I made a list of problems that the Republican Party needs urgently to resolve if they want to be taken seriously and regain their dignity.
They need to stop being against the press. Yes, Trump is well known for his Stalinist phrase "press is the enemy of the people" as he stands in front of a rally that feels more like a lynch mob than a political event. But today, Republican candidates and officeholders routinely block the media from their events, inviting only their handpicked and highly reliable propagandists to cover even the most routine functions. This complete breakdown of trust in the media allows them to live in an alternative reality, one of their own making.
They need to stop being against the abortion. Today there are no Republican governors who support abortion rights, and many are actively working to criminalize abortions in their states. In the 1990s and early 2000s, the Republican governors who were pro-choice governed states with a larger collective population than the Republican anti-abortion governors. Bill Weld of Massachusetts, Pennsylvania’s Tom Ridge, Arnold Schwarzenegger in California, and New York’s George Pataki all were proudly pro-choice. In fact, in the 1990s and early 2000s, there were more Republican governors who were pro-choice than the Republican anti-abortion governors.
They need to stop being against democracy and voting. The Republican Party refuses to admit that America has a legally elected president. After the coup attempt of January 6, Republicans in 47 states introduced legislation to change voting laws to alter the legal framework of democracy. The Republican Party embraced the lie, promoted the lie, and continues to assert the lie as its official position. Had every Republican elected official who knew that Joe Biden won a decisive victory taken the simple step of congratulating the president-elect of their country, it would have instantly isolated Donald Trump and Fox News and others would have fallen in line. The insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol are now heroes and martyrs to a fierce network of men and women who believe they have a moral obligation to remove the elected president.
The Republican Party must abandon the strategy of calls for violence against those with whom they disagree. Violence has become an essential element of the Republican political narrative, signaling to the once fringe militia groups and their sympathizers that they have a place in the party. It is now a standard trope for a candidate to appear in a campaign ad firing a high-caliber weapon. Then you have direct calls for violence like when Ron DeSantis speaks of wanting to assault Dr. Anthony Fauci, the man President George W. Bush awarded the Medal of Freedom in 2008 for his work saving millions in the AIDS epidemic. Some of DeSantis' quotes include: "Someone needs to grab that little elf [Fauci] and chuck him across the Potomac." Or when DeSantis picked a fight with Disney when they refused to embrace DeSantis’s anti-gay legislation by threatening to build a state prison next to Disney World to prove who was really boss, the company canceled a billion-dollar expansion planned for Florida, which would have brought thousands of high-paying jobs to the state.
Other embracing of violence included when the Republican Party embraced Kyle Rittenhouse as a hero. Or when a couple who stood in their yard and waved guns at peaceful Black Lives Matter marchers were invited to speak to the 2016 Republican Convention, where, of course, they presented themselves as the true victims. Or when Tucker Carlson called the verdict against a white police officer who was convicted of murdering an unarmed Black man, George Floyd, by kneeling on his neck for nine and a half minutes "an attack on civilization."
They need to stop making untrue and ridiculous accusations against the Democrats Many Republicans have started to label Democrats as "pedophiles", "groomers", and that they kill babies after they are born using the fantasy term "post-abortion", and for the same as why the Russians call the Jewish president of Ukraine a "Nazi."
They need to stop being against the press. Yes, Trump is well known for his Stalinist phrase "press is the enemy of the people" as he stands in front of a rally that feels more like a lynch mob than a political event. But today, Republican candidates and officeholders routinely block the media from their events, inviting only their handpicked and highly reliable propagandists to cover even the most routine functions. This complete breakdown of trust in the media allows them to live in an alternative reality, one of their own making.
They need to stop being against the abortion. Today there are no Republican governors who support abortion rights, and many are actively working to criminalize abortions in their states. In the 1990s and early 2000s, the Republican governors who were pro-choice governed states with a larger collective population than the Republican anti-abortion governors. Bill Weld of Massachusetts, Pennsylvania’s Tom Ridge, Arnold Schwarzenegger in California, and New York’s George Pataki all were proudly pro-choice. In fact, in the 1990s and early 2000s, there were more Republican governors who were pro-choice than the Republican anti-abortion governors.
They need to stop being against democracy and voting. The Republican Party refuses to admit that America has a legally elected president. After the coup attempt of January 6, Republicans in 47 states introduced legislation to change voting laws to alter the legal framework of democracy. The Republican Party embraced the lie, promoted the lie, and continues to assert the lie as its official position. Had every Republican elected official who knew that Joe Biden won a decisive victory taken the simple step of congratulating the president-elect of their country, it would have instantly isolated Donald Trump and Fox News and others would have fallen in line. The insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol are now heroes and martyrs to a fierce network of men and women who believe they have a moral obligation to remove the elected president.
The Republican Party must abandon the strategy of calls for violence against those with whom they disagree. Violence has become an essential element of the Republican political narrative, signaling to the once fringe militia groups and their sympathizers that they have a place in the party. It is now a standard trope for a candidate to appear in a campaign ad firing a high-caliber weapon. Then you have direct calls for violence like when Ron DeSantis speaks of wanting to assault Dr. Anthony Fauci, the man President George W. Bush awarded the Medal of Freedom in 2008 for his work saving millions in the AIDS epidemic. Some of DeSantis' quotes include: "Someone needs to grab that little elf [Fauci] and chuck him across the Potomac." Or when DeSantis picked a fight with Disney when they refused to embrace DeSantis’s anti-gay legislation by threatening to build a state prison next to Disney World to prove who was really boss, the company canceled a billion-dollar expansion planned for Florida, which would have brought thousands of high-paying jobs to the state.
Other embracing of violence included when the Republican Party embraced Kyle Rittenhouse as a hero. Or when a couple who stood in their yard and waved guns at peaceful Black Lives Matter marchers were invited to speak to the 2016 Republican Convention, where, of course, they presented themselves as the true victims. Or when Tucker Carlson called the verdict against a white police officer who was convicted of murdering an unarmed Black man, George Floyd, by kneeling on his neck for nine and a half minutes "an attack on civilization."
They need to stop making untrue and ridiculous accusations against the Democrats Many Republicans have started to label Democrats as "pedophiles", "groomers", and that they kill babies after they are born using the fantasy term "post-abortion", and for the same as why the Russians call the Jewish president of Ukraine a "Nazi."
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
