"That’s because, when you win that many primaries as a hostile outsider, you physically replace the long-serving delegates who made up the base of the party with the alienated neophytes who supported you. In other words, Trump was not suddenly in charge of the party as it existed the year before; he actually created an entirely different party, beholden only to him. So, for Trump, pledging loyalty to the party is indistinguishable from pledging loyalty to himself...."
Bai ends with this prediction: "The age of pop-up movements and celebrity takeovers in our politics is likely just beginning, I’m afraid. And the time for loyalty oaths — to any party — is rapidly coming to an end."
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52 comments:
The age of pop-up movements and celebrity takeovers in our politics is likely just beginning, I’m afraid
Really? A party responsive to its membership is a bad thing? Overturning the sclerotic, out of touch, old guard is a bad thing? Trump ran as an insurgent candidate and Bai is shocked and saddened that he went on to do what an insurgent would do?
Or is he just feeding the WaPo readership, happy in their bias and ignorance, what they want?
Frankly, Trump’s biggest failing vis-a-vis the party apparatus is that he didn’t do enough of what an insurgent candidate would do.
No need to be afraid unless you’re one of the entrenched old coots that has long passed your expiration date. I’m sickened by the ‘next in line’ expectation the GOP had produced my entire life. A little democracy would be a welcome sight…
Without trump, maybe the candidates can discuss policy instead of trading insults. Might be worth listening to it.
Republicans have been the party of perpetual disappointment. I will not forget how they refused to repeal Obamacare once a President who would sign the bill was in the Oval Office. Of course the Democrats are hostile to me and my way of life. Better disappointment than extermination.
Put another way:
"Don't the proles in the electorate know this is OUR club 😠😠😠"
Mitt Romney? John McCain? Barry O'Bama? Mike Pence?
Please tell me WHY i should care a wit about a party with THESE losers!!
Trump is my Only Hope
Rich said...
Without trump, maybe the candidates can discuss policy instead of trading insults. Might be worth listening to it
Sure. They can talk about a lot of things, but doing them is what they never do. All talk no action gave us Trump.
What a bummer huh Matt?
Here’s how stupid and/or disingenuous “Rich” is. All Republican debates are gonna be about Donald Trump. Period. The end. Any discussion of the border or inflation or the evil of the Biden administration will not come up. What a maroon.
"We were screwing our constituents while getting rich off of their misery, and then one day they show up at our doorstep angry. WFT?"
Bernie Sanders and his loyalty to the party that denied him the nomination in lock step twice could not be reached for comment.
"These outsiders don't understand how important the, what they call anyway, 'corruption,' is to maintaining our way of life, and by 'our,' I mean the people in this room."
PUMA
I don't generally send money to politicians. As George v Higgins said it only encourages them.
But on those few times I do i send direct to the pol. I do NOT send through act red/win blue.
In the case of our president emeritus I sent cash labeled as a personal gift, not a campaign contribution. I sent it to his residence at Mar a Lago.
We need to support challengers in every primary in both parties to keep incumbents off the ticket. Then we need to support challengers in the general and get incumbents out of office
John Henry
Mike Pence was asked about the situation of Americans, and his response was:
THAT IS NOT MY CONCERN
you Have to at least give him credit for being upfront about his hatred and disdain for America
I didn’t notice the Republican Party being beholden to their voters. They expanded government, bailed out banks, and kept Obamacare.
Matt Bat thinks 2016 Trump convention delegates were all alienated neophytes? People who get sufficiently involved to become convention delegates are rarely neophytes, is my impression. But if more of them were, so much the better. Matt Bat specializes in boosting Biden and attacking all his opponents, whether Democrat like RFK Jr., or Republican. Anti-Trump is just an extra little speciality in this tedious orientation. Anyone who champions Biden, as Althouse has posted here from his previous "oeuvre," has bigger problems than opining about what's wrong with the Republican Party. And consider the publishing source. More experts on the American political Right.
Huh. Our same old coots attended. You got the money and the time, you can go. Our delegates were probably exactly the same as 2012.
Guarantee most of them thought we were going to lose badly, too. Whole party shot down in flames. That's why election night was such a hoot.
Who coulda known.
Bai. OK, it didn't change it. My chance to say I will bet a thousand on Matt Bai's predictions about pop-up politics, celebrity politics, lack of loyalty. No, make it ten thousand. No way were those mere glib throwaways.
"And the time for loyalty oaths — to any party — is rapidly coming to an end."
And that's a bad thing because?
Hey, Matt Bai was just using the word "afraid" neutrally. Read his other writing. This is the moment he's been waiting for, for both Parties. He and Glenn Greenwald are the only lefty journalists who try to be fair to the anti-establishment right. He's great, and he's loving how Trump shook thing up. Jealous, too, that the DNC didn't topple.
Give the guy a break. He's a rare honest observer.
Gilbar, you do realize that Trump picked Pence for VP, right? And he stuck with him in 2020 when it was clearly time to try a new running mate because of all the bad Covid news?
They keep straining to make the Hitler connection, but Trump made it clear from the beginning he wasn't joining the Republican Party, but hijacking it, so the criticism isn't correct. He's done nothing to the Republican party that it didn't do to itself: I joined in 2004 and I was out by 2014.
If anything, Trump did them a favor, by keeping them on life-support.
Don’t believe your lying eyes when you see the corruption of the administrative state and the Kleptocrats.
Get serious.
1) I don't believe that political parties are coming to an end.
2) if they do, so what? They were never supposed to exist anyway.
"Without trump, maybe the candidates can discuss policy instead of trading insults. Might be worth listening to it."
Whenever that happens, the Republican winner gets destroyed in the General election because they cannot trade insults with the Democratic candidate.
We're told we don't need term limits because we can vote out the representatives that don't serve our needs. We vote them out and then it's, "oh, no, all new faces!".
A Florida county sheriff is filing criminal charges against DeSantis as we speak, and if Ramaswamy gains any traction, he will be next, but let's pretend that it's only about Trump.
My suggestion is that states that lost Congressional seats and electoral votes due to the Biden Administrations "miscounting" (all red states) bring criminal charges of "conspiracy to deny the civil rights" of their citizens. It's not going to get better until we pick up the cudgels.
"And the time for loyalty oaths — to any party — is rapidly coming to an end."
When WAS the time when blind, blanket loyalty oaths had their time?
---Give the guy a break. He's a rare honest observer.
Not this guy. He's a garden-variety opportunist Democrat. Could you be thinking of the much more interesting Matt Taibbi, Tina?
The GOP started dying in the 90s. It got a reprieve thanks to 9/11, which scared white suburbanites back towards the right, and helped Bush win in '04. Absent that, Bush loses, and Bushism gets pushed aside. Instead, the Bush wing of the party managed to survive and dominate the party during the Obama years.
I suspect that if Trump isn't the nominee, the GOP will be dead by 2028. If he is the nominee, that date will be pushed back to 2032.
Blogger gilbar said...
Mitt Romney? John McCain? Barry O'Bama? Mike Pence?
Please tell me WHY i should care a wit about a party with THESE losers!!
Trump is my Only Hope
8/18/23, 6:20 AM
———————
No, it’s not a cult.
tRump Swabs all complain that you can’t trust politicians. Their solution is to put their faith in the most untrustworthy person to serve in public life in the nation’s history.
They claim that there is no difference in the parties. Let’s test that:
1. If Donald “Ballot Box Poison” Trump had not sabotaged the Georgia 2020 run-offs would the “American Rescue Plan”, which contributed to inflation have passed?
2. Likewise would the “Inflation Reduction Act” which wil further cripple energy development have passed?
It is becoming increasingly clear that Donald Trump is unelectable in 2024. The AP poll yesterday shows that 53% of Americans will not vote for him under any circumstances. All the money donated to him has been and will be going to his lawyers instead of winning the election.
What will the cost be if the Democrats get control of everything:
1. Elimination of the filibuster.
2.Statehood for DC and PR
3.Federal control of elections - good bye voter ID etc.
4. Continuation of the March toward the elimination of fossil fuels in favor of things that will never properly supply the energy grid.
5. The wokification of society on steroids.
6. The effective end of the 1st Amendment
7. Continued progress toward the “digital dollar” and the implementation of a social credit score.
8. Unfettered open borders as far as the eye can see.
But, by all means vote for Trump. His record of accomplishment is unmatched . . . . . Oh, wait, his two big accomplishments as President were due to the hated McConnell and Paul Ryan.
If the tRump Swabs really cared about their agenda they would not vote for Trump. It is certain that a vote for Trump in the primary is the least likely path to getting their agenda enacted. No, for some reason they have decided that a quixotic vote for Trump is more important than the well being of the nation.
I am mystified at the thought process that leads one to make this choice.
Gunner said...
Gilbar, you do realize that Trump picked Pence for VP,
i Voted for Pence for VP in 2016 And in 2020.. I'm entitled to make stupid mistakes
"And the time for loyalty oaths — to any party — is rapidly coming to an end."
He is correct. As I've stated either here...or maybe on another platform, Ronna McDaniel, painfully still the head of the RNC, runs things like we're still in the 1970s. We're not. And the GOP is scheduled to fail as long as she is leading their ideas and visions. They had a chance to correct it a few months ago, but they didn't. And so whoever runs for the GOP is going to have to figure out how to win it without the RNC's help.
AMDG: "If the tRump Swabs really cared about their agenda they would not vote for Trump."
This is written by a DeSantis supporter so the question must be asked: Did Ken Griffin pre-approve your comment?
Because thats a thing over at DeSantis HQ.
1. If Donald “Ballot Box Poison” Trump had not sabotaged the Georgia 2020 run-offs would the “American Rescue Plan”, which contributed to inflation have passed?
Yes, because the GOP would have jumped at the chance to pass it and show their "bipartisan" credentials. There would have been a few changes around the edges, but there's no way that a GOP Senate would have outright blocked a Biden spending bill. Also, Trump didn't cost the GOP the Senate, Brian Kemp and Doug Doucey cost the GOP the Senate when the appointed two awful picks- McSally and Loeffler.
2. Likewise would the “Inflation Reduction Act” which wil further cripple energy development have passed?
Yes, for the same reasons above: the GOP Senate would have happily passed any "bipartisan" bill that gave them a few more goodies.
As for your list, the GOP has been at best complicit, at worst outright supportive, of basically everything 4-8. Their failure to clean up elections in the states where they had control casts doubt on any real resistance to a federal takeover of elections, and they won't give a damn about statehood. The only thing that they might care about is the filibuster, and that's only because they get a personal benefit from it.
"he actually created an entirely different party"
Depends on the meaning of party. If you want an organized opposition force that cultivates candidates, prepares for elections, has personnel to run governments, then the Trumpist GOP is not a regular competitive force in a two-party system. Which was Luttig's point. The right is in fact split.
Bai is completely full of shit. The delegates at the 2016 convention were regular Republican veterans in local and state politics, just Trump supporting ones, not fiercely heterosexual cocksuckers like Chuck and Rich.
The establishment wasn't getting people elected so someone else stepped in. Had the establishment fully supported the Tea Party, things would have been different.
"then the Trumpist GOP is not a regular competitive force in a two-party system. Which was Luttig's point. The right is in fact split."
Yeah, it is split- it is split between Trump voters and Biden voters.
I agree and disagree with you, Yancey. You're right about these folks being Republican veterans, but they're also very different from delegates in 2012, who became the anti-Trumpers.
I think that Matt Bai looks at what Trump accomplished and wishes the DNC would do the same. He's an iconoclast. And he spends a lot of energy debunking some of the worst things the Left says about us.
Blogger Mr Wibble said...
1. If Donald “Ballot Box Poison” Trump had not sabotaged the Georgia 2020 run-offs would the “American Rescue Plan”, which contributed to inflation have passed?
Yes, because the GOP would have jumped at the chance to pass it and show their "bipartisan" credentials. There would have been a few changes around the edges, but there's no way that a GOP Senate would have outright blocked a Biden spending bill. Also, Trump didn't cost the GOP the Senate, Brian Kemp and Doug Doucey cost the GOP the Senate when the appointed two awful picks- McSally and Loeffler.
2. Likewise would the “Inflation Reduction Act” which wil further cripple energy development have passed?
Yes, for the same reasons above: the GOP Senate would have happily passed any "bipartisan" bill that gave them a few more goodies.
As for your list, the GOP has been at best complicit, at worst outright supportive, of basically everything 4-8. Their failure to clean up elections in the states where they had control casts doubt on any real resistance to a federal takeover of elections, and they won't give a damn about statehood. The only thing that they might care about is the filibuster, and that's only because they get a personal benefit from it.
8/18/23, 9:08 AM
—————
In other words you have to make stuff up,in order to justify your cult like behavior.
This is the coin of the realm for tRump Swabs:
The Fat Tub of Goo says something completely made up (e.g. DeSantis is a RINO) that goes against actual evidence and the tRump Swabs parrot it without giving it a moment’s thought.
Their loyalty to man over everything else downright unAmerican.
Their loyalty to piece of crap with no redeeming value is nothing short of stupid.
If Donald Trump said nice things about pedos these people should not turn away in horror. They would join NAMBLA.
That the Party wants to run the policy more than support the electorate's candidate is more a problem than the Party realizes.
And he stuck with him in 2020 when it was clearly time to try a new running mate because of all the bad Covid news?
========
so in that case who would have presided J6 Cert-ificattion if Trump had chosen different VP?
2) if they [political parties] do, so what? They were never supposed to exist anyway.
==========
through what mechanism was American Experiment supposed to work then?
since it is party politics all over the world?
this is news to me - expatiate away.
Hey AMDG, it may be that you have something interesting or pertinent to add to the conversation. Like many others, I'll never find out because when you use a moronic cutesy phrase like "tRump swabs" I simply scroll on past your post. You self identify as a moron. Thanks for the heads up!
"In the case of our president emeritus I sent cash labeled as a personal gift, not a campaign contribution. I sent it to his residence at Mar a Lago."
Your cute little gimmick, if it becomes widespread, puts Trump at risk of violating campaign finance laws, as well as yourself. Publicizing it is either stupid or or informed. I'll be charitable assume that you just don't know better.
Blogger Scott Gustafson said...
The establishment wasn't getting people elected so someone else stepped in. Had the establishment fully supported the Tea Party, things would have been different.
8/18/23, 9:42 AM
If getting people elected is your litmus test then I would submit that Trump has failed it miserably.
The one constant in the 2022 election is that Trump identified candidates universally performed poorer than other Republican candidates. They typically ran around 7% behind other Republicans on the same ballot.
Trump is truly a victim of his compulsion.
If he had invested the money he inherited from his father in an index fund he would be wealthier than he is now.
If he had accepted defeat in 2020 he would be the front runner to win the election.
I believe it was Clinton who correctly pointed out that a political party is a loose coalition of more or less like-minded people;it's not a church to which members owe allegiance.
AMDG: "If he had invested the money he inherited from his father in an index fund he would be wealthier than he is now."
Trump is not a Wall Street trader. He has always been a developer.
But I do congratulate you on your riveting "prescient" and "timely" post hoc financial growth strategy "analysis".
Do you also offer Vegas odds on games that have already been played?
Kai Akker: yes, I am. Thanks for correcting me.
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