Will the GOP become the party of white backlash? - By Michael Gerson
By Michael Gerson
Opinion writer
July 2 at 5:25 PM
With President Trump’s forthcoming nomination of a Supreme Court justice likely to rally and unify the Republican coalition, some commentators are (again) declaring the end of #NeverTrump conservatism. “On issue after issue,” says the Ethics and Public Policy Center’s Henry Olsen , the #NeverTrumpers “are in the minority of their own party.” According to Emerald Robinson, writing in the American Spectator , they are “preposterously out of touch.” Robinson points to the passing of columnist Charles Krauthammer as an indication that “the eclipse of the neocon intellectuals is complete.” Nothing like dancing on the fresh soil of a giant’s grave.
It is difficult to deny Trump’s strength in the base of the Republican Party, evidenced by the degree of political intimidation many elected Republicans feel. But the most interesting and important questions remain: Is Trumpism a compelling ideological basis for the Republican Party in the future? Is it really the wave of the political future?
It should give the advocates of Trumpism — defined by some mix of protectionism, nativism and bitter resentment of elites — pause that the strongest advocates of the creed are some of the most frightening figures in American politics. I am not necessarily referring to the politicians Trump chooses to endorse in primaries — given that the president’s favor is more based on loyalty than ideology. I am talking about that subset of Republicans who take the ideals of Trumpism most seriously. People such as West Virginia Senate candidate Don Blankenship, who, before losing the primary, ran ads highlighting the Taiwanese heritage of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s wife. Or Iowa Rep. Steve King, who argues, “We can’t restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies.” Or Arizona Senate candidate and former sheriff Joe Arpaio , known for extreme ethnic profiling, terrorist raids, and cruel and unusual punishment. Or Virginia Senate candidate Corey A. Stewart, who has associated with white supremacists and thrown his state party into turmoil.
The phenomenon of Republican extremism is hardly new. At the height of the tea-party movement, the GOP had candidate fitness crises in Nevada, Delaware, Colorado, Missouri and Indiana. But two things are now different. First, the GOP establishment is weaker than at any time I can remember. Second, the rhetoric of Trumpism is more explicitly racial than at any time I can remember.
more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumpism-a-whites-only-ideology/2018/07/02/82abd142-7e28-11e8-b660-4d0f9f0351f1_story.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
