If I’m convinced of anything after seventeen some elections, three wins, 14 losses, it is this: Its more important to campaign on what you believe and risk defeat than it is to win at all costs and through dishonesty.
The counter argument to this is persuasive but ultimately a siren song. Those who win, legislate. Or, stated more baldly, lie and you get to make the rules. This has become the modus-operandi of Republican hacks. I have been a casualty of this operation. Moderates were decried as RINO’s. Republicans in name only and purged in primary campaigns with ease. The people flocking to remove them and vote for more pure ideologues didn’t even care if a Democrat would ultimately win in a seat that might be open to a moderate Republican. Their cause was to make life impossible for anyone other than a Republican fire eater. The Result? Donald Trump – long time liberal, libertine and liar who championed extreme Republican positions and brushed aside 19 other candidates who did not want to alienate the larger population of voters. His fake authenticity prevailed. A lot of Americans still like the taste of his vinegar.
The other part of the Republican playbook has been to subvert democracy itself. The Southern Democrat wing that now rules the Republican Party prevented black voters from casting ballots with impunity until the 1965 Voting Rights act. Republicans were eager to change the Supreme Court so that new justices would throw out all the limitations on perverting elections by discouraging voters. Today, in the Palm Beach newspaper I read about Florida Republicans latest efforts to stave off defeat even at the cost of fair elections. It begins:
At first glance, the idea seems reasonable, especially in a state as sprawling and dependent on the automobile as Florida: Require that early-voting sites have adequate places to park.
But then you realize that those pushing it are the same Republican gang in Tallahassee that has spent years looking for ways to suppress the votes of black and brown people, poor people and young people — groups who don’t tend to generate majorities for Republicans.
It begs the question. Does the Republican Party really believe in anything other than winning in perpetuity by depriving a majority of voters their say? Its no wonder why they hate calling Democrats “democratic.” They are jealous.
