Posted on 08/26/2015 11:13:50 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
The GOP is panicking. And it should be.
Conservatives are sending an angry unambiguous message to the party. The message can be read not only in the rise of Donald Trump, but also in the rise of Ben Carson. Republican voters are choosing candidates who don’t talk or seem like politicians. They have lost all faith in the Republican Party.
And it’s hard to blame them.
Conservatives poured time, energy and money into a party that promised to counter Obama and take back America. The GOP controls both houses of Congress and conservatives have nothing to show for it.
Support for Trump and Carson really isn’t about the issues. Attacking them for their past liberal positions is a waste of time. This isn’t about what Trump or Carson believe. It’s about what the base believes.
There has been a profound loss of faith in the Republican Party and the larger political establishment orbiting around it. Faced with a bewildering number of candidates, convoluted flip-flopping on the issues (trying to track the immigration positions of most GOP candidates alone requires a flowchart), a great many Republicans are opting out of politics by trying something else.
Trump and Carson have diametrically opposite personalities, but what they bring to the table is a completely different attitude. Their biggest appeal is that they aren’t politicians.
How do you run against that?
Trump’s biggest draw is the fight. Republican voters want a man who won’t pull his punches, won’t back down at the last minute and won’t walk out of the room with his head down and promise to try harder next time. They’ve had too much of that already and they’re sick to death of it.
That was what Ted Cruz understood with the shutdown. It didn’t matter whether it would succeed or fail. Sometimes an army needs to attack to keep up its morale. It can’t wait endlessly or it will fall apart. Cruz understood that Congress could not conduct business as usual while the voters would wait around patiently for them to act. It’s a truth that few of his Senate colleagues were willing to listen to.
This is a truth that many in the establishment busy strategizing indefinite endgames have forgotten. Their concept of victory is fundamentally different than that of the base. Trump is the reckoning. He is the base’s payback for the breach of trust. His poll numbers show the lack of faith in the GOP.
It isn’t necessary to take a specific position on birthright citizenship to compete with him. There’s no real point in taking a political position that much of the base no longer pays attention to because it doesn’t believe that the politicians taking those positions will stick to them once they are elected.
We’re not dealing with think tank checklists here. What voters want is someone with the right attitude, not the right ideology. They’re willing to overlook Trump’s past positions, his flip-flops now, because he has an uncompromising attitude. This is not an ideological purity test; it’s an emotional purity test.
Trying to show them that Trump doesn’t pass an ideological purity test is pointless. Instead Republican candidates have to pass an emotional purity test. They have to show that they’re willing to fight as hard as it takes with nothing held back. They have to stop being politically cautious and get angry.
Because their base is mad as hell.
As David Horowitz wrote in Go for the Heart, "'Caring'” is not one among many issues in an election. It is the central one. Since most policy issues are complicated, voters want to know above everything else just whom they can trust to sort out the complexities and represent them."
Trump has brought that reality home to the Republican Party.
The Republican field suffers from a lack of decisiveness, a lack of forthrightness and a lack of anger. That’s normal for politicians running for public office, but non-threatening personalities and memorized applause lines are not nearly as effective as they used to be. The base trusts passion more than professionalism.
Even before Trump, Republican candidates were advancing not on their merits, but on their willingness to be abrasive, to offend and to tell it like it is. Conservative candidates who want to edge out Trump will need more than a plan. They will need an attitude. And they will need character.
On the other side of the spectrum, Ben Carson passes the emotional purity test by avoiding the slick preparedness of the professional politician. If Trump is running on attitude, Carson is running on character. He speaks softly, he sometimes seems unprepared and his manner is casual. It should doom him, but instead it convinces voters of his integrity. He’s trustworthy because he isn’t a politician.
Carson brings sincerity to the table. In his own way, so does Trump. Both candidates engage emotions. They aren’t running on their records and they sometimes seem unsure what their own positions are.
But what people want is candidates who pass the emotional purity test.
Trump and Carson don’t like to get bogged down in details. They lay out ideas that are both big and simple. That is something that most of the rest of the field has forgotten how to do.
And both of them harness moral outrage. They don’t exist in a universe of policies, but of principles.
That is where Reagan was. That is where the rest of the field needs to be. The issues aren’t details, they’re moral choices. They’re not abstracts, but people’s lives. The obstacles are enemies. Credibility is more about conviction than another ten-point plan that few voters have the time or interest to parse.
Republican voters are looking for passion and character. Candidates who put them first will succeed. They want candidates who are as outraged about the state of things as they are. That desire isn’t limited to Republicans. Bernie Sanders’ rise is being powered by the same sense of frustration and anger.
In a landscape of antiseptic politicians, anger and clumsiness seem authentic. They humanize political candidates. Many conservatives have come to see the GOP as a mindless unfeeling machine, much like the government they are contending with. They want someone to fight that machine for them.
Republican candidates have to stop thinking about positions and start thinking about people. Inspiration has become cheap. The path to it is through principled outrage that creates the hope for political change.
David Horowitz wrote, "Because Democrats regard politics as war conducted by other means, they seek to demonize and destroy their opponents as the enemies of progress, of social justice and minority rights. Republicans can only counter these attacks by turning the Democrats’ guns around — by exposing them as the enforcers of injustice."
Injustice is the key word.
Countless millions of Americans carry the conviction that something is deeply wrong. They sense that their lives, their freedoms and their futures have become precarious. They need more than a plan. They need someone who will express the outrage they feel and fight for them.
One way or another, this election will be a referendum on the Obama years.
Republican voters do not want to be represented in that referendum by another mild-mannered politician who will sell them out and fail to give voice to the outrage at what has been done to them. They want their pain, their anger and their fear for the future to be heard. That is what Trump is doing.
That is the emotional purity test. The primaries are only a rehearsal. The real test will come in a national election when the Republican candidate will face down Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden. And all the men and women, the families that helped put him there, that spent their time and energy working to help him, will wait to see if he finally calls out their oppressors for the injustices committed against them.
They waited in vain in 2012. They don’t want to make that mistake again.
If the professional Republican candidates want to be standing there on that day representing them, they had better show them that they can do it now.
Before it’s too late.
Trump: Throwing off such Government!
Lock in new tag line.
most of GOPe don’t even pass the ideological purity test, much less the emotional purity test. As Cruz said, it’s not correct to say they don’t have the fight in them. They’re just fighting for the other side. GOPe become very energetic and animated when fighting Conservatives but not against other Left wingers because they’re allies
I want the lapdog, silver-spoon, traitors gone. Guys like Boehner, McConnell, and McCain to vacate their offices. If they can’t figure out why its bad to give Iran nukes, why rampant illegal immigration from Middle Eastern countres who want to do us harm is a bad idea, or that their boss is a Manchurian plant....then they have NO damn business being in office “representing” We The People. Remove them forcibly if so required.
The State Capital and Walker were under siege for months; Walker and conservatives in Wisconsin have been judicially and politically persecuted since 2011.
Their anger animates their opposition - us, and in the end, it is more sustainable and infectious than raging inhouse.
Well, it’s mostly a good piece with some sound reasoning in it.
There may be a couple of mistakes though. For one, I do not believe that the GOP is waiting around endlessly to attack. I believe the GOP is conspiring and cooperating with democrats. I believe their goals are the same.
A second mistake is to assume that the other candidates can change their act and win me back.
They can’t.
There is simply no possible way. Speaking for myself, anyone even remotely associated or even suspected to be associated with the GOP is out. Just not even going to consider it, because they are all just a bunch of stinking liars.
And that includes Fiorina. She may not be a politician, but I suspect that she is a GOP plant, and I’m just not going to mess with her.
A third possible mistake, though I’m not sure it’s a mistake, is Carson.
I’m iffy on that if it’s a mistake, because he doesn’t have the fire in the belly that I’m looking for...buuuut, yes he seems like a good guy. Is it possible that i could consider him for VP...maaaaaybe. Dunno yet.
But I will go ahead and say Carson has a better shot than any of the GOP clones.
And yeah I’d say this writer probably has a better understanding of the dynamic that is occurring than anyone I’ve seen yet.
But I’m soured on the word “emotion”. The word pisses me off.
I think a better way to put it would be a “purity of balls” test.
I didn’t vote in the past two elections because I didn’t like the candidate the party offered or my vote didn’t matter because nothing was going to change.
I voted in 2010 that brought the GOP back in control of the House. Four years later, I felt indifferent to the GOP takeover of the Senate.
Nothing has changed in Washington and the GOP keeps on giving excuses about why they can’t stand up to Obama. People are simply sick of politics as usual.
They love this country and want to restore its greatness but the political establishment attributes it to anger. Its stopped listening to us and has stopped representing us.
I’m beyond caring that Trump may damage them. He is not the problem. They are the problem. They won’t do the things that need to be done. In a word, our political class is not up to the job.
Its time to fire them. And if that has to shake up the party to bring about what’s necessary so be it. My first loyalty is not to the Republican Party. Its to America. And a lot of us out here feel the same way.
what’s emotion got to do with it?
The GOP has failed the Conservative test. They lied to us. Helped obama get things done.
The GOP weren’t given a majority in the House/Senate to get things done for obama. Who the hell consultant told them that is why they won those majorities need to be named and shamed.
Lol — exactly.
Greenfield has totally nailed it here.
It's close. I don't like the connotations that they invoke with their purity meme(puritanical, naïve, hypocritical, zealot, Pharisee). I am not a purist on the battlefield. I am looking for someone who will fight the battle. I may be a Protestant, but I will fight comfortably beside a Catholic; though white, beside a black; though southern, beside a Yankee (maybe LOL).
What conservatives need is Backbone and Balls.
I wouldn’t vote for Jeb or Mitt or any of the candidate the party establishment thinks would be a good President.
To more of the same, I would stay home. I see no reason to vote for someone who doesn’t think there’s anything wrong.
I don’t know of one person in America who likes where the country is headed. The Republican Party may have made its peace with Obama.
The American people haven’t.
Limited Constitutional Government!
I don't want a mommy or a daddy handling government just give me Limited, Basic Government.
It’s a little late for the RNC (and GOP Members of Congress) to win back conservatives (at least THIS conservative).
In theory, they would need to prove to me that they actually believed in something other than feeding the crony beast and spreading enough money around to assure their re-election.
I would personally prefer them picking the moral hill as the one to fight to the death on: PROVE you’re pro-life by drawing a line and refusing to go beyond that line. PROVE you’re pro-family by taking the actions needed to stop the sodomite agenda.
But if that’s not the hill you want to die on then pick the national security hill: PROVE you’re willing to die to protect the border. PROVE you’re pro-Israel by shutting down the Iran deal.
Or if you’re uncomfortable with that hill, then plant the flag on the fiscal hill: PROVE you’re going to really stop Obamacare. PROVE you’re going to shrink unfunded mandates. PROVE you’re going to stop mandatory benefits being paid out to the lazy and unmotivated.
I’m pretty easy: I’d be a little happy if you’d PROVE that you believed in ANYTHING.
What you, GOP-E, have proven is that you believe in absolutely nothing at all. And I, for one, believe that we need to take care of the enemy within before dealing with the enemy without.
And anything you do at this point will likely be received as Election Kabuki Theater.
In other words: pack up your offices. You’re gone.
Just because he doesn't "need" to solicit campaign contributions doesn't mean he's not going to solicit campaign contributions, speech fees and be in it to make money. I don't "need" to get $25,000 dollars for a painting but you can bet I'd take it if offered and do it more eagerly for $25,000,000. Trump's a billionaire, what did he need to be a billionaire for instead of a multi-millionaire? After 5 million what possibly could a person need? It's obvious he "needs" and wants far more than the rest of us, so he is much more "needy" than a guy who retired after spending his life healing people, and if he wants something, how much easier will it be to get it with unlimited power? A million would make me happy as a pig in shit for life but he's never going to be satisfied. That's why I'm not Trump, and why you aren't either, and why he doesn't have to believe a thing he says if it will give him unlimited power by just mouthing the right phrases- none of which are original to himself.
Good thing for you that Trump has never been in a position to vote for anything in a legislature- it helps keep the fantasy that he will be different going.
The GOP can rest in peace with Obama. They are dead to me. The country will be better when every one of these traitorous bastards leave our capital—preferably in chains.
I fear it may be too little, too late; but better to fight and lose, than to obediently slouch into the cattle cars.
I believe these voters were Reagan's margin in 1980 and in many ways Obama's margin in 2008. The winner of the election in 2016 will be the candidate who can convince more voters to join their party.
Bingo. The GOP is nothing but a cartel of paid whores. They blew their last chance to win me back when they capitulated and passed the cromnibus bill after the last election to guarantee they wouldn't have to fight for anything.
” They have lost all faith in the Republican Party”!
Ya got that right.
With “leaders” like Boehner and Mcconnel who screw conservative causes at every turn?
Why the hell should I ever vote for the damned pubbies again?
The GOP is not a conservative party.
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