Blog No. 267. The Future of the GOP. Is There One? (Part I)

Does anyone remember the recent “Republican Convention”? I put the term in quotes because the proceedings had little in common with the Republican Party that I and many others respected and supported. When this blog got started in 2013, the name RINOcracy was taken in recognition of the fact that those of us who were deemed insufficiently conservative (or, more accurately, right-wing) were dubbed RINOs, Republicans In Name Only. I elected to convert the slur to a badge of honor, but I remained a part of the Republican Party.

Today, however, it is the members of the current Republican Party who deserve to be considered RINOs. And, yes, in this case I consider it to be a slur and a well-earned one. To a lifelong Republican and confirmed NeverTrumper, the convention offered four days of embarrassment and anguish. The tone was set when the party dispensed with the writing of a platform and, instead, issued a statement to the effect that whatever Trump had done, or might do, was fine by them. It made sense: Whoever heard of a cult with a platform? The aura of a cult was palpable throughout the convention, and the most honest thing the Party could do at this point would be to discard the name “Republican Party” altogether and simply call it the “Trump Party.”

I will not subject readers to a detailed reprise of the convention: a four day farrago of falsehoods, vague promises, and wild caricatures of Joe Biden. That outpouring was on display for all to see and to make their own judgments. And for those who could not bring themselves to watch, there was a full supply of news reports, comment and analysis. After only two days, Jennifer Rubin pointed out in the Washington Post, that those who declined to observe the proceedings first hand should not harbor feelings of guilt:

Let’s begin with the notion that you should listen to the arguments of your ideological opponents. Well, that is a good idea, but that does not mean one must endure screaming, dog whistles and bullhorn appeals to White supremacy and abjectly ridiculous accusations (“Joe Biden will destroy the suburbs!” “Biden is a socialist!”). There is no agenda (just defend Trump, the RNC’s platform says); thus, there are no arguments in defense of President Trump’s nonexistent policies. Moreover, you need not endure an hour or more each night of straight bile when responsible news outlets can give you the recap.

Then things got worse, climaxing in Trump’s acceptance speech on Friday. On that evening, he hijacked the trappings of the White House to deliver a political rant to crowd of 1500 faithful, seated cheek-by-jowl and maskless on the South Lawn. (Attendees who turned up with COVID-19 presumably have been treated with hydroxychloroquine and quarantined under the care of the Witness Protection Program.)

The more interesting exercise for some of us may be to consider is what lies ahead for the Republican Party, both before and after November 3–or perhaps January 20. I cite the latter date because the first, election day, may be only a way station on the road to learning who will be sworn in on January 20. Whatever the results may be on November 3, Trump has made it clear that he does not intend to “go gentle into that good night.” On September 2, the New York Times captured the disarray that may follow an inconclusive election night in “This Is Democrats’ Doomsday Scenario for Election Night.” And Blog No. 265, “The Coming Trump Coup,” surveyed the legal landscape to be traversed between November 3 and January 20.

Before November 3 arrives, however, NeverTrump Republicans (and Independents) must confront the issue of how to deal with Trump’s enablers on Capitol Hill. This issue has been captured in the colorful question of whether the appropriate course is to “burn down” the Republican Party, or whether its sitting Senators and Representatives should be spared. That is the question to be explored in this Part I. (Part II of this blog will discuss the opportunities and perils that may exist after January 20.)

Burn the Republican Party Down?

There are numerous advocates for the proposition that the Republican Party should be burned down by removing from office as many as possible of its current officeholders at the national level. The question has focused primarily on the Senate for perhaps three reasons. First, Senate Republicans have been even more intransigent than many House Republicans in refusing to operate on a bipartisan basis. Several significant bills have passed the House with bipartisan support, only to die at the hands of Mitch McConnell and his colleagues. Further, Senate Republicans have been complicit in confirming Trump’s frequently dreadful appointments. Finally, as a practical matter, Senators may be more vulnerable than many House Republicans who are elected from safely gerrymandered districts. Apart from those considerations, however, it is important to bear in mind that, as explained in Blog No. 265, if the election results are contested, the composition of both the Senate and House may affect who is ultimately deemed to have been elected President.

The argument in favor of defeating elected Republicans in November rests on fundamental principles. As long ago as June 2018, the dean of conservative writers, George Will, wrote an eloquent column urging a vote against Republicans that November:

The principle: The congressional Republican caucuses must be substantially reduced. So substantially that their remnants, reduced to minorities, will be stripped of the Constitution’s Article I powers that they have been too invertebrate to use against the current wielder of Article II powers. They will then have leisure time to wonder why they worked so hard to achieve membership in a legislature whose unexercised muscles have atrophied because of people like them.

Needless to say, that principle is even more compelling in 2020.

More recently, Charlie Sykes, writing in the Bulwark, argued that we should Burn it All Down in 2020. He surveyed the records of several Congressional Republicans and reached an apt and pithy conclusion:

 [If] the GOP does not somehow renew itself—by purging the foul air of its current corruption—it will find itself in the wilderness for the next 40 years as it tries to explain its history of Vichy Trumpism.

https://thebulwark.com/burn-it-all-down/

The Lincoln Project (to which I am a contributor) has placed numerous ads with devastating portrayals of Donald Trump, but it has also placed ads against Mitch McConnell and several other Republicans. As Steve Schmidt, a co-founder of the Project, put it: “The analogy would be in the same way that fire purifies the forest, it needs to be burned to the ground and fundamentally repudiated.”

At the same time, the Burn It Down movement has been resisted even by some conservatives who have no illusions about Trump’s unfitness. Among them is David French, formerly a senior writer for the National Review. French is sympathetic to the plight of Congressional Republicans, citing “the monumental pressures that Donald Trump has placed on the entire GOP and the lack of good options that so many GOP officeholders faced.” French also worries about the legislative consequences if Biden is elected and has a Democratic Congress to work with. Democrats “would understandably (and rightly) believe that the verdict of the voters went well beyond “Dump Trump” and extended into an endorsement of an ambitious Democratic policy agenda.”

Peggy Noonan’s essay in the Wall Street Journal, “Burn the Republican Part Down?” struck similar note. Noonan argued that the country is best served by a two party system and that the Democratic Party needs the Republican Party “to restrain its excesses and repair what it does that proves injurious.” She also worried that:

[I]f the Republicans lose the presidency, the House and the Senate in November, the rising progressives of the Democratic Party will be emboldened and present a bill for collection. They’ll push hard for what they want. This will create a runaway train that will encourage bad policy that will damage the nation. Republicans and conservatives used to worry about that kind of thing.

In the Daily Beast, conservative writer Matt K. Lewis wrestled with the issue. He acknowledged the case for removal:

[I]t is fair to say that these Republicans have enabled Trump’s despicable behavior, while doing nothing to mitigate his worst instincts. Rather than rising to the occasion, they instead buckled under pressure. They lacked both the courage and the character we should expect from our leaders. If Trump were a more competent authoritarian, their cowardice might have been lethal.  

Yet, like French and Noonan, Lewis fretted over the prospects of Biden and a Democratic Congress. And he was more specific:

Losing the Senate would leave Republicans with little power to block a progressive, pro-abortion Supreme Court Justice nominee, oppose raising taxes, or whatever else Bernie Sanders meant when he said Biden would be “the most progressive president since FDR.”

The objections to “burning down” the Republican Party are not entirely without merit. Nevertheless, I firmly believe that drastic action is called for and that the benefits of removing Republican incumbents far outweigh the policy risk. Only a sweeping defeat of both Trump and his enablers will lay a foundation for a Republican Party that can make a serious claim to being the Party of Lincoln. It may, of course, turn out that some of the Trumpiest Republicans on the Hill will survive, but the minds of other survivors should be usefully concentrated.

The risks, I believe, are exaggerated. Joe Biden is not Bernie Sanders or AOC and is no stalking horse for their followers. More than most politicians, he knows who he is. That is not to say that I would expect to agree with everything a Biden administration may propose. I am confident that I will not, but my disagreements are likely to be within the normal range of political debate. And I am entirely undisturbed by the particular examples cited by Matt Lewis. Lewis to the contrary, I would welcome the appointment of Supreme Court justices who will preserve Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. And I believe that some increase in taxes on the wealthy is not only appropriate but essential to restoring a measure of fiscal responsibility—a concern that conservatives once cared about.

In short: Vote Blue!