The Republicans' Idea of Unity

I know speaking of unity can sound to some like a foolish fantasy. I know the forces that divide us are deep and they are real. But I also know they are not new.—President Joe Biden from his Inaugural Address, Jan. 20, 2021

As a candidate Joe Biden made unity the centerpiece of his campaign to the chagrin of the left wing of the Democratic Party. It helped win over Trump-opposing Republicans, independents and suburban women in his quest to get elected. Though so many have been skeptical of the prospect of unifying such a divided country especially after the past four years, the concept of unity was the principal theme in Mr. Biden’s inaugural address.

Merely hours after the inaugural festivities, truncated as they were due to the pandemic and security concerns, Republicans across the board demonstrated they are not having any of it. A reporter from a right wing media outlet asked the new and refreshingly competent press secretary Jen Psaki if the Democrats are ready to extend an olive branch to the Republicans in the name of unity.The Democrats need to offer an olive branch to Republicans? What a joke!

Maybe if the overwhelming majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives and a handful of senators would acknowledge that Joe Biden won the election fair and square (which he did), that would be a good first step in unifying the country. Recall how over 150 of these legislators objected to the certified election results in several states and that was AFTER the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6.

Let’s also look at sore loser Trump’s behavior following the election. Through the moment he fled to Florida on January 20 as a disgraced twice impeached president, he never publicly mentioned Joe Biden’s name, never acknowledged he lost to Biden, delayed the crucial transition period, failed to cooperate during the transition and in fact, created unnecessary barriers, didn’t welcome Biden in the White House to confer as has been a long standing tradition, and refused to attend the inauguration. What an example of sportsmanship Trump sets for our young people!

Then there’s that pesky matter of a Trump-incited insurrection on our government with the express intent to thwart the peaceful transfer of power and to harm or even kill the first and second persons in the succession. That’s called sedition.

This incitement by urging a frothing, violent, angry mob of white supremacists and other pro-Trump believers to “take back our country” whereby they stormed and ransacked the Capitol earned Trump his second impeachment. Now Republicans, such as Trump supplicant Lindsey Graham, are pleading for the Senate to not try Trump on this article of impeachment if the Democrats want to truly unify.

Yes, Democrats should look the other way and not hold Trump accountable for his attempt to overthrow the government. They should move on. Republicans who advocate this dereliction of duty should be reminded that 5 people lost their lives as a result of the riot.

That’s one more life lost than the Benghazi raid that killed 4 Americans in Libya. Republicans didn’t move on. They held some 10 hearings on the incident and dragged then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to testify at one of these for 11 hours. For years, obsessed Republicans screamed Benghazi! Benghazi! Benghazi! over and over. But a violent attempted coup? Not so much. Let’s just move on.

We should never forget January 6. It should forever be memorialized as 9/11 has been. But this tragedy, this national disgrace, was perpetrated not by foreign jihadists but by misinformed and conspiracy theory-obsessed American citizens who were provoked by a deranged, lying and unpatriotic president, aided by his kooky attorney and two rogue overly ambitious senators and a number of equally seditious representatives.

Within hours of the inauguration, Republicans and their agents on right wing media mocked Biden’s call for unity. The hashtag #ImpeachBidenNow trended on Twitter. Mitch McConnell already began playing games to hold off on finalizing his minority leader status and jeopardizing COVID relief legislation. Unity appears to be an elusive goal especially if it is not in the political interests of Republicans.

It’s a no-brainer for an incoming president especially from a different political party who had previously occupied the White House to ask for unity. And like he said, it could be seen as a foolish fantasy.

A degree of unity could only work if both sides are willing to pull together. One would think that the pandemic that kills Americans regardless of political affiliation would finally bring us collectively to fight the disease as a matter of patriotism.

President Biden’s realistic idea of unity is at least lowering the temperature of the rhetoric. The Republican idea of unity, however, is for Democrats to capitulate to their whims and take no actions to offend that perennially angry Republican base, who for the most part see Mr. Biden as an illegitimate president.

Unmasking Trump’s Biggest Mistake

From his candidacy for president through three plus years in office, Donald Trump has made a host of mistakes. Some have been in the process of governance like the pointless Trump shutdown, separating families at the southern border, the Muslim ban, his response to Charlottesville, his blundering of the coronavirus pandemic response, his taking the wrong position on the George Floyd murder-inspired Black Lives Matter protests, as well as other instances. #hocopolitics

He also made a number of political miscues along the way, such as demeaning the late Sen. John McCain, making fun of a disabled journalist, calling Mexicans rapists, insulting a Gold Star family, and more recently his stroll to the St. John’s Church with Bible in tow for that infamous photo-op after law enforcement broke up a peaceful demonstration using tear gas and other weapons.

So far, Trump, who had been impeached but not convicted for abusing his power to pressure an ally for personal political gain, has more or less weathered the storm, hanging around within single digits of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in most polls.

But President Trump has made one mistake that arguably is his biggest to this point, and that will do more damage to him politically than any of the others. To put it simply, his dismissive attitude towards wearing face masks during the coronavirus pandemic could have an oversized effect on his reelection prospects not to mention adversely impacting the health of large swaths of the population.

Trump needs a strong economy to make the case for reelection but pesky COVID-19 put a halt to that. The ensuing stay-at-home orders provided by his own administration and the nation’s governors closed most businesses, sent well over 40 million folks out of work and plunged the economy into a recession. For this reason, Trump had first denied the seriousness of the pandemic and eventually downplayed it so that he could pressure governors to open their states’ businesses sooner than health officials advised. Remember, for Trump, "it's the economy, stupid."

While some states are seeing their rates of infection decline, the Sunbelt is experiencing a marked rise. In this environment of “re-opening the economy,” it is more incumbent than ever to practice social distancing, avoid large gatherings and to wear face masks to at least mitigate the spread of COVID-19.

Somehow, these common sense precautions have been politicized by Trump, who refuses to wear a mask in public.  His followers take his cue and view wearing masks as a sign of “weakness” putting everyone around them at risk. To be fair, some of the Black Lives Matter protesters have eschewed masks but that appears to be more of a personal decision (albeit a risky one) rather than following the President’s example.

Early on, when there used to be briefings from the White House Pandemic Response Team, Trump never wore a mask on the podium and was in close proximity with other members of the team. He continues to go without a mask in subsequent public outings, and his supporters are following him. For his part, Vice President Pence tweeted a photo (pictured) of him since deleted at a campaign headquarters in Virginia with no masks in sight.

The biggest test to date is Trump’s upcoming political rally in Tulsa, OK on June 20. The planners have not mandated the use of face masks and we know the thousands of expected rally-goers will not wear masks so they could piss off the liberals.  Those attendees will have to sign a waiver so that they cannot sue the Trump campaign if they are stricken with the very virus they seem to deny.

Nonetheless, Tulsa’s health director is concerned for the well-being of the attendees and the president himself.

“I think it’s an honor for Tulsa to have a sitting president want to come and visit our community, but not during a pandemic,” Dr. Bruce Dart, director of the Tulsa City-County Health Department, told the Tulsa World. “I’m concerned about our ability to protect anyone who attends a large, indoor event, and I’m also concerned about our ability to ensure the president stays safe as well.”

We’ve learned this much about COVID-19.  It doesn’t care about party affiliation or the righteousness of causes. Instead, the virus is hell-bent in finding a host and to penetrate his or her lungs to decimate them. Masks help prevent the spread, and without a workable therapeutic or a vaccine, Covid-19 is going to be around for quite a while.

The Far Left Fake News Media, which had no Covid problem with the Rioters & Looters destroying Democrat run cities, is trying to Covid Shame us on our big Rallies. Won’t work!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 15, 2020

By Trump’s not taking the coronavirus precautions seriously like wearing a mask, he is putting his own base, his own voters, his own people and everybody who are in contact with them in danger. The further spread of COVID-19 will slow down the re-opening of the economy if not set it back altogether as the public will be less likely be sufficiently comfortable in patronizing those businesses. Therefore, Trump’s cavalier approach will not help his reelection chances since the economy is unlikely to bounce back under these conditions.

Wearing a mask is the prudent thing to do but Trump doesn’t see it that way. It’s his biggest mistake thus far.

Republicans Must Break From the Shithole President

The GOP is heading off the cliff with Trump.

MILKOS/ABADONIAN/TIM BRADLEY/
EDUARADO MUNOZ ALVAREZ/GETTY

Election Day 2018 is less than 10 months away.  On a national level, midterms are usually perilous for the party in power as voters have little other choice but to vent their frustration against those holding offices. This cycle is shaping up to be a doozey against the GOP fueled by the revulsion towards President Donald Trump who remains the most unpopular president in modern times.

Voter surveys have shown a marked preference for a generic Democratic candidate over a Republican in Congress.  GOP representatives are retiring at a record pace that now give hope to Democratic candidates to seize the opportunities presented and re-take the House.  While it is true Democrats need a strong message during this cycle to win over voters and as importantly, stoke the needed enthusiasm to get out the vote, disdain for Trump will be the party’s guiding star.

Trump has demonstrated an inordinate capacity for getting himself in trouble with his tweets and his verbal comments—the latter exemplified by his reported racially charged characterization of African nations and Haiti as “shithole countries” in reference to immigrants.  He needs this controversy like a hole in the head following the publication of mega-seller Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff where his fitness for office, his mental capacity and stability are allegedly questioned by those who are around him. #hocopolitics

From Charlottesville to Ghana, Trump has displayed his inner bigoted self, substantiated by a history of racism from his real estate development beginnings and birtherism to his anti-Muslim, anti-Mexican rhetoric.  Now the “shithole” mess that validates the charges of racism.

Throughout these episodes, Republican lawmakers have been tepid concerning Trump’s actions and overt racist words, the hovering Russia investigation, and the cavalier saber-rattling handling of the stalemate with North Korea.  While privately they raise their eyebrows and shake their heads with respect to Trump (even calling him a moron or worse), publicly they are latching on to him without any fissures of this alliance to this point.

Trump with his pardoned pal Sheriff Joe Arpaio

Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) who was once a strong critic of the president and gave hope to Americans that the preservation of democracy is far more important than party loyalty has exercised a rather suspicious whiplash reversal since a golf outing with Trump and now seems to be an ally. Even retiring Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) who had criticized Trump and questioned his stability appears happy now that the new tax law has been signed, which will benefit Corker (and Trump) mightily.

For GOP electeds who will be facing a likely prodigious blue wave, it’s not enough to “distance” themselves from Trump; they need to strongly condemn him when appropriate.  This applies to moderate Republican officials—local and national—who don’t agree with Trump on many if not most instances but somehow feel obliged to keep silent about him lest they lose Trump’s shrinking but noisy base.  This is a false calculation because those Trump supporters have nowhere to go but to back a Republican.  Voters in Alabama who supported Roy Moore preferred a sexual predator of underage girls to a Democrat.

Picture GOP elected officials in a line, locked in arms with Trump in the center, heading for a cliff.  If they don’t break from that linkage with Trump, Democrats will remind the voters that Republicans are the party of Trump, Moore and Sheriff Arpaio, and the Republicans could plunge into the abyss with him. 

Republican strategist Steve Schmidt has been hammering Trump for his debasement of the office of the presidency.  His tweet below sums up accurately the challenge facing Republicans.

The corrupted, rotten and complicit Republican majority that is abetting this Presidents damage to our institutions, national security and domestic tranquility must face electoral anhialation.  A massive coalition of Democrats, independent and appalled Republicans must come .

— Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) January 12, 2018

With Trump, the GOP Got What it Deserved

We’re in the “OMG” phase of the 2016 presidential election cycle.  Nobody thought that Donald Trump was a serious aspirant for the presidency; that it was merely a show to stoke his already oversized ego.  How did virtually everyone get it wrong?

Well, had Trump lost a few early contests he probably would, as a good business man should, cut his losses, call it a day and return to his gilded palaces.  That was not the case as we know. 

In fact, he is steamrolling to the Republican nomination, much to the chagrin of the so-called party establishment, and they are wringing their hands trying to figure out how he can be stopped before or during the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July.  Failing to do so would deprive the Republicans the golden opportunity from re-taking the White House in what could have been a victory against one of two vulnerable Democrats.

How did this uncontrollable monster get created?  The GOP brought it upon themselves, and they deserve what they got.

Since Trump’s announcement to join a large but weak field of Republican candidates, he essentially verbalized what many in the “base” of the party had been thinking all along but felt restrained from doing so.  Trump used the failure to enact immigration reform to throw Mexicans under the bus—literally.  “I’m gonna build a huge wall, a beautiful wall because right now we’re a country without borders and if there are no borders, we don’t have a country,” he repeated over and over.  #hocopolitics

That sparked the heretofore latent xenophobic instincts from many within the party to rally around the man who “tells it like it is”.  He tapped into the misogynist characteristics of Republican voters and those who had never previously voted with his verbal insults hurled against Megyn Kelly and Carly Fiorina.  Trump lampooned a disabled person and essentially called Vietnam POW Senator McCain a loser for being captured, and that’s just the beginning. 


These missteps alone should have done him in.  The media, the more sensible Republicans and the American people in general should have recognized the seriousness of his candidacy and expressed sufficient outrage to derail his march.  They never saw it coming.

Trump exposed his racist leanings when he spoke harshly against Black Lives Matter demonstrators.  It was his Sister Souljah moment, and the numerous racists in this country floated to the surface like earthworms after springtime rainstorm.  Then there is Trump’s support for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the country making religion a test for immigration.

Courtesy of mediamatters.org

They found a home with Trump, and when the Donald encouraged his adoring minions to “rough up” demonstrators—mostly black—at rallies combined with his “I’d like to punch him in the face” comment, it was easy to see how he has incited the more violent nature of these rallies and unfortunately they are likely to escalate.

As I indicated before, the Republicans have nobody to blame but themselves for this phenomenon.  Through dog whistles and other subtle forms of bigotry, the party became a home to racists (“Go back to Africa,” said one at a recent Trump rally) and anti-Semites (“Go back to Auschwitz,” snapped another—both on video).  Trump’s hesitation to disavow the KKK and David Duke in particular reinforced that notion.

As Bill Maher correctly points out, obviously not everyone in the Republican Party is a racist but if you are a racist, you are comfotable in the Republican Party.   They now have cover with Trump, and the candidate has done nothing to tamp down the vitriolic rhetoric. The 2008 campaign between McCain and Obama set the tone for the toxicity that exists today.  Though McCain is not directly responsible for it, he did select the village idiot Sarah Palin to be his running mate. 

At rallies during the campaign, Palin accused Obama of being a terrorist, a socialist and more by dint of his past associations.  The GOP did nothing to quell that incendiary rhetoric.  They also did nothing to counter the Trump-led “birther” movement that claimed Obama was born outside the U.S. and is not eligible to be president.

The negative discourse continued after the rather lopsided 2008 election victory for Obama when Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell infamously stated his goal to make Obama a one-time president.  And there was South Carolina Representative Joe Wilson shouting “You lie” during a speech the president made in 2009 to a joint session of Congress.
It had become rather obvious that the loyal opposition was bent de-legitimizing Obama and preventing him from carrying out his agenda.  Had the Democrats acted like this to a Republican sitting president, there would be cries for treason.

They undermined him at every turn including bringing in a head of state (Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu) against Obama’s wishes to speak before Congress to lobby against the Iran deal. Now they want to deny the president the Constitutional responsibility of filling a Supreme Court vacancy.

All this disrespect, all this vitriol planted the seeds for Trump to march through the primaries and vanquish his opponents through personal insults and victories.  Here is a man who has wafer-thin knowledge of policy, little or no understanding of how the government should be run, who publicly said he loves the poorly educated, and convinces himself he can make deals to solve our problems. Trump makes this race all about himself and believes if elected he will be king or a dictator in that  he can do whatever he pleases.  He even admitted recently that he gets his information from the Internet and his advice from himself.

As such, he is poised to damage the Republican Party for years, and all the hand-wringing by conservatives who dislike Trump for his failure to follow conservative orthodoxy and sensible pragmatic Republicans who see defeat being snatched from victory, will unlikely stop this stupid train to November. All they can say now, to paraphrase Trump, is “Get him the hell outta here!”

The Trump Card: Who Wins the Hand?

Pity those poor clowns in the GOP clown car who think they can be president of the United States.  They run around the country kissing the asses of fat cat donors. They suck up to their bigoted, misogynous, and homophobic gun-toting, Bible-thumping party base.  They raise tons of money through unfettered PACs and super PACS and super-duper PACs.  They attempt to speak to “ordinary” folks at the Iowa State Fair amid the stench of cow dung and the acrid aroma of fried foods encased in even more fried batter.  #hocopolitics

They go through all of this but why aren’t they gaining any traction?  Why are they mired in single digits like they are up to their necks in Iowa hog waste?

The answer my friends is blowing in the wind.  And that wind is Donald Trump.

Homophobe Mike Huckabee, who knows what to do with an Iowa Fair corn dog when he sees one, is flummoxed. Trump, according to the former governor of Arkansas, is receiving “10 times the media attention” so no wonder Trump is leading in the polls.  Huckabee claims if he enjoyed that amount of attention, he’d be winning.  Right.

It is true that Trump is ahead of this sorry pack based on the latest polling and by a wide margin.  Four years ago Herman “9-9-9” Cain was a Republican frontrunner as was Michelle Bachman at one time before they both flamed out as their idiocy caught up with them.  Will it be different in this cycle? 

“Teflon Donald” has been able to insult Mexicans, John McCain’s war service, Fox News’ Megyn Kelly and women in general in short order with relative impunity; his polling numbers remain stout.  The GOP pack won’t stand up to him (other than tepid appeals for him to change his tone) lest the Donald reaches from his vast arsenal of insults and fires verbal slingshots at them, which is more than the Democrats are willing to do. 

The Dems are gleefully sitting on the sidelines enjoying the spectacle that is Donald Trump and hoping that Trump-mania will diminish (if that’s possible) the other GOP contenders and deflect attention away from their own flawed frontrunner.

It’s not the correct approach.  Rather than passively avoiding the fray and hoping upon hope that Trump stays in the race to injure the eventual nominee, Democratic strategists should have been seizing on this gift-wrapped opportunity and swing into attack mode—a tactic that’s not natural to them.

With every Trump gaffe, rather than condemning the self-centered showman, Dems need to put out releases that say, “Trump is only saying what the rest of the Republican hopefuls are thinking but don’t have the courage to say for themselves.”  This is not a stretch; few GOP candidates respond to Trump on the substance of his comments, only to the manner in which he states them.

It is a win-win strategy for Democrats.  Either the electorate will tie Trump and his bluster to the GOP field if the Dems keep taunting or his antics will force the other contenders to confront Trump and risk the verbal equivalent of a nuclear war.  On the other hand, his outrageous comments can make the other candidates seem less extreme and more adult by comparison, which is a risk for Democrats.

Of course, as long as Trump stays in the race he will cause trouble for the other candidates.  He has commanded most of the attention without question and attention is like catnip to a guy like Trump.  He’s already proven that he can say just about anything and get away with it.  Though his policy positions have been scant so far, they’re likely to mirror those of the rest of the field whose differences aren’t dramatic.  

Trump’s distinction is that he and only he can get the job done and “Make America Great Again.”  It’s about him as the savior, not his particular positions on issues that should matter.

One good thing about Trump is that he is not a demagogue on social issues like most of the other GOP hopefuls.  His pro-life position had evolved to meet the requirements of the GOP but he is unconvincing.  While he is for “traditional marriage,” he doesn’t offer anti-gay diatribes as most of his fellow contenders do.  One reason for his relative silence on the topic is that he cannot come up with a good answer to the question, how do your three marriages represent traditional marriage?

He also said on Meet the Press on August 16 that being gay should not be a reason to fire employees of private companies.  Only Scott Walker, Jeb Bush and George Pataki of the other Republican candidates share that view.

How long can or will Trump remain in the race is the billion dollar question.  As long as he’s riding high in the polls, he is not going anywhere.  A significant dip may cause him to pull out, but that doesn’t seem likely now.  Such decisions will have to wait for the primaries and caucuses to get underway in the winter.  That will be a better measuring stick than current polling.

He has threatened to run as an independent should he be treated as badly by the GOP.  That is unlikely because of the need to gather so many signatures in all 50 states and the added costs of doing so.

Right now, he is riding the wave of voter anger and people are backing him no matter how absurd his comments and unrealistic his positions are.  They like people who call our elected officials “stupid”  and will keep him rolling along, so he remains a nightmare for establishment Republicans.

The longer the disarray, the better it is for the Democrats.  The Trump card will help them win the hand…for now.

Running the Bases

“Democrats never agree on anything, that's why they're Democrats. If they agreed with each other, they would be Republicans.”—Will Rogers

The Republican Party has a much easier time with their base than the Democrats. Essentially, the GOP base consists of three groups: Social/Religious Conservatives, Fiscal Conservatives and Military Hawks.

Republican leaders do little to risk offending a particular segment of the party. Many, if not most, share common Republican “principles,” you know, like anti-immigration, anti-environment (social conservatives tend to be more moderate on this issue, however), anti-tax, anti-regulation, anti-HIV funding, and, of course, anti-gay. But they won’t “teabag” when one segment of the party falters in their view. They save that asinine activity for the Democrats.

The 2008 election run-up was illustrative. The Republican base eroded during the two years prior to the election. But that was fueled mainly by anger by fiscal conservatives as President Bush allowed the federal deficit to swell to historic levels.

Social conservatives never abandoned Bush; he maintained that marriage was solely between a man and a woman, so they were content. Never mind that the country was mired in two wars, the economy sunk into near oblivion, and our standing in the world was somewhere between pariah and outcast. Bush was resolute against marriage equality. That’s what mattered most to them.

The same thing goes for the military hawks. They got what they always wanted: war. Two of them, in fact. Better to fight them over there than to fight them here.

So, when all was said and done, the Bushies garnered 25 to 28 percent support nationally for doing a heckuva job. These folks resided in the social conservative and military hawk legs of the 3-legged stool called the GOP base. Only the fiscal tightwads lost their devotion.

Democrats have a more complex conundrum. There aren’t groups of voters who fit into few and tidy categories. Democratic constituents really don’t form a base in a pure sense but a variety of bases that sometimes are pitted against each other. That’s where they differ markedly from the Republican base.

The Democratic base consists of large chunk of the minorities in the country, especially African-Americans and Hispanics. You also have conservative Democrats, labor unions, teachers, environmentalists, intellectuals, young people, lgbt folks, “Hollywood personalities,” pro-immigration, pro-choice, anti-death penalty, anti-gun, anti-war, the beat goes on.

Not all of these elements work against each other for sure. But not all work together either. The result: the Democratic Party. Gnawing at each other, yes, but also slapping the others’ backs following the uplifting election of November 2008, when the “base” was energized.

There was no back slapping, however, in the aftermath of the Proposition 8 debacle in California. The knee-jerk reaction of many gay activists was to blame not only the Mormons who disproportionately financed the pro-Prop 8 campaign, but African-Americans.

While it is true that socially conservative but Democratic African-Americans are largely opposed to same-sex marriage, statistical analysis post-Prop 8 revealed that as a group, they were not responsible for the passage of this hideous ballot initiative. Instead, it was older voters that tipped the scale on that one. Of course, that group did include socially conservative African-Americans.

Nevertheless, these two key components of the Democratic base continue to square off against each other. African-Americans who oppose marriage equality base it for the most part on religious grounds. Many also resent the comparison between the quest for LGBT rights and that of the civil rights movement, despite the pronouncements from Julian Bond, the late Coretta Scott King and other prominent black civil rights leaders.

“No people of good will should oppose marriage equality,” said Bond at the October 11 National March for Equality rally. “We have some real and serious problems in this country; same-sex marriage is not one of them.”

President Obama is feeling the pressure from leading a party with such a diverse and ornery base. His silence during the Prop 8 debate was irritating to gay activists. He ostensibly made a calculation that while his heart may be on the side of LGBT rights, his political brain told him not to alienate the African-American base within the party.

His problems with his LGBT base were heightened following his now controversial speech before the Human Rights Campaign annual dinner. He didn’t specify a timetable for passage of key legislative initiatives, and many gay activists huffed and puffed. The anger among these folks is palpable, and the effect it will have on a unified Democratic Party going into the 2010 mid-term elections remains to be seen.

That’s where we are now—a struggle, a tug-of-war. Democrats share common ideals and principles but fight among themselves.

This doesn’t happen with the Republican Party. At least not yet.

www.SteveCharing.blogspot.com.