Both Sides Lost

Megan McArdle writes:

If the left had been a little less visibly eager to condemn Kavanaugh before the trial — and if images of enraged protesters beating on the doors of the Supreme Court had not dominated our televisions —Democrats might have managed to knock the Republican Senate majority down, or perhaps even to shift it to a narrow blue wedge blocking Trump’s nominees. Instead, the Republican [Senate] majority has grown. It will be functionally impossible to remove Trump from office and even more difficult than it already was to stop a steady flow of conservatives into the vacancies on the courts.

I saw few people, however, entertaining such unpleasant thoughts on election night. Partisans seemed focused on the bright side: Democrats happily anticipating their House investigations, Republicans savoring their future judicial appointments. But eventually, these joys are likely to pall in the sight of the opposition’s ongoing victories, and partisans’ attentions will turn to what might have been, if they’d been a little more focused on practical politics and a little less focused on instant, evanescent victories in the culture war.

63 Comments for “Both Sides Lost”

  1. posted by Matthew on

    Every election “won” by a Slaveocrat was a stolen one. Every single one. The GOP needs to challenge every one of these stolen elections in court until the courts overturn the results. The country can no longer tolerate any amount of Slaveocrat duplicity and treason anymore, nor can we tolerate the double-crossing of so-called “Libertarians” anymore either.

    If elections were truly fair and free, the United States would still be under one-party Republican rule on every level and would have been since the moment Lincoln died. The Slaveocrats have declared war on this country and war on the Jewish and homosexual values that both created it and made Western Civilization possible in the first place.

  2. posted by Matthew on

    And fuck you California for refusing to repeal the gas tax through the same methods you used to ban gay marriage twice. An America where only gay Republicans were allowed to vote will be the closest thing to Heaven on Earth possible.

  3. posted by Tom Scharbach on

    I’m heartened to know that Democratic opposition to Judge Kavanaugh was the deciding factor in energizing the Republican base in yesterday’s election, and that the President’s race-baiting, fear-mongering and wild polemics during the closing days of the race had nothing to do with it.

    I could take issue with that analysis, I suppose, but not wanting to “weigh in on political issues of left/right beyond LGBT concerns”, let me confine myself to congratulating the LGBT candidates who won state and federal elections yesterday, and commiserating with those who did not.

    My list at this point is not comprehensive; a couple of races are too close to call at this point, and I haven’t personally tracked state legislative races outside Wisconsin.

    The run-down as I know it as I write:

    Jared Polis was elected Governor in Arizona, after serving the state in Congress for a decade. Kate Brown was elected Governor of Oregon. Christine Hallquist lost her bid to become Governor of Vermont.

    In other statewide wins, Joshua Tenario was elected the Lieutenant Governor of Guam, Maura Healey was re-elected as Attorney General in Massachusetts, Kevin Lembo was re-elected Connecticut State Comptroller, and Dana Nessel is leading but appears to have won the tight Attorney General’s race in Michigan.

    In Senate races, Tammy Baldwin was handily re-elected in Wisconsin, but Kyrsten Sinema was narrowly defeated in Arizona.

    In the House, David Cicilline (RI), Angie Craig (MN), Sharice Davids (KS), Sean Maloney (NY), Tracy Mitrano (NY), Chris Pappas (NH), Mark Pocan (WI), and Mark Takano (CA) were elected or re-elected. Lauren Baer (FL), Gina Ortiz-Jones (TX), and Rick Neal (OH) lost their bids to win a seat in Congress. Katie Hill (CA) was leading in a tight race as I write, but only 80% of the votes have been counted.

    In Wisconsin, Tim Carpenter returns to the State Senate, but Lee Snodgrass lost his bid in a heavily Republican district. Marishevel Cabrera, Mark Spreitzer and JoCasta Zamarripa were all elected or re-elected to the State Assembly.

    In other states, the Victory Fund reports 81 wins for LGBT candidates at the state legislative level, but results are not in for a about a third of the races.

    And off-topic for LGBT concerns but important to those of us in Wisconsin, I am delighted that Tony Evers defeated Scott Walker for Governor by a narrow margin. Governor Walker sold out to the Foxconn scam, gutted our highway maintenance funds (as I am reminded driving every time I drive on state highways) and did more than his share to destroy public education in Wisconsin. It was time for him to go.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      Since I last commented, I see that we picked up another LGBT member of Congress, Angie Craig (MN). Good on her.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      We think we can add Katie Hill (CA) to the list of LGBT members of the House. With 100% of precincts reporting, Katie Hill leads incumbent Steven Knight 51.26% to 48.74%. Politico and other national media haven’t listed the race as a “win” yet, though, so maybe there is something I’m not aware of at this point.

      • posted by Matthew on

        1. It is extremely homophobic to lump lesbians and gays in with a bunch of sick, homophobic, self-mutilating freaks whose long-term agenda includes the elimination of homosexuality and the normalization of pedophilia along with it. Reducing the word gay to just another letter in an ever-changing acronym of sexual deviants projecting their own sexual deviancy onto gays and lesbians is a means of demonizing homosexuality. Semantics matter because language shapes laws, culture, and behavior. Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity.

        2. Even with the state of California, a state built on land stolen from Indians by Spanish imperialists with money stolen from Jews, pretty much gerrymandered to the point where the entire voting class is a de facto slave of the Slaveocrat Party, you couldn’t keep the US Senate despite Californians being forced to choose between Slaveocrat A and Slaveocrat B and deprived of a write-in alternative. We need to get rid of the Slaveocrat Party before they make this the norm on every ballot everywhere in the United States.

        3. Along with blasphemy against the Jewish God and perversion of the gay and lesbian norm, The Slaveocrat Party is the reason for this country’s moral, intellectual, and economic decline. You are easily swayed by falsehoods and appeals to fear and hatred while projecting that quality onto the Right, and you prove your bigotry time and time again when you would rather support oppressor class members over gay Republicans.

      • posted by JohnInCA on

        God I hate that name. I know nothing, absolutely nothing, about her policies. But she had the single most aggressively aggravating campaign I’ve ever endured. A few weeks back I had to deal with her door-to-door poltical salesemen twice in the same day. For a week there I was getting multiple calls from her campaigners every single day.

        If Knight wasn’t so awful, I would have voted against her because her on-the-ground campaign was borderline harassment. And it wasn’t enough to say “I already know how I’m going to vote” or “I already voted”. They wanted pledges, and to get information so they could mail me a “reminder” “sample ballot”, and then they wanted to know how I voted. It’s called a secret ballot for a reason you under-paid busy-bodies!

        I swear, this is the first time I’ve actually had my opinion of a candidate swayed by partisan campaigning. Because while before I had no strong opinion of her, now I actively want her to be primaried in 2020.

        • posted by Matthew on

          There’s no Republican awful enough to make me vote for a Slaveocrat again no matter what.

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            I know, it’s almost like I’m a person and you’re a caricature or something.

          • posted by Matthew on

            More projection from a Slaveocrat Party field slave.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      The Detroit News just announced that Tom Leonard has conceded the Michigan Attorney General’s race to Dana Nessel, so we can add that race to the “win” column.

      • posted by Matthew on

        Don’t be disingenuous. You don’t want gay candidates. You want el-jibbity-pandering transcultists who support gay erasure. That’s why you’re a Slaveocrat: because you’re a self-loathing homophobic Communist who only supports other self-loathing homophobic Communists. You want to see gays erased while still maintaining an illusion of progressiveness. Don’t lie to me. You’re an embarrassment to the gay community. Everything wrong with gay culture is wrong because of people like you.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves vote Republican.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves do not engage in so-called “open relationships,” which is just a PC word for cuckoldry.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves do not support the chemical and physical mutilation of other gay men and lesbians.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves do not support gays and lesbians having to settle for opposite-sex sex partners.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves do not support countries or religions that either ban gays and lesbians or advocate our chemical or physical sterilization.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves do not listen to shrill and shitty tuneless synthesized pseudo-music pumped at deafening volumes.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves recognize and publicly acknowledge the superiority of Western Civilization to the savage barbarians who want to destroy it.

        Gay men and lesbians who respect ourselves do not lump gay and lesbian interests, identity, and culture with every sick, twisted heterosexual fetish and kink when heterosexuality is perverted enough in and of itself to begin with.

    • posted by Matthew on

      Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity, and openly gay NY Republican Pete Holmberg “lost” to some privileged breeder bitch who, like most NY Slaveocrats, relied on systemic dago mafia voter fraud. Slaveocrat Uncles Tom and Aunts Jemima do not speak for the gay community. So spare me your crap about el-jibbity when the one gay candidate who refused to kiss the ass of the anti-gay anti-woman gay erasure-enabling el-jibbity left lost to some privileged breeder bitch. Heterosexual women are a privileged class in ways gay men are not, and as gay men and lesbians we need to be both jenn-durr-critical and hetero-critical. Tolerance of the oppressor class is a luxury gays can no longer afford and never could, but sellouts like you praise the election of other sellouts.

      “I’m heartened to know that Democratic opposition to Judge Kavanaugh was the deciding factor in energizing the Republican base in yesterday’s election, and that the President’s race-baiting, fear-mongering and wild polemics during the closing days of the race had nothing to do with it.”

      You mean because gullible, vindictive, condescending Slaveocrats took the word of some lying, cheating Tar Hole whore just because she had tits and a pussy and the man she lied about has neither?

      And when Don Lemon is the one calling white men terrorism while black conservatives, gay conservatives, woman conservatives, et al, are still vilified and demonized by fascists like you, the race-baiting is on the Left and the Left alone.

      And Scott Walker was the best thing to happen to Wisconsin. Unions suck (the ones not run by the dago mafia are run by Communists and you know it), infrastructure belongs in the private sector, and anything Slaveocrats think is a scam really isn’t. And after their “candidate” proved to be the deciding vote, I will strangle anyone who calls themselves a Libertarian after this; you’re just a glorified Slaveocrat who recognizes the need for lower taxes and the medicinal benefits of cannabis. You want shitty roads, come to California and watch the pavement crumble like a chocolate chip cookie. And it’s only going to get worse now that the state has been gerrymandered out of having any real political competition.

      • posted by Tom Scharbach on

        Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity, and openly gay NY Republican Pete Holmberg “lost” to some privileged breeder bitch who, like most NY Slaveocrats, relied on systemic dago mafia voter fraud.

        Even worse.

        A question: Holmberg describes himself (on his campaign website) as “I’m a homosexual and a Christian. ” Does “homosexual” (a descriptor which presumably includes both gays and lesbians) meet your “Just Say Gay!” requirement for political correctness?

        • posted by Matthew on

          Yes, since you can’t say “homosexual” without also acknowledging that sex is real, immutable, and unchangeable. And it applies to both men and women equally. It is not derogatory; it is neutral at worst.

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            Don’t be absurd.

            Your claims are factually incorrect and obviously absurd. To demonstrate: I’m gay. I’m homosexual. I’m part of the LGBT community. The way you’re using the term, sex is not immutable and unchangeable. Trans folk exist and are not just confused gay people.

    • posted by Matthew on

      “Jared Polis was elected Governor in Arizona”

      That’s Colorado, you moronic Kraut. So much for the Master Race theory.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity

      • posted by Matthew on

        Yet you still refused to support him, so he called your bluff by kicking the transcult infiltration out of the military while nominating gay people to ambassadorships. If Trump is going to pander to your semantic distortions and you still support the Slaveocrat Party who is responsible not only for those distortions but for enabling some horrific barbarism against gay and lesbian bodies, then why should Trump give you any support in return? The transcult does not belong in the military. It does not belong in schools. It does not belong in any part of the public and private sector. It is no more a civil rights movement than lobotomies or the Tuskegee Experiments were. The Trump Administration should be praised for kicking it out of the military and for demanding that vilely sexist and homophobic unword that rhymes with “blender” be removed from government documents. As long as the Slaveocrat Party enables the mutilation of gay people at any age, I will continue to vote Republican and support any and all jenn-durr critical activism and regard any gay man or lesbian who refuses to get behind these movements as sellouts, quislings, and turncoats. You have always been that and you have always projected that onto us. It stops right now.

      • posted by Tom Scharbach on

        Yet you still refused to support him …

        Oh, I wouldn’t go so far as to call President Trump a bigot, as you do, despite the tortured-prisoner-of-war-voice he adopts when he pronounces “L … G … B … T … Q.” But I don’t think that he is an ally, either, despite the couple of gestures he’s made while allowing his administration to reverse a number of administrative policies and procedures directly affecting gays and lesbians.

        But you are right about one thing. I didn’t support him and don’t now. I think that the President is personally corrupt and a potentially dangerous authoritarian.

        • posted by Matthew on

          “Oh, I wouldn’t go so far as to call President Trump a bigot, as you do,”

          I did no such thing. You are putting words in my mouth as you project your bigotry onto both me and President Donald J. Trump.

          “despite the tortured-prisoner-of-war-voice he adopts when he pronounces “L … G … B … T … Q.””

          Because q***r is a slur, joining the transcult is a choice, and it’s bullshit to lump those in with homosexuality, and deep down he knows it’s bullshit. He also said “gay marriage is the law of the land.” There were no trans-identified people at Pulse the night of the attack anyway.

          “But you are right about one thing. I didn’t support him and don’t now. I think that the President is personally corrupt and a potentially dangerous authoritarian.”

          Then at this point, that makes you a traitor to both the office of the Presidency and the office holder and by proxy to the United States. And after Michigan and Utah legalized cannabis and after you just wasted your vote on the same policies that have turned blue state cities into shitholes that barely qualify as first-world anymore, calling him an “authoritarian” makes you an even bigger idiot than you were before. As usual, it’s a deflect-and-project to distract from the Regressive Left’s totalitarian intent and effect in every nation where its treasonous machinations are tolerated.

        • posted by Tom Scharbach on

          I did no such thing. You are putting words in my mouth …

          Oh, really? How many times have you repeated “Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity …” in this thread alone?

          President Trump uses the term and uses no other. He does not say “gay” or even “gay and lesbian”. He says “LGBT”, or (as you put it, thinking you are cute, “el-jibbity”.

          Maybe you should change your catch-phrase from “Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity …” to something else, or at least clarify that you are giving President Trump a pass.

          • posted by Matthew on

            You say it but you hate Trump. You’re a hypocrite. And like I said, you need to #JustSayGay or you’re an Uncle Tom. Homosexuality is wasted on an idiot like you anyway.

          • posted by Matthew on

            “Oh, really? How many times have you repeated “Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity …” in this thread alone? ”

            Not as many times as you proved your self-loathing bigotry by reducing homosexuality to just another letter in a vile acronym that lumps us in with a bunch of over-made-up rapey breeders in tacky dresses. You can’t be all four at once. You can’t condemn the President for something you do yourself. That takes cognitive dissonance to a whole new level.

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            The only one condemning the president for saying “LGBT” is you. The rest of us don’t condemn or condone someone based on their use of that acronym.

          • posted by Matthew on

            ” The rest of us don’t condemn or condone someone based on their use of that acronym.”

            Then you’re an Uncle Tom, too. I’m condemning EVERYONE who refuses to #JustSayGay.

          • posted by Tom Scharbach on

            I’m condemning EVERYONE who refuses to #JustSayGay.

            Including, one presumes, President Trump. So the circle is completed.

          • posted by Matthew on

            You mean the same Donald Trump who valiantly tried to kick the transcult menace out of the military while nominating gay people to ambassadorships? That Donald Trump?

            If you are anti-trans and anti-Trump, then what are your political options?

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            Yes, that same Donald Trump is the Donald Trump who uses “LGBT”, a phrase that you claim is exclusively used by “bigots”.

            So either you’re calling that same Donald Trump a “bigot”, or you are admitting that you don’t mean it when you say that only “bigots” say “LGBT”.

          • posted by Matthew on

            By that standard, you just admitted you’re a bigot, too. But since you claim to be gay (no real gay man would submit to misogynistic homophobic interlopers in such a fashion), it also makes you an Uncle Tom and an enabler of gay erasure. You are to blame for normalizing the subjugation of homosexuality to an anagram made up by misogynistic leftybros to normalize heterosexual perversion and project it onto their gay superiors.

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            You do realize I can understand how your standard is applied without accepting it as my own, yes?

        • posted by Matthew on

          “Including, one presumes, President Trump. So the circle is completed.”

          Meanwhile Hillary and Obama said it, too, and since Obama is the one who pardoned a tranny traitor and signed an executive order forcing men into the women’s room, he’s an enabler of violence against women. He also enabled violence against Jews and gay people with his deal with Iran, where homosexuality is a capital crime but transcultism is allowed. As long as the Slaveocrats tolerate trannies and camel fuckers, they are a clear and present danger to the long-term liberty and security of the United States.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      In Senate races, Tammy Baldwin was handily re-elected in Wisconsin, but Kyrsten Sinema was narrowly defeated in Arizona.

      As it turns out, after all the votes were counted, Sinema won the Senate seat.

  4. posted by Tom Scharbach on

    … since the moment Lincoln died …

    Abraham Lincoln would roll over in his grave if he knew what the Republican Party has become. So would Ronald Reagan, for that matter.

    • posted by Matthew on

      Allies say gay, bigots say el-jibbity.

    • posted by Matthew on

      Lincoln’s in his grave because of a white gentile heterosexual male Slaveocrat — and an actor, so even then show business was a hotbed of anti-GOP propaganda — who supported slavery enough to kill the gay man who freed the slaves. And you’ve got a lot of nerve invoking the name of Reagan when you Slaveocrat trash vilified him every day of his life while gleefully putting the next generation of gay men at risk for AIDS by rationalizing whoredom and cuckery as life goals. If he had handed condoms to every gay bar in America, you would have thrown them in his face.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      Lincoln’s in his grave because …

      Doesn’t change the fact that he would roll over in his grave if he knew what the Republican Party has become.

      And you’ve got a lot of nerve invoking the name of Reagan …

      Or the fact that Ronald Reagan would too, for that matter.

      • posted by Matthew on

        The same Ronald Reagan who said “thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican?” Fat fucking chance he’d be too unhappy once he saw the stock market gains, the employment gains (including the lowest minority unemployment rates in decades), and the fact that the US is actually standing up to Iran again. And the Regressive Leftists who hate Reagan for deregulation should also hate Jimmy Carter for the same reasons getting the ball rolling on it, even though your airplane tickets would be twice as expensive if not more so without it, but he hates Israel so he gets put on a pedestal.

        The last three Slaveocrat Presidents will be the last three Slaveocrats ever to hold the office. By 2020, the House of Representatives will be the laughingstock of the United States and the states that enabled Democrats will be the first to see some whatever economic decline happens under their watch. We’re still not over the last crash you and you alone caused as soon as you took back Congress in 2006. You have tried to pass the buck for that since day one, but it was not until Republicans took it back that recovery was even possible.

        Capitalism is the only moral economic system, Judaism is the one true faith, homosexuality is the only normal form of human sexuality, biological sex and race are neither changeable nor social constructs, cannabis is harmless and should be legal, untaxed, and unregulated, and meat is the only type of food humans need to live. If you disagree with any of those statements, then you are not fit to either vote or hold public office.

      • posted by Tom Scharbach on

        The same Ronald Reagan who said “thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican?”

        Yup. He’d definitely roll over in his grave. Ronald Reagan was the first and last Republican presidential candidate I voted for, and he would be appalled at what the party has become.

        • posted by Matthew on

          Then you’re just another fairweather patriot who is easily led by fads instead of principles. And if I recall correctly, it was at this stage in Oscumba’s travesty of a presidency that the Slaveocrats lost control of Congress.

        • posted by Matthew on

          Unlike Brad Pitt and that no-talent bleached blonde harridan he got away from for good reason in the first place, Reagan would never go crawling back to the Slaveocrat Party because it would only remind him why he left it behind in the first place. The same reason Walt Disney left it behind. The same reason Charlton Heston left it behind. The same reason I left it behind. It represents the values of traitors and turncoats. You need to grow up and leave the Slaveocrat Party, the Regressive Left, and everything it stands for behind, too. Friends who ostracize you for doing so are fairweather friends.

        • posted by Tom Scharbach on

          Reagan would never go crawling back …

          I am not suggesting that he would. President Reagan became a conservative over the course of two decades, and there is no reason to think that he would switch back.

          I am simply saying that he would be appalled by what the Republican Party has become, and I think that I’m right about that.

          The party, as presently constituted often — more often than not, in fact — stands in stark opposition to the principled, pragmatic libertarian, conservatism that President Reagan exhibited during his time as Governor of California and as President.

          President Reagan would have nothing to do with the present party — relentless attacks on the rule of law; rejection of objective truth as a standard for governance; defiling the military, the intelligence agencies and the FBI; catering to dictators and authoritarian tyrants; systematically dividing the American people; constant scapegoating; race-baiting that no longer can be hidden behind dog-whistles; betrayal of long-standing alliances for no good reason; and all the rest.

          The Republican Party has gotten to the point where slavish obedience to an authoritarian, erratic leader is confused with patriotism. Anything else — any opposition at all to strongman leadership — makes a citizen (as you put it) as “a traitor to both the office of the Presidency and the office holder and by proxy to the United States“.

          Ronald Reagan would be appalled at what his beloved Republican Party has become. Appalled.

          My guess is that he would do what George Will and so many other principled conservatives have done, and leave the party.

          I am not recommending, mind you, that you should leave the Trump party. You fit right in.

          • posted by Matthew on

            “The Republican Party has gotten to the point where slavish obedience to an authoritarian, erratic leader is confused with patriotism.”

            The Slaveocrat Party crossed that line first under Oscumba and you know it.

            “betrayal of long-standing alliances for no good reason; ”

            Like Oscumba betrayed Israel by making a deal with Iran where his fellow Chicagoan Calypso Louie just preached “death to America”?

            “race-baiting that no longer can be hidden behind dog-whistles”

            You mean like Don Lemon calling white men terrorists, then Alec Baldwin goes and proves him right?

            Everything you accuse Trump of doing was done by Oscumba. Everything.

  5. posted by Jorge on

    Well, we had two years of unified government in DC, and I didn’t get much of what I wanted out of it, only what I needed.

    There is a part of me that would be very pleased if Nancy Pelosi were our next president… but logically is it not satisfactory enough that she could be House Speaker again?

    My first impression is to worry that what turnover I see has caused Congress has become more extreme in both directions.

    Well, to my state, then. I’m not happy the Democrats won control of the state Senate but it has always been a long time coming (let’s see if it sticks this time). Gillibrand won in a landslide, my Representative and both my state legislators ran without Republican party opposition–two completely unopposed, one who is so much of a perennial no-campaign placeholder he ran on the Conservative line only–the Republicans didn’t even bother listing him on their line.

    Governor Cuomo had a strong showing despite perhaps having the most vulnerabilities ever. Was he ever likely to lose? No. But every year the quality of sheep led to the slaughter seems to decrease. This year’s opponent turned me off instantly with his wanting to fire a parole board over one controversial (but correct!) decision he (or more likely, his political ****suckers) did not like. The state Republican party has for too long been beholden to the longstanding chair of the Conservative Party, which used to serve it well in its regional strongholds but also has made it unable to attract credible or even reasonable candidates on either a statewide level or in its weaker districts. It is stagnating badly. Maybe losing the state Senate will wake it up.

    • posted by Matthew on

      That fascist guinea bitch should be deported. She and everyone like her is the reason San Francisco degenerated into a shithole.

      • posted by Jorge on

        Nah, Nancy Pelosi ain’t to blame. It’s all the Republicans who never lived there.

  6. posted by Jorge on

    The only one condemning the president for saying “LGBT” is you. The rest of us don’t condemn or condone someone based on their use of that acronym

    Bu-b-b-b-but I regularly make fun at how the “LGBTs for Trump” flag message was written.

    It is extremely homophobic to lump lesbians and gays in with a bunch of sick, homophobic, self-mutilating freaks

    I do not believe any of the identity groups you identify with are immune to like criticism.

    I am simply saying that he would be appalled by what the Republican Party has become, and I think that I’m right about that.

    The party, as presently constituted often — more often than not, in fact — stands in stark opposition to the principled, pragmatic libertarian, conservatism that President Reagan exhibited during his time as Governor of California and as President.

    President Reagan would have nothing to do with the present party — relentless attacks on the rule of law; rejection of objective truth as a standard for governance; defiling the military, the intelligence agencies and the FBI; catering to dictators and authoritarian tyrants; systematically dividing the American people; constant scapegoating; race-baiting that no longer can be hidden behind dog-whistles; betrayal of long-standing alliances for no good reason; and all the rest.

    I find that view nothing short of astonishing coming from any semi-politically aware gay person.

    Now, mind you, I know nothing about Ronald Reagan conducted himself in any of his primaries. But if Reagan didn’t aid and abet the homophobia that the religious right publicized in the 1980s and 90s, he certainly seems to have aided the religious right itself. And I’m not talking about trading political goals the way Trump does, I mean he gave them moral credibility.

    And I don’t think they used it well.

    You want to know why the Republican party is the way it is today? Ronald Reagan made that monster.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      But if Reagan didn’t aid and abet the homophobia that the religious right publicized in the 1980s and 90s, he certainly seems to have aided the religious right itself. And I’m not talking about trading political goals the way Trump does, I mean he gave them moral credibility.

      Yes, he did. President Reagan (working with Roger Ailes) courted the”Religious Right”/”Moral Majority”, and that decision was a cynical political accommodation on both sides, in my opinion. I’ve written about that issue many, many times over the years, usually citing the article I just linked.

      President Reagan gets no points for inviting the “Religious Right”/”Moral Majority” into the party. His decision to do so was the reason that I left the Republican Party and never returned, and I’ve said that many times, too.

      Your astonishment is misplaced. I am well aware of that tawdry chapter in the party’s history.

      However, if you look at what I actually wrote, you might notice that I didn’t include President Trump’s pandering to conservative Christians on my list of things that President Reagan would be appalled about:

      President Reagan would have nothing to do with the present party — relentless attacks on the rule of law; rejection of objective truth as a standard for governance; defiling the military, the intelligence agencies and the FBI; catering to dictators and authoritarian tyrants; systematically dividing the American people; constant scapegoating; race-baiting that no longer can be hidden behind dog-whistles; betrayal of long-standing alliances for no good reason; and all the rest.

      The reason I didn’t include President Trump’s shameless pandering to conservative Christians as something President Reagan would be appalled about is that President Reagan wouldn’t be appalled about it.

      Barry Goldwater was appalled, and warned the party many times about where President Reagan’s pandering to conservative Christians would take the party, but President Reagan would not be appalled by President Trump’s shameless pandering to conservative Christians because he was the father of that particular Republican love child.

      You want to know why the Republican party is the way it is today? Ronald Reagan made that monster.

      I think that it is fair to say that President Reagan was largely responsible for creating the Republican Party as it existed in January 2016. Up until that time, it was the rare Republican candidate who could speak for more than five minutes without invoking His Holy Name of Sacred Memory. The voodoo economics, the shameless pandering to conservative Christians, the tacit homophobia that became explicit in the Bush/Rove years, and so much else, are all part of President Reagan’s legacy.

      But you are wrong to say that “Ronald Reagan made that monster.

      The monster that is now the Republican Party, the monster from which so many Reagan Republicans have fled in the last year or so, began in the shitstorm of the 2016 primaries, when He (and He Alone, as he is fond of saying) swept through the Republican establishment like the Grim Reaper at Flanders Field.

      I repeat, because I’m right: President Reagan would be appalled at the current state of his beloved Republican Party. And for good reason.

      • posted by Jorge on

        I have a very hard time understanding what distinguishes the Falwell/Dobson/Franklin Graham segment of the Christian right (and a considerable portion to the left of them) from maybe 60% of what you mentioned–especially in ethics.

        Only appearance. When you get down to substance, well, again, I don’t know what Reagan’s primary instincts are. I don’t know what would happen should Ronald Reagan lose an intra-party battle. It is said he championed a big tent. Why would he begrudge a certain segment of the party prevailing over another? Why would he be unhappy with Trump and not Bush, who are merely two very different sides of the same coin?

        I’m not buying it.

        • posted by JohnInCA on

          Look at the Bush’s vs. Trump.

          Makes a point of avoiding blaming Islam for 9/11. Lied about Muslims cheering after 9/11.

          Respected and supported the military and intelligence agencies. Actively attacks them.

          Has a cordial working relationship with other Republicans. Makes attacking other Republicans a weekly feature.

          The Bushs were very much in the “party of Reagan”. Trump is very much not.

          • posted by Matthew on

            That’s rich coming from someone who hated their guts when they were in power.

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            I’m curious on what basis you’re making that claim.

          • posted by Matthew on

            “Makes a point of avoiding blaming Islam for 9/11. Lied about Muslims cheering after 9/11.”

            That was not a lie. Multiple news sources reported it, including the same ones Trump is doing battle with as we speak.

            Based on every stale piece of NPC propaganda spewed at gay conservatives, Republicans, and libertarians (both small-l and Large-L) since as far back as I first came here in the early 2000s; I think it was before 9/11. And also based on every post-9/11 attack on George W. Bush, the GOP, the United States, its allies, and Western Civilization itself.

            “Respected and supported the military and intelligence agencies. Actively attacks them.”

            Would you prefer he pardon transcult traitors like Oscumba did or force his AG to vacate the successful Log Cabin Republicans lawsuit against DADT that was filed under Bush to begin with as Oscumba also did?

            “The Bushs were very much in the “party of Reagan”. Trump is very much not.”

            Bush’s domestic discretionary spending increases unrelated to the War on Terrorism suggest otherwise. The bailouts of 2008 were more in line with, believe it or not, Jimmy Carter who did the same for Chrysler during the 1970s.

            Reagan was part of the media all the years he was in Hollywood. He knew all their tricks, and that differentiated him from his successors. Bill Clinton had the skills (and low morals) to succeed in Hollywood, he just chose to apply those to politics instead.

          • posted by JohnInCA on

            That’s a non-sequitur.

            You made a very specific claim that I “hated their guts”. On what basis are you making that claim?

      • posted by Matthew on

        Slaveocrats enable radical Islamic fascist terrorism, making all your talk about Reagan “pandering to conservative Christians” ring hollow. Trannies and camel fuckers are the biggest threats to the safety and liberty of gay people and Jews worldwide, and the Slaveocrats are responsible for that state of affairs.

        The Regressive Left is always accusing the Right of what they and they alone are doing.

    • posted by Tom Scharbach on

      Why would he be unhappy with Trump and not Bush, who are merely two very different sides of the same coin?

      Again, look at the list:

      President Reagan would have nothing to do with the present party — relentless attacks on the rule of law; rejection of objective truth as a standard for governance; defiling the military, the intelligence agencies and the FBI; catering to dictators and authoritarian tyrants; systematically dividing the American people; constant scapegoating; race-baiting that no longer can be hidden behind dog-whistles; betrayal of long-standing alliances for no good reason; and all the rest.

      Do you seriously think that Bush I or Bush II relentless attacked the rule of law? Or rejected objective facts as the basis for governance? Or defiled the military, the intelligence community or the FBI? Fawned over dictators and tyrants like Trump does? Or systematically set our to divide the American public, scapegoating those who disagreed? Or race-baited as openly as Trump? Or worked to destroy NATO and our other longstanding alliances?

      I’m not buying it.

      Clearly. But I think that you are dead wrong. And so we disagree. I thiink that Reagan and the two Bushes were decent men. I don’t think that of Trump.

      • posted by Matthew on

        ” Fawned over dictators and tyrants like Trump does?”

        You mean the way Slaveocrats and especially Buycrack Oscumba kiss the asses of a bunch of racist sexist antisemitic homophobic camel fuckers at the expense of gay and Jewish lives?

    • posted by Matthew on

      A lot of those Religious Wrong types supported Jimmy Carter in 1976 and had an extreme case of buyer’s remorse. So did a lot of people if Ted Kennedy was seen as a credible primary challenger in 1980.

      Meanwhile, Ronald Reagan played a part in helping get Prop 6, which would have banned gay teachers in schools, defeated in 1978.

    • posted by Matthew on

      The modern-day GOP is not a monster. It is a knight in shining armor whose purpose is to slay the Slaveocrat monster. The Slaveocrat Party was a hate group upon its inception, it was a hate group when it committed a four-year terrorist treason to tear the country in two to own black people as slaves, it was a hate group when FDR banned cannabis and decided interning Japanese-Americans was more important than saving the lives of European Jews and homosexuals, and it is an even bigger hate group now that it is at the forefront of pushing Islam, Communism, and transcultism on the United States at the expense of gays, Jews, and women.

    • posted by JohnInCA on

      Bu-b-b-b-but I regularly make fun at how the “LGBTs for Trump” flag message was written.

      Okay.

      Do you, like Matthew, claim that someone’s use of “LGBT” is sufficient criteria to identify them as a bigot? I know it’s a low bar, but that’s the one that Matt has set.

      • posted by Matthew on

        The organization was called “Gays For Trump,” and its founder just lost in NC to a heterosexual gentile black man who just happened to belong to the Slaveocrat Party, so don’t lecture me about racism when heterosexual privilege trumps all.

      • posted by Jorge on

        No. I have different low bars for milder reactions.

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