re: Why can't Republicans unite?

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Why can't Republicans unite?

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Because someone ran early and might be wearing lifts God damn it!!!

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Republicans prefer saying they are against something yet they never come up with an alternative.

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This is a huge problem for the GOP. And too many of them talk a good game on the news networks, yet nothing ever really gets done. Its lip service. People are tired of it.

The fact that the GOP can't get significant wide spread wins in national elections with how much the Democrats are a trainwreck now tells you just how pathetic they are. The party's leadership is abysmal.

All fair.

I just have my doubts based on our experience last time.

I’d love to be pleasantly surprised.

So either we lose both ways or you acknowledge that we won with conservative populism and, without Covid, are enjoying a second term of it.

Without Covid MIV, republicans own all three chambers.

Clean up voting systems and voters will show you that we are still majority center-right.

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Maybe the base is tired of being told by GOP politicians that if we would just vote to put them in power, they would start fixing problems.

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If the base was still conservative, politicians who tried to appeal to it on the basis of "fixing problems" would not be elected, because a conservative base wouldn't be looking for politicians to "fix problems." They'd be looking for elected officials to shrink government and get it out of the way so that people could handle their own problems. That's what being conservative means.

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They had their chances for the first 2 years of Trump to fix health care...

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What exactly do you want them to do to "fix" health care? 10 to 1, whatever you're going to say would not have to do with government getting out of the way.

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reform taxes

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Do you mean going to a flat tax or sales tax or something other than an income tax? Did anyone actually campaign on doing that?

Look, I would like to see that too, but surely you understand that that is a reform—like campaign finance reform or term limits or holding elected officials accountable for insider trading—that is going to be very difficult for voters to enforce b/c it will negatively affect the politicians. It will be one of the last things that ever happens, and it isn't reasonable to expect it to happen unless or until we demonstrate that we are serious about shrinking government. If we're still calling for politicians to "fix health care," we're not within 5 zip codes of that being any sort of realistic expectation. Not unless what we mean by "fixing health care" is removing 75% of the government regulations that currently encumber it already.

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secure the border

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Why do you think neither the left nor the right will stop illegal immigration to the degree that should be possible?

IMO it has to do with the fact that Americans are not reproducing at a rate that will sustain a tax base to fund the current government bloat. SS/Medicare is already insolvent and that is with something like 20% of the population being of age to collect it and 40% of the population being of an age to contribute to it.

What happens when that ration shifts to 30% and 20%? The math simply doesn't work.

And it's going to at our current rate—that shift will happen. Porn (which is literally sterilizing young men) and feminism and abortion and leftist government programs designed to decimate the nuclear family are coming home to roost. Look up the numbers. Within 30 years those programs will be unsavable...UNLESS, we import a new population who will be paying taxes by then to replace the children that Americans are currently not having.

But again, that goes to being addicted to massive government programs. Raise your hand if you'd give up SS/Medicare to shrink the government.

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It's not the base that ditched conservatism. It's the GOP leadership that have done that. It's a huge reason why Trump has gained so much support over the years.

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The Republican leadership has indeed (long) given up on conservatism, but that's not so surprising to me. You work for the federal government, you're probably going to end up getting sucked into perpetuating the machine you work for, especially when it benefits you financially to do so.

But this is a representative republic. Those people are supposed to be working for us. We're supposed to be their boss. If we don't hold them accountable and we LET them not do their jobs yet we still keep voting for them, it's our fault and we have no one to blame but ourselves.

But what we should be doing is following conservative principles with regard to choosing new leaders...it makes no sense to get mad at establishment Republicans for not being conservative enough and react by electing what really amounts to the policy profile of a moderate Democrat circa 1985.

"I'll show you how to not be conservative enough, I'll vote for a guy who is not even as conservative as YOU! Take that!"

And Trump is not a cause, he's an effect. He stepped into the right space at the right time. He has encouraged this descent into populism and has been riding that wave at its crest, but he didn't start this whole thing.

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He capitalized on and exposed GOP leadership.

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He called GOP leadership childish junior high school names. Except for the ones he put in his cabinet, which only delayed him calling them childish junior high school names.

He didn't "expose" anybody. He turned out to have just as big a gap between what he promised and what he delivered. Don't believe me? Ask Mexico whether they paid for the wall that still isn't built yet.

(no message)

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conservative populism

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There's no such thing as "conservative populism." There are different flavors of populism—there's the populism favored by those who watch Tucker Carlson and the flavor of populism favored by those who march in BLM parades (riots), but curiously, both groups are on record against capitalism (actually, not curiously at all...the more populist the right becomes, the more it will continue to become like the left). So which one is the "conservative" one?

I think it's probably more likely that Trump wins in 2020 without COVID, but I think it's a huge stretch to act like having all three branches without COVID is a certainty, but that's not really the point of this discussion, is it?

Say we did have all three branches, but couldn't agree on an agenda because the agenda isn't informed by any foundational principles. What good would it do?

The populism of both the right and left wants America to become an isolationist country, completely ignoring the history of what happens every time we do that. BLM opposes capitalism because it oppresses black people (supposedly), fans of Tucker Carlson oppose it because it produces Dollar Stores. No populist anywhere is willing to give up SS/Medicare. Both sides are addicted to conspiracy theories. Neither side wants to close the border (and I posted why I think that is above...too long to re-post, but let's just say that IMO the root of it goes back to losing those "Puritanical traditional social values").

So let's say we had all three branches packed full of populists from the right. What would happen? What would the agenda be?

I guarantee you it wouldn't be a small government agenda. So what would we have won?

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What exactly have "conservatives" won so far?

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I feel like Bunny Rabbit in 8 Mile.

"Didn't you listen to the last round, meathead?
Pay attention, you're sayin' the same shite that he said..."

There haven't been many actual conservatives in quite some time at this point. Probably since before Eisenhower. That's why the federal government has grown so big since WWII.

The base was a lot more conservative up until recently, but failed to hold officials accountable for the ideals they campaigned on. I'm not saying it's a new problem, it's been going on for some time.

What's new is not that the politicians have abandoned the principles, but that the base has. As long as the base holds those principles, there's hope.

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i would have thought jeff sessions would have been a great attorney general. he said and did all the right things as senator. but he was exposed quite quickly under trump. he is the face of the republican party to me. don't listen to what they say but what they do. most republicans on capitol hill are just like jeff sessions.

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He "was exposed quite quickly?" Let's see what Jeff Sessions did as AG:

1. Reinstated mandatory sentencing for drug crimes, reversing Eric Holder.

2. Instead, he ordered prosecutors to seek maximum sentences.

3. Threatened "sanctuary cities" with losing federal funding if they continued to not comply with immigration law.

4. Was one of the key players in enforcing the family separations at the border.

5. Shrank his area of government by disbanding the National Committee on Forensic Science and imposed a hiring freeze on the DOJ Criminal Division.

Those are the notable things I am aware of that he did as AG. Which of those "exposed" him, and what did they "expose" him to be? Or did I miss something?

He also recused himself from the Russia investigations, which he was legally required to do.

Again, him following the law in that case "exposes" him as what? Someone who values the law more than Trump's desire for everyone he works with to be willing to throw themselves on a sword to try to protect him? He was "exposed" as not being willing to be the first Rudy Guilanni?

O.k.

Boy, that's some expose.

If that's what you mean by that, then you're right. Trump is radioactive and cancerous to those who try to support him and only a fool would do so at this point.

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*Economic recession
*Porous border
*Failing morals
*Soaring debt
*Out of control bureaucracy

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Because they helped create all of this, but just don't want you to know.