The Future of the Republican Party

The Republicans who want to beat Trump by as much as possible

And that leads us to the party itself. The need for an entirely new party grows in direct proportion to the strength of the argument that he is unfit. “The reality is that the vast majority of Republican leaders are putting party ahead of principle and putting power over the interests of their own country. And that’s the challenge that we have going forward,” said independent conservative candidate Evan McMullin on ABC’s “This Week.” “That’s the challenge that this country has. That’s the challenge that the Republican Party will have. And that’s the challenge that the conservative movement has, which is why Mindy and I are calling for a new conservative movement in this country.” Put differently, as Republicans show there is literally nothing Trump could do that would force them to disown him, they make the case again and again that the party stands only for its own survival, not for any ideals or policies. It makes it crystal clear that it is willing to insult and stereotype minorities if it means it gets the White House.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2016/10/24/republicans-for-beating-trump-by-as-much-as-possible/?utm_term=.51aa81e44cf4

I.B. Fine wrote:...or could it be leadership of both parties is corrupt?
Party over country is nothing new, we're seeing individual gain/greed over party, over country-in both parties.
maybe...

What the Hell Happened to My Republican Party? The party of principled conservatism, of promoting freedom at home and abroad, has become a party of conspiracy-mongering, authoritarianism, and white power.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/10/18/trump-presidential-election-gop-values-republican-party-conservative-principles/

As a confirmed #NeverTrump conservative from day one, I should be ecstatic at the way Donald Trump’s campaign has cratered since the Oct. 7 revelation of an audiotape in which he boasted of groping women. Numerous women have now come forward to testify that this was not, as the Republican nominee claimed in the second presidential debate, an empty boast. The Real Clear Politics average has Hillary Clinton seven points ahead nationally in a two-way race; a landslide is becoming increasingly likely.

And yet, although I’m relieved that Trump is unlikely to be our next president, I remain profoundly disturbed and depressed that so many of my fellow Republicans continue to back him despite the growing evidence of his degeneracy and lunacy. Their position in the campaign’s waning days — sitting on the Trump Train as it hurtles toward the precipice — bodes ill for the future of the Republican Party.

And yet as surprising as this all has been, it’s also the natural outgrowth of 30 years of Republican pandering to the lowest common denominator in American politics. Trump is what happens when a political party abandons ideas, demonizes intellectuals, degrades politics and simply pursues power for the sake of power.

Ideally, I’d like to see an intellectual revival on the right such as we saw after the Goldwater defeat and the Watergate debacle. Freed from the stultifying strictures and kowtowing to know-nothing Trumpian populists—perhaps building on new outlets and institutions that celebrate intellectual rigor and reject shallow sound bites—a few conservative thinkers can plow a path toward sane, responsible conservative governance, just as people like Irving Kristol and Jack Kemp did during the Carter years. (Some conservative thinkers, such as the Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin, speculate that Mitt Romney may emerge as the leader of a sane, modern, technocratic wing of an intellectually revitalized GOP.) If a leader doesn’t emerge, moderate Republicans—many of whom did not and will not support Trump—could be lost to the Democratic Party for good.

If the Republican Party and the conservative movement abandon populism, mindless appeals to the electorate’s lowest common denominator, and the pursuit of power for the sake of power and instead pursue a fully formed policy agenda based on solid analysis and research, then I don’t think it will take very long for a Republican revival. If it takes a Trump debacle to make that happen, it will have been worth it.

DWags wrote:Hilliary is what happens when a political party doesn't evolve.

Turtleneck wrote:

DWags wrote:Hilliary is what happens when a political party doesn't evolve.

While that is true and disappointing, it not nearly as dangerous as what Republicans have embraced. They have surprisingly given into Trump's agenda, and at least in public, are not as divided as they once appeared.

It won’t be like John Tyler and Andrew Johnson. It will probably be worse.

President Trump has been feuding, verbally and publicly, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Establishment types like Sean Spicer and Reince Priebus have vacated the White House. This has led to questions about whether a major and durable rift between Trump and the party is coming. Although presidents and their congressional parties frequently experience tension, even during periods of unified government, we have very few examples of presidents who really broke away.

The two comparisons that have surfaced are John Tyler and Andrew Johnson, both of whom governed as presidents without parties. Jonathan Bernstein has written about how these examples illustrate the potential pitfalls of independent presidential leadership and give a sense of what we might expect if Trump goes that route.

But the Tyler and Johnson comparisons are limited. If Trump breaks away from his party, his presidency won’t be like those. It’s likely to be something much worse. Several factors distinguish Trump from these earlier cases, and add up to a clear distinction: Tyler and Johnson were untethered from their parties because of divisions within those parties. They were chosen as running mates for their coalition-building potential, not because they ran against their parties in the first place. And both, unlike Trump, were professional politicians with distinct, if questionable, sensibilities on policy.