David Corn: The Republican Party Is Racist and Soulless. Just Ask This Veteran GOP Strategist.

[babylonsister]

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/08/racism-republican-party-stuart-stevens/

The Republican Party Is Racist and Soulless. Just Ask This Veteran GOP Strategist.
Stuart Stevens says he now realizes the hatred and bigotry of Trumpism were always at the heart of the GOP.
David Corn
September/October 2020 Issue

snip//


Asked if the Republican Party in the Trump years has become an outfit free of governing ideas, Stevens went even further: “It was all a lie.” He noted that this was word-for-word the title of his forthcoming book, It Was All a Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald Trump. The modern GOP, he said, never truly cared about the ideas it claimed to care about.

This was a stunning indictment coming from a longtime political consul­tant who had toiled on five Republican presidential campaigns and numerous Senate and gubernatorial races. “The Republican Party has been a cartel,” Stevens said excitedly. “And no one asks a cartel, ‘What’s your ideological purpose?’ You don’t ask OPEC, ‘What’s your ideology?’ You don’t ask a drug gang, ‘What’s your program?’ The Republicans exist for the pursuit of power for no purpose.”

snip//

Stevens now argues that Trump’s rise was not a fluke that the party can sidestep or survive. “This is the complete moral collapse of a governing party of a major superpower,” he remarked. He wonders how he could have been blind to the GOP’s racism and turpitude for so long. “It is hard to see this when you’re in the middle of it,” he said. “The only analogy I can find is the collapse of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union, when the difference between reality and what is believed became so disjointed. I should’ve seen this. I did see this, but I wanted to believe the crazies were a minority.”

Stevens conceded that had Trump not come along, he still might not have been fully aware of the structural immorality of the GOP: The Republican Party was “a comfortable place for a lot of us. If Trump had lost, I’d probably still be working for a Republican candidate. But Trump made it impossible to deny what the party is. I just don’t get why these Republican senators don’t stand up to him. What’s the worst thing? You’ll be an ex-senator? They are the Trump Generation. It’s how they will be remembered. Like the segregationists of old.”

It was hard to slow Stevens down as he spoke. He had so much to confess. He forecast a bleak future for the party. Citing the demise of the Repub­lican Party in California (where more voters are now registering “no party preference” than Republican), he observed that the GOP was becoming a “regional/Sun Belt party.” And he shared his fear that young political operatives working for the party have drawn the lesson that a candidate must emulate Trump to win—that what most matters is not policy ideas but the ability to attack and exploit fears, divisions, tribalism, and resentments. “Elizabeth Warren can articulate a coherent theory of government,” Stevens said. “There is no coherent theory of government for Republicans right now. Usually a coherent theory versus an incoherent theory carries the day.”

“It’s really incredible how this had happened,” Stevens told me, as I realized I had received far more material from him than anticipated. “This is the last book in the world I wanted to write. It is tough to come to terms with this, and incredibly depressing. If we say we believe in personal responsibility, you have to take personal responsibility and start with yourself. We created this. It didn’t just happen.” Stevens was not pleased or satisfied with his epiphany: Ideas are not the currency for today’s GOP and never truly were. And Trump alone could not be blamed for that. “Republicans only exist to elect Republicans,” Stevens remarked with sadness. “They are down to one idea: How can we win?”

[Hotler]

1. And selfish. nt

[bluedye33139]

2. Amazon shipped my copy this morning

In addition to all the reasons I support Biden, I want to be living in a country where I don't have to keep buying all of these books! loo

[Wounded Bear]

3. Well, d'uh...nt

[UpInArms]

4. These mea culpas are always so late

I am sick to death of what they created

[JI7]

6. not too late for the elections coming up

[UpInArms]

10. I merely have a difficult time

Understanding how anyone can be passively evil ...

It hopefully is never too late for awareness

[wryter2000]

12. True, but

Last edited Tue Aug 4, 2020, 01:24 PM - Edit history (1)

Think of all the people like this guy who STILL stand by the party and Trump. The evil boggles the mind.

I think I'm going to buy this book.

Edited to add: I just bought the e-book. It's $13.99. I would guess that's cheaper than a hardback.

I read a couple of reviews first. Frankly, I wasn't interested if the book portrayed Reagan as a saint. "Woe are we. What happened to the party of St. Ronnie?" BS.

One review mentions Reagan and his "welfare queens." Anyone who doesn't think this mess started with George Wallace and proceeded from there is blind.

So, dear reader, I bought it and will start reading it today.

[iluvtennis]

17. + agree. DUH. nt

[madaboutharry]

5. I believe in second chances, but this is a hard one.

It took a Mussolini wanna-be for these people to wake up?

This morning, journalist Elise Jordan was a guest on Morning Joe. She said she is now ashamed to have been a member of the Republican Party. I don’t know. She seems like a nice lady, but she grew up in Mississippi and it took Trump for her to get a clue?

[Bernardo de La Paz]

19. Second chances for people who show remorse. In some cases. NOT for parties.

Especially not for Greed Over People parties.

Parties are not people. Let them become rump parties like the Constitutional Party and the Whigs.

[GopherGal]

7. I think the only news here is that a Repuke admits it.

Consider this sentence.

This was a stunning indictment coming from a longtime political consul­tant who had toiled on five Republican presidential campaigns and numerous Senate and gubernatorial races.

The indictment is not stunning. The excerpted sentence is not true unless you include the "coming from ..." clause. They are the party of selfishness of bigotry, little else.

[Sherman A1]

8. Agreed

Nothing we didn’t already know.

[NonPC]

13. But What About the Money?

So is he going to donate all the proceeds of his salary for those 5 campaigns -- and the book -- to charity? Yeah, right.

[NewJeffCT]

9. He's been an interesting follow on Twitter

He was at the Trump rally as a press member or observer where they started the "Send Them Back" chant for The Squad and said that Lara Trump came out & warmed up the crowd with the Send them Back chant, so it was NOT spontaneous.

[Eyeball_Kid]

11. The GOP, IOW, is in confluence with Trump: the ends justify the means. That's it in a nutshell. n/t

[crickets]

14. "They are down to one idea: How can we win?"

I find it hard to believe he's just now coming around to knowing this about Republicans. It's been obvious for quite some time now.

[PatSeg]

16. Oh yes, I think he

figured it out quite some time ago and is finally coming to terms with the truth.

[Kaiserguy]

18. How can they win

by lying, cheating, stealing and voter suppression and that is the only way they can win.

[PatSeg]

15. Oh, a lot of republicans are not personally racist at all,

but in a sense, they are rather worse. Republican politicians will take advantage of their constituents' racism to win votes. Basically, most of them will do or say anything to win an election, so I think that makes them worse. No real character, no values, no principles, winning is everything.

[CaptainTruth]

20. Decades ago I concluded Republican politicians had one primary goal:

To gain & maintain power.

That's it. They'll do whatever it takes & the country be damned.

[JHB]

21. What's incredible is not how it happened, but that nobody did anything about it.

This has been the modus operandi since Movement Conservatives took over the party. Heck, it's HOW they took over the party. Bowl over norms, treat opposition as illegitimate and traitorous, grab with both hands, and push push push your agenda. Brazen out the squawking that follows, then do it again.

Every single Republican in a position of power has done this. Some more than others, but all of them.

[LudwigPastorius]

22. They are nihilists, man. They believe in nothing.

[zentrum]

23. The Party of Personal Responsibility....

…..is a good line to confront the Repugs with.

[Faux pas]

24. Kickin'

to finish tomorrow, thanks for sharing

[onetexan]

25. This is the party that came up with the Southern Strategy to their detriment

the party of old, male & white pandering to simpleminded Americans a politics of grievance and blame. For that to happen racism had to be entrenched. The end product of that is the Idiot in office today.