If Never-Trump Republicans don't run their own candidates in 2022, they're essentially collaborators

[EarlG]

This is kinda sorta in response to Rick Wilson yelling at Democrats to "stop fucking around" and "play offense" yesterday.

Thing is, elected Democrats are gonna do what elected Democrats are gonna do, like it or not. We know how they operate, and that's unlikely to change over the next year or so. In 2022, the Democrats will probably run on successfully handling the pandemic, healthcare, and the economy. You know -- normal political stuff.

Meanwhile the Republicans will run on conspiracies, lies, and other Fox-News-viewer-tweaking bullshit. As usual, their base will eat it up. And they're going to have the advantage of gerrymandering and voter suppression laws to give them an even bigger boost.

But this is the first mid-term election after a change in president. The party out of power will get an advantage from its energized voters, and the party in power will struggle, because its voters won't feel as compelled to turn out. Those are the bare facts, and spending the next year or so arguing about whether we're doing enough to prevent GOP candidates yelling, "They're child molesters who want to defund the police!" at us is really kinda missing the point. (Spoiler: they're going to do that no matter what we do.)

So, sure, the Democrats need to "stop fucking around." Let's do that. But if Rick Wilson and his buddies would like to help us "play offense" then perhaps they could put their money and time where their mouths are.

We know that there are a potentially significant number of Republican voters out there who are deeply uncomfortable with the GOP's rapid shift towards anti-democratic authoritarianism. But apparently they are also uncomfortable with the Democratic Party's "leftward shift" (insert infinite eyeroll emoticons here) since Joe Biden got elected.

So rather than spending the next year arguing about whether the Democrats are "too far left" or "not left enough," what would REALLY help is if Rick Wilson and the rest of the Never-Trumpers had a plan to run rational, independent, anti-Big Lie conservative candidates in as many swing districts as they possibly can.

The point of doing this would be to simply to offer an alternative to voters who don't like the Trump Party but would ultimately vote for that shit rather than vote for a Democrat.

It doesn't matter if these independent candidates win or lose. If they win, then that Congressional district gets a conservative Representative that ACTUALLY BELIEVES IN DEMOCRACY; a Representative who will, yes, vote with the Republicans on normal Republican stuff, but will also stand up against the Trump Party's anti-democratic tendencies when it comes to voter suppression and the Big Lie. Which is probably about as good as we can get at the moment.

If they lose, then they would hopefully split the vote in enough swing districts to keep the Democrats in control of the House. (Note: the Democrats are the people who ALSO ACTUALLY BELIEVE IN DEMOCRACY.)

The purpose would be to form an anti-dictatorship coalition of sorts, intended to try to keep as many Trump-loving nutbags as possible out of power, and to limit the authoritarian tendencies of those who are in power. Because when the nutbags are in power, they do crazy shit like help a violent mob attack the Capitol Building in an attempt to overthrow the presidential election, and then try to cover it up by voting against investigations. When they're in power, they use that power to grab more power, and make it harder and harder for We The People to take that power away if we don't like what they're doing.

This isn't about partisanship. Aside from traditional left vs. right there are new political lines being drawn in this country that essentially separate people into two groups: "Rational actors who prefer to live in a traditional Western democracy" and "Complete fucking psychos who would happily turn the USA into Putin's Russia."

So if the Never-Trumpers don't take sides in this battle and do what they can to help us stop the psychos winning, then for all their big talk, what use are they?

Do they actually want to do something to stop Trump's dangerous nutbags taking over, or are they going to make videos and collect clicks all the way up to the election, then stand back, shrug, and point at us and say, "Why didn't you stop fucking around and play offense?"

Hopefully it's the former. Unfortunately, I suspect it will be the latter.

[JoeOtterbein]

1. K n R ! Thanks for posting! nt

[AllaN01Bear]

2. """" and we need to take control and mean it and not pussy foot around .

also , we need to quit negotiationg with these so and sos as well. weve done it for over 50 years and we lost a lot . enough.

[Irish_Dem]

3. I had the same reaction to Rick Wilson's comments. Rick, get off your duff and do something.

Don't just admonish and criticize Dems.

[OnDoutside]

6. I don't think it was meant in the way some people are taking it. Having listened to their podcasts,

Wilson and the others are watching horrified that the GOP are busy bringing in all these voter suppression laws while Democrats in the Senate are wasting time not getting S1 (or as close as possible to it) through. They're only one Pat Leahy illness away from losing the Senate, and if they don't get something through soon, the Democrats are going to suffer terribly from this inaction for years to come.

They're right.

His comments were more an exhortation rather than criticism.

[Irish_Dem]

7. Thanks for the clarification. I see your point. A call to arms so to speak.

[OnDoutside]

8. Yep.

[Crunchy Frog]

10. I agreed with everything Rick said. nt

[lame54]

4. The dems main message should be - starting yesterday...

Get out and vote in the midterm like it's a general election

We cannot afford the lackluster midterm turnout regardless of how strong their message and platform is

The hyper cheating by the repugs needs to be overcome by turnout

[PortTack]

15. +1000

[OnDoutside]

5. No, Earl, I think you are wrong on this.

This has been a discussion amongst Never Trumpers for the last 18 months, and the reality is that the two party system is so engrained in American political life (especially within States) that it would make a 3rd party next to impossible. The Lincoln Project did have a notional thought of creating a Lincoln Party, but 74m voting for Trump killed any thoughts on that.

As for Never Trumpers putting up candidates in swing districts, it would just as likely hurt Democrats getting over the line. There is a group of Never Trumpers (inc Barbara Comstock, Bill Kristol) who have threatened to start a 3rd Party if the GOP don't reform, but Steve Schmidt thinks it's unlikely to get anywhere. Better to attack the GOP from the "independent conservative" outside, and even the TLP are planning to hit them in key swing districts, encouraging wavering Republican voters to either vote for the Democratic candidate, or not vote at all. They are on the offense, but in a far more targeted way than wasting money on what would be nominal 3rd party candidates. Make Republican voters take the big decision, and don't let them off the hook. And bear in mind that 2022 really needs to be a referendum on the GOP rather giving them an "out" in an inter family dispute.

I do agree that new political lines are being drawn, (a la 1964), and it would be a fitting shift in the 10-15% of queasy Republican voters to cross to the Democratic Party rather than giving them an easy way out in a 3rd party that would be doomed to fail.

[EarlG]

12. Thanks for your thoughts

I agree with you that they shouldn't form a third party -- from the perspective of my argument, there would be no need. I'm not suggesting they attempt to form new, long-lasting, independent movement, it's more about crippling the chances of extremists to get into power, or, once they are in power, crippling their ability to destroy democracy itself. Hence the suggestion to run independent conservative candidates in swing districts. These would essentially be "guerilla" candidates, whose job is to do as much damage to the Trumpy candidate as possible.

I honestly do not know whether it would hurt Democrats if they did this, although that would obviously be a concern. It does strike me that without Trump on the ballot, forcing wavering Republicans to choose between the Trumpy Republican or the sensible Democrat -- in the first mid-term after a change of president -- will ultimately send a lot of them home to the Republican Party. Offering a "reality" conservative alternative might strip enough of them away to swing some districts in our favor.

I don't personally have any data to support that though, and regardless, a "one size fits all" approach would probably not be a good idea. I'm sure there is plenty of data out there on whether such a tactic might or might not work in individual districts.

Bottom line, I want Wilson et al to work as hard as they can to keep nutjob Republicans out of power. I don't want them standing on the sidelines and then pointing fingers at the Democrats should we not get it done in 2022.

[OnDoutside]

14. Wilson has spoken about races in the past where Green Party

candidates would be backed in order to take Dem numbers down, and I could certainly see something similar with Libertarian Party candidates. As and when, yes that would be great .. in fact the Lincoln Project backed that independent Senate candidate in Alaska (Al Gross iirc).

If Never Trumpers could encourage former Republican voters to switch to the Democratic candidate, that's a net 2 swing, and making 2022 a referendum on the GOP creates the opportunity for them to say to moderate Republicans, that it's too dangerous to sit on the sidelines when the democracy is at stake. Though I'd happily take a sit at home or a 3rd party vote too !

The other point they made was that the Democratic Party will be starting at a negative 4 seat deficit just because of redistricting, and then you have these voter suppression laws on top of that. If something is not done, Democrats will lose the house and maybe even the Senate. It's a scary thought.

[PortTack]

16. Agree..no 3rd party. If the elected never retrumplicans really wanted to make a statement they

would Start caucusing and voting with the Dems. They don’t need to switch parties or start a new one. Them voting with the Dems would really damage the leadership, and possibly topple it.

Today’s break away of 35 qgop who voted with the Dems for a 1.6 commission is a small test.

[uponit7771]

18. "it would just as likely hurt Democrats getting over the line." Could you explain? This doesn't look

... likely even from a simplistic perspective.

A democrat isn't going to jump ship even to a never Trumper republican and historically 3rd party splinters hurt the party that was splintered way more than the opposition party

Thx in advance

[OnDoutside]

21. I was coming at this from the perspective of Democrats being with striking distance of their

Republican opponent, while the likes of TLP intend to make this a referendum on the GOP. So if they (and other Never Trump Republicans) hit their targets in key purple swing districts, it will be to drive queasy moderate Republicans to stay home or better yet, move across to vote for the Democrat. You don't want these potential swing Republicans wasting their vote on a Never Trump candidate, when you could get the double hit of one crossing to vote for a Democrat.

[JHB]

9. THANK YOU. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

A lot of NeverTrumpers have had a fairly lucrative landing spot during the Trump administration on "liberal" cable channels because they had pal in their contact lists who would get them gigs on the teevee, and they became the face of pointed opposition to Trump, since equivalent liberals were unpromoted and consigned to obscurity.

However, the NeverTrumpers always were looking for Democrats to do the heavy lifting to get rid of Trump, but, with microscopically few exceptions, also worked hard to never shine a light on their own contributions to the current state of the GOP and were trying to position themselves in the same way they did in 2016: as the kingmakers of a post-Trump Republican party.

At any time over the past 5 years, they could have made good on their claims, offered up dirt on pro-Trump colleagues to destroy their careers, but they never did anything like that. There's a club, and Democrats ain't in it. What they want is Dick Cheney's America back, and they're not so anti-Trump as to give that up. They still call us baby-killers and socialists in that wingnut-right version of the word ("everything we don't like" ).

In the election, their own stated goal was to cut Republican voters away from Trump, and from Republican politicians who enabled Trump. Trump got more votes than any Republican in history, and every enabler they targeted won their seat back handily.

So yeah, what good are they? The choice faced by any "reasonable" (using the term loosely) Republican is that to save their party, they have to torpedo the Raving Monster Loony Party, which is also their Republican party. To do that, they have to give up the raft of what we're now calling "Trumpism" that every conservative victory since the 70's rode to success on.

They should do it, but they won't.

[LanternWaste]

11. GOP is at a crossroad that mirrors in some ways, the Democratic party of the late 1940s.

The split in the Democratic party at the time was, though more extreme in ideology, less militant and factionalized than the current competing coalitions of the GOP. That distemper, much narrower in scope, scale and numbers than the divided GOP of today resulted in the Dixiecrats.

So I won't be surprised if the Magats split off from the mainstream GOP in a fit of pique and go their own way over the next four years. And as they already have their messiah-figure around which the cult of personality has already been created, it's just a few more steps forward in the creation of a brand new party.

[Hortensis]

20. Sure. The Dixiecrats were the Southern conservative faction of what had

become a strongly liberal -- and quickly diversifying -- party. By then, in addition to a long list of extreme ideological divisions, politically active AA had consolidated in a solidly pluralistic Democratic Party.

So in that respect the situation was very different from the strongly (!) conservative Republican Party of today.

But I agree. I really could see today's extremist faction, the Magats, loathing and angrily rejecting a majority that sidelined them by rejecting extremism with its hate-based culture wars and rediscovering traditional conservative morals and ideals, including modest acceptance of pluralism.

for that last.

Their new party would be on a fast track to a quick end, but they are extremists so that reality wouldn't necessarily stop them. By then Trump himself would be a backwater and do what he could to keep the money and adulation from stopping altogether.

Another alternatives is that critical numbers retreat from political involvement. As losing the public battle of religion v science (evolution) in the 1920s caused some to do.

[pwb]

13. This was their big play and trump couldn't bring it

over the finish line. IMO. Now the lies and excuses to make things seem right make them look more pathetic. They are done, I think. Independents don't want to hear it. Much more to come in that regard.

[lamp_shade]

17. kick for visibility

[kentuck]

19. Agree.

They keep waiting for the Democrats to pull their bacon out of the fire.

They should be preparing to run a candidate against every one of the anti-democratic Congresspeople.