post, James!
Hannah was correct. I watched the gyrations of the Tea Party when the Kochs took over the GOP. The focus was on Libertarianism and free market capitalism, which purely enriched the oligarchs over the working class. The Kochs’ charity schemes are still running in the background of the GOP. They control the Red State apparatus.
The Tech Broligarchy is center stage now because of all the money their industry is making—the “Magnificent 7” account for a large share of the value on the NYSE.
Neither political party has been “people-centered” for generations. The political class has always worked for the oligarchy. MAGA is just a rebranding of the Tea Party. The KKK has always been a part of the right wing. The religious right has always been a part of the right-wing.
The Dems struggled between being a people-centered party during the FDR period and becoming officially controlled by Wall Street thanks to Bubba Clinton. Oligarchs rule the party, and we saw that reality play out in the New York mayoral race. The power of the people is taking steps to regain control of the country, while the Democratic Party fights them.
Another place we see it is in Europe and Venezuela. However, Venezuela is just the first country on the list as we “try” to remove all the left-wing leaders who’ve embraced China/Russia/BRICS to install right-wing fascists who will privatize natural resources and hand them over to the US oligarchy. Trump can’t even spell checkers, but is going up against two Chess masters.
Grab your popcorn!
p.s. Julian Assange has filed a complaint against the Nobel Peace Prize Committee for violating their own parameters and those of the Nobel Prize when he set up the foundation. Awarding the prize to Machado was a global endorsement of the war in Venezuela. She is the “opposition party” who is cheering on the US to attack her own country. Peaceful, eh? 😉
the parties (R&D)make sure no one outside of their demanded views even try to carry a run for office. looking at the so-called they do nothing to suppress the p2025 nazis or take a view that they have crushed the working class in the last 45 years party,s.thats both parties R&D. saturation media by the one half has delt a quiet down in some dank alley cry from anyone else. johnsons congress has made sure by media they stand with and produce flack or find their family will get death threats otherwise. patels flopBI makes sure the law is quiet about retaliation to those issues. ice goons prey,steal lives and leave a slimmy snail like slime that has made sure we dont speak out,or now becalled a terrorist cell. thanks speaker johnson, your now due the new presidental medal of little freedoms left,and be granted it by your owed white house nazis.
and to think, your party is now the owner of this mess while the demos just feel thier stock portfolio is doing good,lets just keep the working class in its place..
Merry Holidays all. i only bought from local thrift stores,for gifts. screw the corps,and anyone who supports them.
James:
ice detention centers,opening prisons that were closed, buying aircraft to deport,sending so called gang memebers to other nations prisons,making sure were called terroists. the privatly owned prison industry. yea, were headed back to that. how many Amercans are there now?
One detail that gets very little attention in all of this red ink. Have we elevated the difficulty of governing a liberal democracy so that it’s no longer within the bounds of human intellect and collaboration?
Maga is obviously not even in the same ballpark as capable governance. It will fail. Then what?
A.I. will someday offer us a very costly crutch to develop, power, and maintain, but can it ever be trusted to do what’s necessary? Its first suggestion is likely to be the necessity of doing what we have been so spoiled by getting here to this land of plenty that our collective response is liable to be the spoiled child’s I don’t want to, and you can’t make me.
Of course, over time, our objections will be overcome by the good spanking we’ll be given by the earth, following rules much greater than us. Unfortunately, that’s liable to be followed by overshooting our correction, and who knows where that will lead?
I just wonder if a turnip with an (R) will still automatically win in Indiana.
To provide a “fresh” perspective (MAGA) – Liberal Justices were “activist”; MAGA Justices are “orginalist” (and their logic and ability to read the Constitution is very “original”)
States’ Rights for me, but not for thee.
Getting serious, the GOP you are describing, Sheila, had a much bigger tent. The abolitionist party of Lincoln took in a pro-plutocrat faction, had a progressive wing that went anti-trust, and generally kept a broader tent until Nixon’s Southern Strategy, Powell’s memo (thank you Vernon), and trickle-down drove too many “traditional” Republicans out, making way for the MAGA takeover. It was a long process.
I agree with Todd on the vacillations between FDR and Bubba. So far, the Democrats still have a large tent. I hope it holds together for a while longer and someone can get the country back on track.
The larger “problem” is “political” parties. Both parties are at their root about their own power and the money supporting them. It is time for a party “of the people, for the people and by the people” – not “buy the people”.
What your “linked article” does NOT note is the Republican Party’s embrace of racism dating back to the 1920s here in Indiana and its subsequent opposition to all things “equal rights”. They may have taken off their white robes and hoods, stopped burning crosses all over the place, and lynching black folk, but that racism, that hatred, lived on in the Indiana Republican Party where they kept them close.
After the passage of the Civil Rights Bill during Johnson’s administration the Republican Party saw an opportunity to sweep up all those Democrat racists in the South, and sweep they did. The south has been voting Republican ever the 1960s, even as they have pushed to dismantle the Civil Rights Bill to this day. All of this was going on long before the 1980s.
More recently, as dismantling the Civil Rights Bill has not been enough to maintain power, the party of hate has turned to gerrymandering, voter repression, and outright lies. Even violence (think Jan. 6th) has resurfaced as a tactic of the Republican Party.
I believe that the Republican Party has become exactly what it was heading for back when they first tolerated hate as a political tool. That wasn’t just 40 years ago.