11-12-2022, 11:23 AM
(11-12-2022, 09:14 AM)pally Wrote: It wasn’t as much luck in the past election as bad politicking by the Republicans. Since 2016, despite losing the popular vote, they decided they ONLY people they need to win an election is the increasingly right wing Republican base. And to campaign to the base all they had to do was “own the libs”. What the succeeded in doing was to fail to continue to expand their base, failed to look to the future, and failed to provide solutions. Non affiliated voters want answers and a functioning government. Republicans weren’t offering that…and Republicans didn’t care enough to pay attention to that
I think blame falls less on the GOP leadership itself and more on the base. The experienced leaders in the party know full well how difficult it is to win a general election or true swing state with a hard right authoritarian-style candidate. Their dilemma lies in the party primaries when they have to face only Republican voters. The base still largely supports Trump and his policies. Most of them really do feel that the 2020 election was stolen and that the Jan 6th insurrectionists are heroes. We've seen over the last 6 years that they will indeed throw out previous democratic norms to gain power over the libs.
Not many primaries favor a moderate Republican over a rabid Trump lackey in the last half decade. The powers that be in GOP have little choice but to go to the freakshow to find candidates to appease the mob. It's all fun, games, and lib owning until they have to go up against, well, any semi-reasonable Dem in the actual general or remotely in-play House seat contest.
If I were McConnell or McCarthy, I'd more or less tell the base to get bent. Pick strong conservatives without attachments to MAGA and focus on the economy and policy. The Dems do it all the time. Practically no Democratic candidate comes off as inspiring or overly exciting. They're just better than what the average registered Dem sees running for the GOP, which is enough.
The right should take out the MAGA trash. Tell the nutbags in the base to suck it up. Are they really going to get mad enough to vote for a dem candidate? I doubt it. Somebody has to be the adult in the party and tell the unruly children that eating ice cream for breakfast, lunch , and dinner isn't good for little insurrectionist Jonny, even if he throws a tantrum when they don't give in to his petulant demands and hysterics.
Until this happens, even weak Dem candidates will have a fighting chance in close races.
