The Editorial Board of The NY Times is on a roll lately.
For those of you saying “Well duh!” it’s still nice to see the “paper of record” officially pronounce what the rest of us have been saying for what seems like forever. (Kevin Drum nailed it over two years ago.) It’s probably too much to hope that the news side of the business will start treating the G.O.P. like the illegitimate festering mass of corruption that it has become (Hello MAGA Haberman!), but it’s a start. Here’s the lede:
Of all the things President Trump has destroyed, the Republican Party is among the most dismaying.
“Destroyed” is perhaps too simplistic, though. It would be more precise to say that Mr. Trump accelerated his party’s demise, exposing the rot that has been eating at its core for decades and leaving it a hollowed-out shell devoid of ideas, values or integrity, committed solely to preserving its own power even at the expense of democratic norms, institutions and ideals.
Tomato, tomahto. However you characterize it, the Republican Party’s dissolution under Mr. Trump is bad for American democracy.
The editorial has a broad sampling of the ways the Republican Party has become irredeemable under Trump. It closes by wondering if anything can be saved, or whether it would be better to burn it to the ground.
Kevin Drum’s offering at Mother Jones from August 9, 2018 still has what is IMHO a concise summary of what the G.O.P. has become in GOPus delendus est:
...The Republican Party can’t win using ordinary methods. On the process side, they can win only by inflating the white vote via gerrymandering, cracked-and-packed districts, and ruthless black voter suppression. On the policy side, they can win only with heavy dollops of strident and outright bigotry against Mexicans, Muslims, blacks, Hispanics, Chinese, and anyone else who comes along. Even Canadians will do in a pinch.
Today, the Republican Party exists for one and only one purpose: to pass tax cuts for the rich and regulatory rollbacks for corporations. They accomplish this using one and only method: unapologetically racist and bigoted appeals to win the votes of the heartland riff-raff they otherwise treat as mere money machines for their endless mail-order cons.
Like it or not, this is the modern Republican Party. It no longer serves any legitimate purpose. It needs to be crushed and the earth salted behind it, while a new conservative party rises to take its place…
In lieu of flowers, please send donations to Biden/Harris and/or the Democratic candidates of your choice — and VOTE Team Blue all the way!
