When Did the GOP Lose Touch With Reality? By David Frum:

[boguspotus]

This article has probably been posted here before, but I just found it. Interesting article by David Frum. When I've seen him on TV he does seem sane for a Repub.
On FB, a lot of my relatives and old High School friends are bagger types and most of my newer, other friends in Minneapolis are progressive.
Do I feel like getting into a bagger argument? It's fun sometimes, but it never changes anyone's mind.

"I’ve been a Republican all my adult life. I have worked on the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal, at Forbes magazine, at the Manhattan and American Enterprise Institutes, as a speechwriter in the George W. Bush administration. I believe in free markets, low taxes, reasonable regulation, and limited government. I voted for John ­McCain in 2008, and I have strongly criticized the major policy decisions of the Obama administration. But as I contemplate my party and my movement in 2011, I see things I simply cannot support."

http://nymag.com/news/politics/conservatives-david-frum-2011-11/

What do you folks think? Worthwhile to put on FB?

[Hekate]

1. If it's from 2011, it's probably old news

Hmmmm

[boguspotus]

3. Yeah, it's old:

But I think it still applies. Like when they were so positive on Fox that Romney was going to win by a landslide, and they were just so wrong. People so entrenched in their beliefs that reality won't even make them change their mind.
And we tried the trickle down hardcore style when W was in office - and these people want to do it again!! It boggles my mind.

I dunno, I'll think I post it on FB anyway - it fun to see baggers defend themselves and get all huffy and self righteous......

[Oakenshield]

2. I couldn't care less for the opinion of someone who really voted for John McCain.

And that the article shows the faces of evangelical whackjobs is cute....but the face that should really be shown again and again and again is Ronald Reagan. The mess we're in today started with him. With the idea that if we let the 1% hoard all the wealth, then by some strange magic the rest of us would benefit.

[boguspotus]

4. I agree:

The repub folks I know just love him, deficits were fine when they were under him.
He is the poster child of the baggers, but they would never elect him now - way, too liberal.

[1-Old-Man]

16. Friend, let me tell you something about Frum

Yes, the Republican Party is repugnant and Frum is certainly one of them, but he is a bit different in at least one way. Frum has never hesitated to air the Republican's dirty laundry. Make no mistake, Frum wants his Party to be stronger and I suspect it is his belief (never heard him say this) that by pointing out its weaknesses the can get people to address them. They, the Party's leadership, don't do the things he suggests and in fact he's been purged more than once, but for the rest of us, using a skeptical ear, he is always worth listening to.

[boguspotus]

18. Good point - Thanks.

[JHB]

5. There's a pretty easy answer to that question...

Last edited Thu Jun 2, 2016, 07:46 PM - Edit history (1)

It lost touch with reality for basically your entire adult lifetime, Mr. Frum. All the deals that you made, all the nutty groups you courted to win power, all the campaigns against "liberal media" and "liberal elitism", and the radicalism those things fed. You recruited these radicals -- as long as they hated liberals then the Republican Party wanted them.

You used all of that to gain power, and to enact your lower taxes, your notion of "reasonable regulation", and your imaginary "limited government", and you're just now noticing that they don't want to stop at a place that you think is reasonable. You fed this pack of beasts, and now you've discovered that since you're not completely with them, they regard you as a slacker, backslider, and backstabber, and they're happy to chew you up too.

And let's not forget how you've been a Useful Idiot for conservative billionaires who do not want "free markets, low taxes, reasonable regulation, and limited government" -- they want markets that work for THEM, no taxes on THEM (just on "the little people&quot , regulation that doesn't limit THEM but does limit anyone who would cause THEM problems, and government that THEY can control.

The intellectual underpinnings of this were laid down in the 50s and 60s, the tools were sharpened in the 70s, your Great Crusade was launched in the 80s, and took on its present form in the 90s. If you're only noticing it now, just think back on the 20-40 years of excuses you've made for the radicalism that now has a firm grip on your party.

How did the Republican Party lose grip with reality? By ignoring reality, Mr. Frum. Just like you did.

[jasond54231]

6. Great post dude

The Republican Party, with very few exceptions (Eisenhower, Lincoln), has always been represented by a bunch of war-hungry, racist, sexist hypocrites. God help us when they end up in the White House again.

[LongTomH]

7. +1000 Great post!

I really want to scream when I see someone talking about the GOP getting back to being "the party of Reagan," like that was a good thing. Ronnie Raygun began the dismantling of the middle class and the huge military buildup that's siphoned money away from anything useful, like investment is science or infrastructure.

[boguspotus]

8. Awesome Post JHB!

Yeah, guys like Frum help nurture the crazies and now the crazy clown car is out of control. I will be way scared if one of those nuts becomes president.
On FB when I post political articles, I mostly get into it with my bagger brother. I'm surprised that other folks don't jump in more. My brother worships Reagan, but when I bring up the shit that he did to our economy, militarily, the huge deficit and so on - that gets ignored.
He once told me that basically since Fox News has such great ratings, how could I not believe what they had to say? That's another weird ass mentality I see too with baggers - since everyone's doing it, it must be good - just follow me. That's a total weird way to think.
I told him lots of people like to watch professional wrestling too, but that doesn't make it real. He didn't like that.

[bluestate10]

11. Even in conservative republican districts, representatives are starting to reap what they sowed.

The republican establishment egged on teabaggers, often cheering while the baggers acted with gross civil disobedience toward democrats. Now, that same republican establishment is being consumed by the monster it helped create. Do the Koch brothers seriously think that teabaggers will let them rule if baggers took over government and the country? The Kochs would be baggers last victims.

[JHB]

13. A couple of my old posts you might want to look at...

...just some of my own "talking points" when dealing with these people -- and remember, you're not necessarily going to convince them, but you might have more effect on bystanders, and even the "arguing with a brick wall" people can have seeds planted that eventually break up the bricks.

“People who just want stuff”: 1860
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021803220
(because they need to be constantly reminded that Lincoln's Republican Party was a liberal-left party)

Let's look at history: where did income tax brackets fall?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2576927

A Century of Tax Bracket Thresholds
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002400229

Today I discovered that Grover Norquist agrees with me about something...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021886942

This list came up last year. My answers remain: *regarding RW talking points that I've also had relatives post on Facebook)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=1580958

It's worth remembering we've been through this before: (Re: fearmongering about muslims)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=1506090

Finance isn't the "engine of the economy". It's the lube system.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=1367629

Lysenko Economics (naming the mess Krugman describes)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002857819

[boguspotus]

19. I think that could be very true.

I would like to think that I made some good strong points on FB when arguing with my bagger brother. Very few folks would join in, maybe I made a little dent somewhere and they thought I made sense?
Well, at least I'll go with that thought for now : )

Thanks for the links to those older posts. I will check them out! Always good to have more insight and information.

[Skidmore]

9. Add to your list the creation of an echo chamber by them in the media using Fox News and

a jumble of think tanks that began to create tailored "facts" for regurgitation. They started to believe their own hype.

[JHB]

12. I count that as part of the "sharpening their tools"...

Last edited Mon Aug 12, 2013, 10:10 AM - Edit history (1)

The think tanks, the computerized "hot button" fundraising letters (using what today we call data mining to tag names on their mailing lists with certain issues of interest, so that the letter they get is tailored to push their hot buttons and make them more likely to cough up some dough and/or get active), guys like Bob Grant were carving out AM talk radio as a haven for hippie-haters, Reed Irvine launched Accuracy In Media, which posed as media criticism but counted anything short of conservative cheerleading as examples of "liberal bias", etc.

[madokie]

14. This is a reply I wish I could recommend

Definitely spot on.
Thanks

[bluestate10]

10. "They send one of ours to the hospital, we send two of theirs to the morgue"

Strange how the right views those that don't agree with them. How do the right expect to carry out it credo without being discovered, and destroyed?

[hatrack]

15. "The Bush Years Cannot Be Reputidated" - Oh really? Why's that, Dave?

Oh, yeah, because you were a big part of them, that's why, and no one wants to just throw out their best work, right?

The crazy's been growing since 1994, and it's been drooling and shitting its pants in public since, oh, 2002, and in 2011 he publishes this wea culpa in which he's shocked, shocked to notice what's been going on for decades?

Nice powers of observation there . . .

[jwirr]

17. 1980 with the election of Raygun.