If there’s a silver lining to be found in the Republican Party’s terminal velocity plummet into fascism, it’s that this transformation is proving deeply unpopular with the American electorate. Right-wing media outlets are doing their best to project optimism about the coming election but the omens are grim for the GOP.
A particularly potent portent of things to come can be found in the triumph of Democrat Timothy Kennedy over Republican Gary Dickson in the special election for New York’s 26th congressional district. The two were competing for a vacancy left by retiring Democratic Congressman Brian Higgins. If the right-wing smears of Biden and the larger Democratic Party had been effective, we would have seen the signs here. Instead, we saw a comfortable blue victory and a failure by conservatives to seize a much-needed seat.
Republicans were desperate for a win in this special election because their House majority is hovering at just one seat, down from the commanding 223-213 majority that they held at the beginning of the congressional session. Their humiliating legislative collapse over these past few years was not a fluke but rather an unavoidable consequence of the GOP’s present structure.
Tell Wisconsin voters to reject the out-of-state multimillionaire trying to buy a Senate seat
The personality cult that once called itself a party is completely beholden to its most deranged fringes members — Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz being the most prominent — and is thus incapable of forging a functioning governing coalition. No legislation will ever be far-right enough to satisfy the lunatics and the lunatics are incentivized to pick fights with RINOS to drum up campaign donations from the base. It’s a vicious, self-cannibalizing dynamic. It’s this endemic dysfunction that led to Kevin McCarthy begin ousted from the speakership by his own party after a measly ten months.
Not surprisingly, a result of this constant infighting is that absolutely nothing gets done. The Republicans have no legislative accomplishments to tout to voters. Instead, they’ve wasted our tax dollars on an utterly fruitless investigation into President Biden geared towards a sham impeachment. Oh, and they passed a bill to stop Democrats from taking your gas stoves despite the fact that Democrats never wanted your gas stoves in the first place. Republicans passed a bill to combat their own paranoid Fox News-fed delusions.
The rapidly accelerating derangement of the GOP has prompted many to jump ship. Twenty-one Republicans have announced their retirement from Congress, with five of them not even bothering to finish out their terms. The hard authoritarian shift of the party is also scaring off moderate Republicans from getting involved in politics. As a result, complete maniacs are easily winning GOP primaries and then promptly face-planting in general elections. Perennial loser Kari Lake springs to mind. The truth is that the more the Republican Party embraces its base, the more off-putting it becomes to the wider public.
The dirty secret beneath all of this chaos is that the wealthy donors and corporations who keep the Republican Party afloat are completely fine with government gridlock. In fact, many of them would prefer we had no government at all. If there’s no government then there’s nobody to enforce all of those regulations (many of them lifesaving) that get in the way of their all-important profits.
Ultimately, that’s what this election comes down to. On one side is a frothing fascist party backed by the super-rich with no discernible policy goals beyond inflicting cruelty on its political enemies. On the other side are the Democrats who want to give the American people stronger infrastructure, better healthcare, and a thriving economy. As November approaches, that contrast will only grow sharper.
Stay focused, stay energized.
Brian
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DON'T BE A MITCH FUND
The "Don't Be A Mitch" campaign is back after a hugely successful 2022 cycle, having raised $1.2 million for voter registration groups ahead of the midterm elections. This year, with a tough Senate map, we have no room for error. I put together a list of organizations from 5 key states (Montana, Ohio, Arizona, Wisconsin, and Missouri) that I think are best situated to ensure that the Senate stays in Democrats' hands. Any amount helps!
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