An observation on Republican Party culture

[Mr. Morden]

I mean, ~20% of Republicans in Congress outright refused to endorse their party’s presidential nominee, while it was ~0% on the Democratic side.

I just think much of what you’re listing in the OP has to do with different ways that the elite of each party dissent, and who is included among “the elite”.  (And of course, the fact that Trump was himself an “anti-establishment” candidate, and the party’s “establishment” is still thinking about how to deal with him.)

Regarding what’s happened since Trump’s election, there is undoubtedly a “honeymoon” period, which includes the Senate GOP going along with all of Trump’s Cabinet appointments*.  But I’m not convinced that’s going to last once we move from filling the administration jobs to actual policy substance.  There’ll be issues where Trump faces as much resistance if not more as Obama faced from Stupak and Nelson.  It won’t all be “moderating” influences though, since many of the ideological splits in the party have the non-Trump forces as the ones on the right.  (And areas like foreign policy defy easy “right-left” categorization.)

* Though even during this honeymoon period, has any recent president of either party been criticized during the transition period by one of their own party members from Congress as much as Trump has been criticized by Amash?