The exodus is ongoing. Joe Scarborough has announced that he’s leaving the Republican party. Isn’t that nice?
Time and time and time again they turn the other way,Scarborough said of Republicans.And they are doing the same thing now. It’s actually disgusting and you have to ask yourself, what exactly is the Republican Party willing to do? How far are they willing to go? How much of this country and our values are they willing to sell out? I am not a Republican anymore. I’ve got to become an independent.
But, you know, when the rats abandon ship, that isn’t a sign that they’ve become cute and adorable, they’re just desperate and self-interested. Go ahead and become an “independent”, Joe, while promoting the same old deceits.
@JoeNBC has become an Independent –"this is not Ronald Reagan's party" https://t.co/0Iyk24i2Le
— Mika Brzezinski (@morningmika) July 11, 2017
You’re wrong. This is still Ronald Reagan’s party, and the foundation of greed and contempt for government and racism and science denialism were all there in the 1980s. I haven’t forgotten what a monster of ignorance and corruption he was, and to dream of turning back the clock to that nightmare is no ideal to aspire to.
At least he’s not becoming a Democrat. That’s my worry: that those opportunists in the Democratic party will see all the deserters from the Republican party and decide to become more accommodating to plague rats. We don’t need another party infected with the disease of Reaganism.
“Hey, Democrats, you should try courting some independents”
“okay, how about all these people leaving the republican party”
“Wait no–”
They’ll probably just be independent in name, unless they’d seriously consider voting third party.
Still, the more fragmented they become, the better. What would be really cool is if a few Congressional Republicans broke away. There are clearly factions within the beast, so it could happen. Same for the Democrats, of course.
Political party affiliation in this country is more about district political demographics than ideology or principles. All these Republicans from the South were Democrats back in the 50s because Southern white voters didn’t vote for Republicans.
It would be interesting to see what would happen to American politics if we managed to break the hegemony of the two party system.
So Republicans, and by extension most right-wing parties across Western democracies, have been promoting anti-intellectualism and science denial for decades and are only now surprised the logical conclusion of this is the current government?
Maybe people will learn to listen to us unwashed hippies for once.
The Coalition of Sunken Ships Rats, Mices, and Fleas would like to register a protest at the comparison. The rats, mices, and fleas do have standards! For instance, without their valiant efforts, the Black Death would not have been so effective, and they managed that catastrophe without controlling any part of any government anywhere.
Hard core repug aparatchiks, or People of the Russian Front (People’s Front of Russia?) who say they’re leaving the Party, are, in fact, doing nothing of the kind. Like the old Soviet Union, there can be only a single Party which, either you support, or you are banished to Siberia (Kansas?). Even if sincere, Party leaders won’t care and aren’t changing.
Taking back our country will not depend on people like Papa Joe but on people like us.
One thing this announcement about his urgent transmogrification does not say: he’s not a conservative anymore, since he’s suddenly realized conservatism is a hot mess of ignorance, hate, greed, etc.
Of course, there’s also this quote:
… in case you weren’t quite sure just how utterly useless the “independent” label was supposed to be.
Anyway, the situation is not really that he’s getting off the boat. In his mind, he is imagining a second ship, which is like the first (i.e., the one he is still actually on) in all the ways that matter, and he can pretend to be the brave captain. They’re still pirates, though, and he believes he knows where they can find some nice plunder. But at the same time, in his mind, it all somehow seems like they’re sailing off to the Undying Lands or doing some respectable-sounding thing like that. It’s all a dream within a dream, or a hallucination within a nervous breakdown, or something like that….
Siobhan @ #3
I don’t think Republican, conservative, right-wing, white supremacist, and fundamentalist voters in this country are surprised. They don’t see a problem. They think this is great, exactly the kind of government we need…anti-intellectual, authoritarian, bombastic, belligerent. Trump is doing a great job. He’s going to cut taxes, kill socialism, stop murdering babies and put uppity folks (blacks, browns, women, liberals) in their place. And Trump Jr. didn’t do a damn thing wrong…just smart campaigning.
@robro
I should have specified the fortresses of cognitive dissonance that embody so-called “moderate” conservatives. Of course the hoary-mouthed reactionaries see no problems with deteriorating democracy.
consciousness razor @6
Watching him on Colbert last night, he made it clear he’s still very much a conservative. He still wants to punish the poor by lowering his taxes and cutting services and he will still cheer on American imperialism. He just won’t do it under the Republican banner.
Tabby Lavalamp @9: That’s exactly what cr said.
Democrats are already infected, and people are leaving.
What we are learning is just how little Congressional Republicans are willing to sell their souls for. That, to me, has been the most amazing thing about this whole experience, though in retrospect I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised as I am.
Republicans love to claim they are really Independents or Libertarians – it fits their mental self image of being tough lone wolves. Of course they’ll still be the same authoritarians they always were.
I presume that Brzezinski will still not be able to get a word in sideways on their silly shout fest of a show.
Lauren, took a look at that link. Democratic party affiliation down from 50%ish to 30%sih – a 40% drop – from 2009 to now. Wow. Neither party has a lot of support.
Isn’t this kind of cyclical? Didn’t we have something of a Republican exodus during the Bush years, both early and later? I seem to remember a ton of people who were card-carrying Republicans suddenly declare themselves Libertarians around 2002 or so. I’m still not sure what the difference was, though. If pressed, I guess I’d concede they started pushing their idiotic claims with more fervency and felt even less inclined to hang their ideas on reality or facts than before, but otherwise their opinions didn’t change any. I take that back, most seemed to buy into 9/11 truther claims, though they still blamed Jews, Muslims, and liberals for it despite it supposedly being an inside job committed by a Republican administration.
Then there was a smaller one, which sort of became the Tea Party, but I do recall a few running into the welcoming arms of the Democratic Party. Not that it did many of them any good; a prime example being Arlen Specter. Again, I don’t recall much difference between their positions as a Republican and their positions as a whatever else they tried to pass themselves off, except maybe a greater level of irrationality.
Personally I hope Mathew Perry drops this Joe Scarborough character soon and goes back to doing something more interesting. Seriously, has anyone seen them in the same room together?
I saw this this morning on facebook.
https://youtu.be/64mWOoj68qo?t=3m44s
@12 Thirdill:
You’ve made the assumption they have souls.
@19: thirdmill — all hail Typos!
The Democratic party has always been willing to go that extra mile to reach to the right. In fact that was a major part of their strategy in the last election, was it not?