Many modern Republicans don't deserve to be taken seriously

[T'Chenka]

In the battle of ideas, many (but not all) modern day Republican voters and commentators don't deserve to be taken seriously. I have a hard time explaining this point, so bear with me here.

It all comes down to high school debate class for me. Both sides will state their ideological beliefs and then they will argue for and against them using logic, evidence, etc etc. The huge problem is that many modern Republicans don't actually hold the beliefs they claim to hold, and the beliefs they DO hold are laughable and/or deplorable.

Let me give you an example. Republicans had been screaming for law and order and a stop to riots in the summer, but on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive. Therefore, their beliefs are NOT what they claimed them to be. "I am against riots and for law and order" was a lie. What they actually believed was "I am for or against riots depending on who is doing them amd I am for or against law and order depending on the situation".

So what is happening here is that Democrats are bringing ideoligies and beliefs to the table that are much stronger and/or much more in line with the Constitution, democracy and American values, and the Republicans are bringing lies and bad faith to the table because it's the only way that they can claim "we just have equal but different beliefs and ideas". This is the current state of American politics, taxation and healthcare aside.

I'm tired of pretending that a large percentage of Republicans are my moral or political equals when they won't bring good-faith ideas and counter-arguments to the table. Healthy debate and strong arguments on both sides benefit everybody involved. I want to see more of that and less hypocrisy.

[Damocles]

“Law and order” was always a chintzy dogwhistle for “beat up Black people.” Nothing more.

[Non Swing Voter]

There's a reason 2/3 of people with college degrees are voting for Democrats now, despite half of them voting against their own financial interests...

[GP270watch]

 There are plenty of conservative parties in developed nations that are pro business, pro "traditional values", and they think America's GOP is a total joke. The GOP is only comparable to insane parties like North Ireland's DUP or other far-right nationalists fringe parties you see around Europe.

 The GOP's inability to comprehend/accept climate change reality or do anything sane on nationalized Healthcare coverage put them out of step with the vast majorities of conservative parties around the rest of the world.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://mobile.twitter.com/joshtpm/status/1348618156143730696

[Progressive Pessimist]

As far as a political party goes, with an agenda and ideas that they want to pursue in the interests of Americans-they do indeed deserve to be treated as a joke. In every other respect though they need to be treated very seriously as a dangerous, violent cult that seek the destruction of our democracy in order to create some sort of one-party, rural white hegemony.

[MATTROSE94]

I would love to see the anti-Trump Republican split off and form their own political party (either the Whig or Liberal Party). Such a scenario would result in vote splitting that would enable the Democrats to remain in power for 20 years or more and allow aCo brews to remain firmly in Democratic control for the foreseeable future.

[Hermit For Peace]

Someone especially who shouldn't be taken seriously is Lindsey Graham. He spends 4 years carousing with Trump, golfing with him, sticking up for him in every way, then when push comes to shove and Trump goes over the edge, finally Graham says that's enough.

No cell in my body has any respect for that man. Phooey on him.

Phooey on those who are too afraid to think for themselves and allow a lowlife like Trump to dominate their thoughts and their lives, following like sheep behind him, hanging on his every word.

That's just plain sad. And dangerous.

[Benjamin Frank]

In the battle of ideas, many (but not all) modern day Republican voters and commentators don't deserve to be taken seriously. I have a hard time explaining this point, so bear with me here.

It all comes down to high school debate class for me. Both sides will state their ideological beliefs and then they will argue for and against them using logic, evidence, etc etc. The huge problem is that many modern Republicans don't actually hold the beliefs they claim to hold, and the beliefs they DO hold are laughable and/or deplorable.

Let me give you an example. Republicans had been screaming for law and order and a stop to riots in the summer, but on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive. Therefore, their beliefs are NOT what they claimed them to be. "I am against riots and for law and order" was a lie. What they actually believed was "I am for or against riots depending on who is doing them amd I am for or against law and order depending on the situation".

So what is happening here is that Democrats are bringing ideoligies and beliefs to the table that are much stronger and/or much more in line with the Constitution, democracy and American values, and the Republicans are bringing lies and bad faith to the table because it's the only way that they can claim "we just have equal but different beliefs and ideas". This is the current state of American politics, taxation and healthcare aside.

I'm tired of pretending that a large percentage of Republicans are my moral or political equals when they won't bring good-faith ideas and counter-arguments to the table. Healthy debate and strong arguments on both sides benefit everybody involved. I want to see more of that and less hypocrisy.

1.One point I think that isn't really appreciated by many people, although they seem to recognize it in their own lives, is that doing nothing is not neutral.  This plays out in the idea that the filibuster is essential because it prevents radical action that doesn't have widespread consensus.

In reality, of course, doing nothing favors the status quo and status quo interests.  Since Republicans tend to favor entrenched wealthy and powerful interests who benefit from the status quo, it's not a surprise that they often simply want to block change.  As such, it's also not a surprise that Republicans are less interested in basic governance.

[Benjamin Frank]

2.One other point that should also be made clear is that there has been a strain in the Republican Party going back a long time that is interested in little or nothing more than grandstanding and not actually governing.

This is from the book I've been reading called The American Century: A History of the United States since the 1890s (3rd edition published in 1986.)

One thing that I certainly don't think is well remembered, is that for a brief period of time after World War II, many Americans and especially many Republicans wanted the United States to return to isolationism or to only oppose communism as long as it didn't require spending tax money.  The reason for this is that the 'iron curtain' actually did not completely descend over Eastern Europe right away (except for East Germany.)  The Soviet Union weeded non communists out of the Hungarian, Polish, Chechoslovak, Romanian and Bulgarian governments over of a period of two or three years.  So, the full impact of the domination of Eastern Europe by the Soviet Union was not initially fully appreciated.

In 1947 Truman called on Congress to allocate $400 million to defend Greece and Turkey from Communist insurgents.  "One Truman supporter in Congress chuckled at the trap the President had sprung on Republicans who wanted to fight communism but not spend money: "Course they don't want to be smoked out...They don't like Communism, but they still don't want to do anything to stop it.  But they are all put on the spot now and they all have to come clean.""  (Page 340)

More recent examples include the 1993 Clinton Budget where, under a Democratic President, the Republicans would not lift a finger to help Clinton balance the budget. Of course, this came after the 1992 election where Republicans soon started to believe the myth that Bush lost because he violated his 'no new taxes' pledge.

The book The Agenda By Bob Woodward details, more or less, two such cases.

"Gore told Clinton that he wanted to confidentially sound out some moderate Republican deficit hawks he knew in Congress about quietly exploring a bipartisan agreement on a Social Security COLA freeze.  Clinton gave his approval, and Gore said he would do it in his own name to preserve Clinton's deniability on such a touchy political subject.  Gore spoke with four Republicans in the Senate and several in the House.  He had rarely received such point-blank refusals.  He reported to Clinton that no one would even agree to discuss it.  The new administration and the Democrats in Congress were going to have to make cuts on their own.  Gore noted that these were the Republicans who pounded hardest on the federal deficit, but since he had promised to keep his exploratory conversations with the Republicans in confidence, he was prevented from going public with their hypocrisy." (Page 93)

Later, as a false alternative to the Clinton 1993 deficit cutting budget, a group of so-called moderate Democrats and Republicans, led by Oklahoma Democratic Senator David Boren proposed rather than increasing taxes mostly on the wealthy (and a $0.045 a gallon gas tax) that the budget cut entitlements.

At this time, the media especially was still in thrall with Reaganism and the importance and excellence of wealthy people, so this non-proposal, was taken seriously, while the Clinton plan was regarded as some 1960s style liberalism.

The non plan in the end involved only four Senators, 2 Democrats and 2 Republicans: David Boren, John Breaux of Louisiana, and Republicans John Danforth of Missouri and Bill Cohen and the media especially played up David Boren as some kind of 'moderate bi-partisan' hero.  

"Up at the capital, (Senate Majority Leader George) Mitchell reviewed Boren's proposals. Mitchell didn't consider the proposal serious.  It certainly couldn't be enacted, and Boren wouldn't try to bring it to a vote because he and the others wouldn't even vote for it themselves."
(Page 197)

More recently, there were a group of Republican Senators led by Marco Rubio who proposed something on immigration that they themselves ended up voting against.

[TheReckoning]

on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive.

Really? A vast majority condemned the violence, including McConnell and Trump.

It was arguably too little, too late, and not really totally in line with “law and order” but if nothing else, only 35% of Republicans said they supported the riots.

[T'Chenka]

on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive.

Really? A vast majority condemned the violence, including McConnell and Trump.

It was arguably too little, too late, and not really totally in line with “law and order” but if nothing else, only 35% of Republicans said they supported the riots.

My OP mentioned Republican voters/citizens and commentators moreso than lawmakers. Also, I saw a poll showing 45% not 35%.

[Benjamin Frank]

Another modern problem with Republicans, in addition, to what was argued in the initial post, is that most modern Republicans only speak about broad principles, or platitudes and not on specifics.  They then argue with these broad principles in absolute terms.  

Not only is their no attempt to engage in debate with actual specific cases, the idea of nuance is regarded as a foreign, evil concept.

This is not from Republicans or Americans, but certainly from right wingers.  This is from my complementary copy of the Epoch Times.  This used to be a decent free paper from the Falun Gong that published interesting stories on culture, history and 'weird news' but had political news as well, mainly anti China.  After Trump got elected though, the Epoch Times went Full Trump (never go full Trump) and went down the rabbit hole into conspiracies and nonsense.

So, this isn't from Republicans and this isn't from necessarily mainstream right wing 'thinkers' and this edition isn't even from Americans, but in addition to this excerpt are columns from Bruce Pardy, a law professor, and from John Robson, a columnist for the National Post and, based on his PhD, a professor in American History.  

This is an excerpt from a book called "How the Spectre of Communism is ruling our world" written by the Epoch Times editorial team.

"Some left leaning states in the West today use the idea of the 'common good' to convince their populace to sacrifice their individual freedoms...Socialist counties set equality of outcome as the primary goal and thus are bound to deprive people of their freedom in the name of progress...Of course, it's impossible to enforce equality by suddenly elevating those at the lower levels, so instead, socialism artificially restrains those at the higher levels."

I actually don't necessarily have a problem with this as far as it goes.  It's a broad hypothetical argument, one presented without specific examples of restraint or even mentioning any Western socialist nation in the world it's referring to. But, sure I don't dispute we need to argue against those who want to legislate equality of outcome.

However, a paragraph later, this is what the excerpt says:

"This has come along with the legalization and normalization of all manner of anti-theist and profane speech, sexual perversions, demonic art, pornography, gambling and drug use. The result is a kind of reverse discrimination against those who believe in God..."

So, what, the Epoch Times editorial board was for individual freedoms and against any notion of the 'common good' until they were against individual freedoms and for the notion of the 'common good?'

Do they have a different definition of 'individual freedoms?'  I mean, it is possible they do.  Many right wingers have at least implicitly argued that business owners should have more 'freedom' than everybody else.

Only now, with, for example, these business owners deciding that right wing extremists can't be on their platforms, are they complaining about business owners.

I remind all here that one of the first acts of the Trump Administration was to eliminate 'net neutrality' because that was 'muh market freedom.'

However, when you have people using concepts like 'freedom' in seemingly inconsistent ways, and making seemingly contradictory absolutist arguments one paragraph after the other, it is very hard to take these people seriously.

[TheReckoning]

on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive.

Really? A vast majority condemned the violence, including McConnell and Trump.

It was arguably too little, too late, and not really totally in line with “law and order” but if nothing else, only 35% of Republicans said they supported the riots.

My OP mentioned Republican voters/citizens and commentators moreso than lawmakers. Also, I saw a poll showing 45% not 35%.

Different polls show different results. This one says only 18% of GOP.

http://maristpoll.marist.edu/pbs-newshour-marist-poll-results-analysis-insurrection-at-the-capitol/#sthash.AYe9ptLF.f8N09eGu.dpbs

But yeah, the GOP is largely garbage. Only place where we disagree is how much the Democrats are actually better.

[HisGrace]

Let me give you an example. Republicans had been screaming for law and order and a stop to riots in the summer, but on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive. Therefore, their beliefs are NOT what they claimed them to be. "I am against riots and for law and order" was a lie. What they actually believed was "I am for or against riots depending on who is doing them amd I am for or against law and order depending on the situation".

I do think the overall point you're trying to make applies much more to the right than left today, but that particular example and especially the last sentence applies just as much to the left as to the right. When the riot was actually going on I was too concerned about them to worry about liberal hypocrisy, but with distance I do agree with the right wing critiques that the left are full of s***, only I'm not going to use that as a whataboutist defense of the capitol rioters like they did. I am against rioting in both instances, unlike most people. 

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Case in point:
https://mobile.twitter.com/tomgara/status/1348851565982048256

(Yes, she's just a political consultant running for borough president. On the other hand, the story is not from The Onion.)

[T'Chenka]

Let me give you an example. Republicans had been screaming for law and order and a stop to riots in the summer, but on January 06 when it was white Trumpists and not BLM, many were either silent or supportive. Therefore, their beliefs are NOT what they claimed them to be. "I am against riots and for law and order" was a lie. What they actually believed was "I am for or against riots depending on who is doing them amd I am for or against law and order depending on the situation".

I do think the overall point you're trying to make applies much more to the right than left today, but that particular example and especially the last sentence applies just as much to the left as to the right. When the riot was actually going on I was too concerned about them to worry about liberal hypocrisy, but with distance I do agree with the right wing critiques that the left are full of s***, only I'm not going to use that as a whataboutist defense of the capitol rioters like they did. I am against rioting in both instances, unlike most people.  

Lol, this itself is a bad faith argument.

Most people on the left condemned the rioting and looting, and you know that. Thanks for proving my point.

EDIT - Oops I mixed you up with another green Florida avatar. Ignore the snark. Mea culpa. Point still stands regarding many people making this argument though.

[Badger]

The OP misspelled "almost all".

[Non Swing Voter]

Lets reflect on how we got here.

ACT 1: Lure the idiots
The Republican Party has been better at politics for 2 decades than Democrats.  They've been much better at fooling stupid people to vote for them than Democrats have.  Despite having positions that are widely out of touch, they figured out a way to convince lower middle class people to vote for tax cuts for large corporations by turning everything into some race/culture issue.  They perfected this to such a degree that stupid people flocked to the party in absurd numbers. 

ACT 2: The idiots take over
Then at some point their control over the dumb dumbs got away from them.  They didn't just get enough stupid people at the margins to vote for Republican politicians to win (the same Republicans who screwed them and gave corporations tax cuts).  No, instead the entire party became overrun with stupid people.  So much so that the stupid people called all the shots and nominated Trump. 

ACT 3: Placate the idiots
Now to remain in power, the Republicans just completely absolved themselves of any dignity and have made it a mission to cater to the stupid people.  They can't be taken seriously by most Americans but when Ted Cruz and Matt Gaetz perform their carefully crafted clown show, believe me, it's taken very seriously by the people who matter, their stupid base.

[Benjamin Frank]

A couple more examples for this:

1.When Donald Trump was elected in 2016, he, more or less implied with the Obamacare repeal that the Congressional Republicans had an alternative plan to replace Obamacare with.  Of course, although the Republicans came very close to repealing Obamacare, and did succeed in partially repealing it, they never had any alternative.

2.When this became an issue in the election over pre-existing conditions and the Republican case before the Supreme Court, Trump and the Congressional Republicans first lied about their court case, and then lied that some ridiculous executive order that would somehow magically protect those with pre-existing conditions actually was serious.

[Buffalo Mayor Young Kim]

Even outside of the obvious biggest issue right now, that of armed Trumpists trying to overthrow democratic government and the politicians who love them, the congressional Republican Party and the conservative moment more generally have been operating on almost non-stop bad faith for decades. This is just what it took for the public writ large to tell them to shove it.

[Benjamin Frank]

https://twitter.com/dpakman/status/1349345479415443461

[Person Man]

Everyone just wants more power for either them or whoever they live vicariously through.

[Badger]

Everyone just wants more power for either them or whoever they live vicariously through.

Don't lump progressives in with this. Yes, we want to win elections. But to paraphrase another Atlas poster from a few days ago, we are willing to spend decades out of power and seeing our legislative goals not passed if it means we live in a country with a pluralistic free and fair democracy where every vote is counted. That is it best lip service for republicans as demonstrated by the fact that they are by large more than ready to support any Republican who helped incite this riot, and it very best throw Trump under the bus since he's no longer relevant to their maintaining political power.

[PSOL]

So what are the sides of our current “serious” discourse?