The GOP’s declaration of moral bankruptcy

[Mikey]

“How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.

“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

That famous exchange from Ernest Hemingway’s novel “The Sun Also Rises” comes to mind when contemplating the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the Republican Party.

You can debate when the GOP’s road to ruin began. I believe it was more than a half century ago, when Barry Goldwater and Richard Nixon showed their willingness to pander to racists to wrest the segregationist South from the Democrats. The party’s descent accelerated with the emergence of Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich and Fox News in the 1990s, of Sarah Palin in the 2000s, and of Ted Cruz and the tea party in the 2010s. There were still figures of integrity and decency such as John McCain, Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush. But the GOP evinced no more enthusiasm for any of them than it had for George H.W. Bush. With the election of Donald Trump in 2016, the party’s plunge into purgatory picked up momentum.

Republicans now found themselves making excuses for a boorish, ignorant demagogue who had no respect for the fundamental norms of democracy and no adherence to conservative principles. The party of fiscal conservatism excused a profligate president who added $2 trillion in debt and counting. The party of family values became cheerleaders for what Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg has witheringly and accurately called the “porn star presidency.” The party of law and order became accomplices to the president’s obstruction of justice. The party of free trade did nothing to stop the president from launching trade wars. The party of moral clarity barely uttered a peep at the president’s sickening sycophancy toward the worst dictators on the planet — or his equally nauseating attacks on America’s closest allies. The party that once championed immigration eagerly joined in the president’s xenophobic attacks on refugee caravans. And the party that long castigated Democrats for dividing Americans by race pretended not to notice — or even cheered — when the president made openly racist appeals to white voters.

Faster and faster went the GOP’s descent into oblivion. Now its bankruptcy is complete. It has no more moral capital left. The Republican Party as we once knew it — as a party of limited government — officially ended on March 14.

That was the day that 41 of 53 Republican senators voted to ratify President Trump’s blatantly unconstitutional and transparently cynical declaration of a national emergency so that he can spend money for a border wall that Congress refuses to appropriate. This comes 16 days after 182 out of 195 House Republicans voted the same way. Only 13 Republicans in the House and 12 in the Senate dared to block this flagrant assault on the Constitution. So only 10 percent of Republicans in Congress have any — any — principles left. By an interesting coincidence, that’s also the percentage of Republican voters who disapprove of Trump. The party of Lincoln — the party that freed the slaves and helped to win the Cold War — is now devoted exclusively to feeding Trump’s insatiable ego and pandering to his endless lust for power.

And to think that some commentators hailed the Senate’s abysmal failure to muster a veto-proof majority as a victory for principle because, why, 12 whole Republicans dared to defy their supreme leader. There were indeed some pleasant surprises in that list, such as Roy Blunt (Mo.), a member of the Senate leadership, and Roger Wicker (Miss.), who typically votes with robotic predictability for whatever Trump desires.

But only one Republican who is up for reelection next year — Susan Collins (Maine) — had the guts to defy the president. Other senators stared into the abyss and blinked. Ben Sasse (Neb.), who prides himself on his devotion to the Constitution and his independence from Trump, was among the sellouts. No one should take his claims to be a serious person seriously ever again. So too supposed constitutional conservatives such as Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), Charles E. Grassley (Iowa), Cory Gardner (Colo.) and John Cornyn (Tex.) revealed themselves to be rank hypocrites and craven partisans. We ask soldiers to risk their lives to defend the Constitution, but these cowards would not even risk their political careers.

Cruz (Tex.) was a particularly choice study in situational ethics. He thundered in 2014 that “it’s incumbent on Republicans in Congress to use every single tool we have to defend the rule of law, to rein in the president, so that the president does not become an unaccountable monarch imposing his policies.” But his devotion to the rule of law ended with the Obama presidency.

Somehow Thom Tillis (N.C.) managed the difficult feat of making himself even more ridiculous than Cruz. As recently as March 5, he proclaimed his intention to vote against the state of emergency. “It’s never a tough vote for me,” he said, “when I’m standing on principle.” Turns out reelection mattered more to him than any principle. Facing threats of a primary challenge next year, he folded like an accordion.

Trump won’t be president forever — he could be gone in less than two years. The GOP can always find a new leader. But where will it find new principles? Because it has none of the old ones left.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... 3dc6001963

[Mikey]

But...but...but...Hillaryyyyyy!!!!
AOC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Joe in PB]

The party doing the most damage to the country are the Democrats, and it's not even close.

Joe in PB Post

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

[Sirfindafold]

Looks like little mikey got dog-whistled again this morning.

[Left Seater]

Both Parties are full of a-holes and self serving hypocrites.

We all just tolerate one more than the other because it fits better with the one issue or couple of issues that matter more to us.

[Mikey]

The party doing the most damage to the country are the Democrats, and it's not even close.

Funny how that works, seeing as how they have basically no power to do anything while your Dear Leader remains on his throne, and his minions in the Senate have no problem letting him do end runs around the Constitution.

[Mikey]

Looks like little mikey got dog-whistled again this morning.

Looks like Sirfindatake got ass-raped again this morning.

[Joe in PB]

The party doing the most damage to the country are the Democrats, and it's not even close.

Funny how that works, seeing as how they have basically no power to do anything while your Dear Leader remains on his throne and his minions in the Senate have no problem letting do end runs around the Constitution.

What I see happening in California and in major cities is their plan for the country. Not enforcing illegal immigration, green lighting non citizens for voting, and enabling heroin use.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

[Joe in PB]

Both Parties are full of a-holes and self serving hypocrites.

We all just tolerate one more than the other because it fits better with the one issue or couple of issues that matter more to us.

I agree with this, both parties have sell outs. What scares me is if or when the Democrats get a national super majority, they'll run the country down like they're doing California.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

[Goober McTuber]

Both Parties are full of a-holes and self serving hypocrites.

We all just tolerate one more than the other because it fits better with the one issue or couple of issues that matter more to us.

I agree with this, both parties have sell outs. What scares me is if or when the Democrats get a national super majority, they'll run the country down like they're doing California.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tardtalk

You're assuming that democrats in other states are as fucked in the head as Cali dems. I believe there's enough moderate democrats to prevent the Californication of the United States.

[Mikey]

You're assuming that democrats in other states are as fucked in the head as Cali dems. I believe there's enough moderate democrats to prevent the Californication of the United States.

None of that's going to matter at all if Joe and his cohort of brain dead fondlers of orange haired scrotum keep allowing the nation to be sucked down the Trump rabbit hole.

[Joe in PB]

You're assuming that democrats in other states are as fucked in the head as Cali dems. I believe there's enough moderate democrats to prevent the Californication of the United States.

None of that's going to matter at all if Joe and his cohort of brain dead fondlers of orange haired scrotum keep allowing the nation to be sucked down the Trump rabbit hole.

If Trump has done something that is impeachable, then go at it.

When I think brain dead followers it's Democrats. We've seen not enforcing illegal immigration elsewhere in the country, like Chicago. We've also seen a push elsewhere to give non citizens the right to vote. Sure I voice my displeasure, what I don't get is how anyone can justify or defend these things as being in the best interest of the country.

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[BSmack]

You're assuming that democrats in other states are as fucked in the head as Cali dems. I believe there's enough moderate democrats to prevent the Californication of the United States.

None of that's going to matter at all if Joe and his cohort of brain dead fondlers of orange haired scrotum keep allowing the nation to be sucked down the Trump rabbit hole.

If Trump has done something that is impeachable, then go at it.

When I think brain dead followers it's Democrats. We've seen not enforcing illegal immigration elsewhere in the country, like Chicago. We've also seen a push elsewhere to give non citizens the right to vote. Sure I voice my displeasure, what I don't get is how anyone can justify or defend these things as being in the best interest of the country.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

Joe's posts read like the same mad lib over and over again.

"Whenever I think of bad shit I think of Democrats."

[Joe in PB]

Joe's posts read like the same mad lib over and over again.

The stuff I listed is bad imo. I call it like I see it. Brian you ignore party BS.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk[/quote]

[Left Seater]

You're assuming that democrats in other states are as fucked in the head as Cali dems. I believe there's enough moderate democrats to prevent the Californication of the United States.

Would that be like Beto? Dude and the media is calling him a moderate Democrat. But dude is all about himself and is no different than any other fat cat politician. Dudes Father In Law bankrolled him on the El Paso city council. Beto then turned around and spearheaded the approval of a new development. No surprise the developer was his father in law. Got a bunch of low income types and illegals kicked out of their living quarters.

This is the same guy who said he wouldn’t take big oil money donations over $200. And then accepted their money.

[Goober McTuber]

I never mentioned Beto, but I respect your obsession. Being a hypocrite cuts across the entire political spectrum. Tell me you knew.

As to whether he is a moderate Democrat, this is from the Great Oracle:

Political analysts classify O'Rourke as a progressive, liberal, or centrist. During his time in Congress, O'Rourke was a member of the New Democrat Coalition, a pro-business member organization. National Journal gave O'Rourke a composite ideology of 85 percent liberal and 15 percent conservative in 2013. Describing himself, O'Rourke has said that he does not know where he falls on the political spectrum. He has sponsored bipartisan bills as well as broken with his party on issues like trade.

GovTrack placed O'Rourke near the ideological center of the Democratic Party; the American Civil Liberties Union gave him an 88 percent rating, while the United States Chamber of Commerce, a more conservative group, gave him a 47 percent rating. According to FiveThirtyEight, which tracks Congressional voting records, O'Rourke voted in line with Donald Trump 30.1 percent of the time during the 115th Congress.

Allegheny College bestowed the 2018 Prize for Civility in Public Life to O'Rourke together with Will Hurd, a Texas Republican. In March 2017, facing snowstorm induced flight cancellations O'Rourke and Hurd, both stuck in San Antonio, needed to get back to Washington for a House vote. They rented a car and embarked on a 1,600 mi (2,600 km) drive that they captured on Facebook Live. O'Rourke and Hurd have worked collaboratively on legislation since the road trip.

[Left Seater]

Well he’s the new guy. Same as the previous ones it would appear.

[Left Seater]

As for Moral Bankruptcy we could easily say the GOP is just catching up with the Democratic Party.

Any discussion of morality and the Democratic Party ends with the authorized killing of life that is viable outside of the mother. Period. Full Stop.

[Diego in Seattle]

We've seen not enforcing illegal immigration elsewhere in the country, like Chicago Mar-A-Lago.

[Diego in Seattle]

The party doing the most damage to the country are the Democrats, and it's not even close.

Funny how that works, seeing as how they have basically no power to do anything while your Dear Leader remains on his throne and his minions in the Senate have no problem letting do end runs around the Constitution.

What I see happening in California and in major cities is their plan for the country. Not enforcing illegal immigration, green lighting non citizens for voting, and enabling heroin use.

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

Yes, we'd like to have the whole country operate with a huge surplus.

[Goober McTuber]

As for Moral Bankruptcy we could easily say the GOP is just catching up with the Democratic Party.

Any discussion of morality and the Democratic Party ends with the authorized killing of life that is viable outside of the mother. Period. Full Stop.

Back to abortion again? Fuck off.

[Diego in Seattle]

As for Moral Bankruptcy we could easily say the GOP is just catching up with the Democratic Party.

Any discussion of morality and the Democratic Party ends with the authorized killing of life that is viable outside of the mother. Period. Full Stop.

The Trump administration kept spreadsheets on how far along pregnant immigrant women were (but nothing about their health).

But they have no idea what they did with the thousands of children that they took away from their parents.

Save your "Pro-Life" bullshit!

[Left Seater]

Save your "Pro-Life" bullshit!

Right so the GOP is catching up to the Democratic Party.

Reading and Comprehension aren’t your strong points, eh?

[Goober McTuber]

Save your "Pro-Life" bullshit!

Right so the GOP is catching up to the Democratic Party.

So the GOP will now be supporting a woman's right to abortion?

[Derron]

What scares me is if or when the Democrats get a national super majority, they'll run the country down like they're doing California.

Oregon and Washington both have super majority Legislatures. The fucking Demorats are trying to pass all kinds of tax increases, bills to ban guns of all kinds, and failing to address the 26 billion dollar unfunded liability in the Oregon PERS system. They will ruin this state. They are trying to increase property taxes by over 35% in change over to real market value versus assessed value. With no plan on how to determine RMV. They are all ready well on their way to ass fucking this country.

[Derron]

“How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.

“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

That famous exchange from Ernest Hemingway’s novel “The Sun Also Rises” comes to mind when contemplating the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the Republican Party.

You can debate when the GOP’s road to ruin began. I believe it was more than a half century ago, when Barry Goldwater and Richard Nixon showed their willingness to pander to racists to wrest the segregationist South from the Democrats. The party’s descent accelerated with the emergence of Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich and Fox News in the 1990s, of Sarah Palin in the 2000s, and of Ted Cruz and the tea party in the 2010s. There were still figures of integrity and decency such as John McCain, Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush. But the GOP evinced no more enthusiasm for any of them than it had for George H.W. Bush. With the election of Donald Trump in 2016, the party’s plunge into purgatory picked up momentum.

Republicans now found themselves making excuses for a boorish, ignorant demagogue who had no respect for the fundamental norms of democracy and no adherence to conservative principles. The party of fiscal conservatism excused a profligate president who added $2 trillion in debt and counting. The party of family values became cheerleaders for what Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg has witheringly and accurately called the “porn star presidency.” The party of law and order became accomplices to the president’s obstruction of justice. The party of free trade did nothing to stop the president from launching trade wars. The party of moral clarity barely uttered a peep at the president’s sickening sycophancy toward the worst dictators on the planet — or his equally nauseating attacks on America’s closest allies. The party that once championed immigration eagerly joined in the president’s xenophobic attacks on refugee caravans. And the party that long castigated Democrats for dividing Americans by race pretended not to notice — or even cheered — when the president made openly racist appeals to white voters.

Faster and faster went the GOP’s descent into oblivion. Now its bankruptcy is complete. It has no more moral capital left. The Republican Party as we once knew it — as a party of limited government — officially ended on March 14.

That was the day that 41 of 53 Republican senators voted to ratify President Trump’s blatantly unconstitutional and transparently cynical declaration of a national emergency so that he can spend money for a border wall that Congress refuses to appropriate. This comes 16 days after 182 out of 195 House Republicans voted the same way. Only 13 Republicans in the House and 12 in the Senate dared to block this flagrant assault on the Constitution. So only 10 percent of Republicans in Congress have any — any — principles left. By an interesting coincidence, that’s also the percentage of Republican voters who disapprove of Trump. The party of Lincoln — the party that freed the slaves and helped to win the Cold War — is now devoted exclusively to feeding Trump’s insatiable ego and pandering to his endless lust for power.

And to think that some commentators hailed the Senate’s abysmal failure to muster a veto-proof majority as a victory for principle because, why, 12 whole Republicans dared to defy their supreme leader. There were indeed some pleasant surprises in that list, such as Roy Blunt (Mo.), a member of the Senate leadership, and Roger Wicker (Miss.), who typically votes with robotic predictability for whatever Trump desires.

But only one Republican who is up for reelection next year — Susan Collins (Maine) — had the guts to defy the president. Other senators stared into the abyss and blinked. Ben Sasse (Neb.), who prides himself on his devotion to the Constitution and his independence from Trump, was among the sellouts. No one should take his claims to be a serious person seriously ever again. So too supposed constitutional conservatives such as Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), Charles E. Grassley (Iowa), Cory Gardner (Colo.) and John Cornyn (Tex.) revealed themselves to be rank hypocrites and craven partisans. We ask soldiers to risk their lives to defend the Constitution, but these cowards would not even risk their political careers.

Cruz (Tex.) was a particularly choice study in situational ethics. He thundered in 2014 that “it’s incumbent on Republicans in Congress to use every single tool we have to defend the rule of law, to rein in the president, so that the president does not become an unaccountable monarch imposing his policies.” But his devotion to the rule of law ended with the Obama presidency.

Somehow Thom Tillis (N.C.) managed the difficult feat of making himself even more ridiculous than Cruz. As recently as March 5, he proclaimed his intention to vote against the state of emergency. “It’s never a tough vote for me,” he said, “when I’m standing on principle.” Turns out reelection mattered more to him than any principle. Facing threats of a primary challenge next year, he folded like an accordion.

Trump won’t be president forever — he could be gone in less than two years. The GOP can always find a new leader. But where will it find new principles? Because it has none of the old ones left.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... 3dc6001963

Nice cut and paste there Goober. Good to see you back in the saddle again.

[Left Seater]

Save your "Pro-Life" bullshit!

Right so the GOP is catching up to the Democratic Party.

So the GOP will now be supporting a woman's right to abortion?

Negative. Read my previous post. The GOP is catching up on the moral bankruptcy of the Democratic Party. Abortion long ago sealed the moral bankruptcy of the Democratic Party.

[FiatLux]

Nobody cares.

I'm surrounded by retards.

[Softball Bat]

RACK Mikey's post!

The GOP couldn't be more pathetic.

[Goober McTuber]

RACK Mikey's post!

The GOP couldn't be more pathetic.

When you get time, could you read it to ADHDohron?

[Goober McTuber]

Abortion long ago sealed the moral bankruptcy of the Democratic Party.

You're funny.

[Mikey]

Funny how none of the knuckledraggers have addressed any of was actually discussed in the article.

Just...
Democrats!!!!
Beto!!!
Aaabbooorrrtionnnnnnn!!!!!!!!!!!

[Left Seater]

Oh, you think it was earlier? Maybe the refusal for years to denounce the KKK? Ehh, you may be correct.

[Left Seater]

Why? I have conceded the point. Just making sure you Libs understand there isn’t any morality on either side.