what will be the gop's new social (wedge) issues?
(an excellent article in the current issue of vanity fair)
What Will Be the G.O.P.’s New Social Issue?
From marriage equality to abortion, many of the social “wedge” issues used by the G.O.P. have been losing steam. What will take their place in the 2016 race?
Governor Scott Walker, of Wisconsin, who is running for president, says he is personally opposed to gay marriage but takes the position that this is a matter for each of the 50 states to decide for itself. Nice try, Governor, but that train has pulled out of the station. The country has already accepted gay marriage, and it’s too late for half-measures. “Leave it to the states” is a hoary evasion for national politicians who want to duck a troublesome issue, but it’s not available to Walker, because governors of states can’t duck an issue by saying it should be decided by the states. Well, they can try, but they shouldn’t be allowed to get away with it. You are the governor, Governor. Man up (as Sarah Palin used to say) and tell us where you stand.
It’s remarkable that a Republican running for the Republican nomination for president should need to be evasive about marriage equality, as opposed to using it as a cudgel. There were days, not long ago, when Republicans used to fabricate issues like this in order to embarrass the Democrats. Elderly readers may recall 1988, when George H. W. Bush beat Michael Dukakis in a vicious campaign almost entirely about artificial issues concocted in the G.O.P. laboratory, like the urgent need for an amendment to the Bill of Rights against burning the American flag. Twenty-seven years later the Bill of Rights remains pristine, there has been no serious effort to pollute it with an anti-flag-burning amendment, and yet there has been little if any flag burning going on. It will not be an issue in the 2016 campaign. There may be some vestigial sentence in the Republican Party platform, but no podium time will be wasted on it.
Regarding abortion—a genuine social issue—something similar has happened. Few people have actually changed their minds about the morality or legality of abortion, but Republicans don’t look forward to arguing about it on the campaign trail. They wish it would just go away. They may honestly believe that human life begins at the moment of conception, or they may have adopted that position cynically, but in most places the candidates would just as soon not dwell on it.
Abortion, marriage equality, gun control, drugs, prayer in the schools, affirmative action, the “War on Christmas”: these are all classified as “social issues” (as opposed to economic and foreign-policy issues) and have generally been regarded as “wedge issues” too—issues that the Republicans can use like a wedge to pry voters away from the Democrats. But the wedge isn’t what it used to be.
. . . .
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/06/republican-new-social-issues-class-divide
= new reply since forum marked as read
Abortion, marriage equality, gun control, drugs, prayer in the schools, affirmative action, the “War on Christmas” are still there plus voter repression, destroy education, and attack science. And there is nothing to stop them from continuing to bash the ACA and to speak against equal marriage. I mean, just because the cases are settled ... 
