Osodecentx said:
whiterock said:
RMF5630 said:
Mothra said:
whiterock said:
Mothra said:
J.R. said:
Mothra said:
Oldbear83There are two ways to guarantee we lose the White House in 2024:
1. Bank everything on supporting Trump
2. Alienate Trump supporters with endless attacks on Trump
Exactly right. I've been saying it for years, but the party can be a bigger tent. The old school Repubs and neocons have much more in common with MAGA than they do with the Dems, and there is room for populism and pugilism in the party. As much as they despise Trump, he has expanded the base, brought in conservative blue collar workers, and a Hispanic element to the voting block that really didn't exist before. If the MAGAs and Trump sycophants could let go of their absurd devotion to Trump, and embrace DeSantis, that is someone we could all get behind.
The Dems have absolutely nothing to offer the American people. They've gone completely woke to the point of absurdity. They have alienated moderates and blue dog democrats with their policies. They have literally done nothing right for the last year and a half. Every policy has been a disaster. There is no reason the next election should not be ripe for the taking, if they choose the right candidate (not Trump).I
I disagree on the old school republicans (which I basically am) and commonality with MAGA. Us, old school republicans have ZERO in common with the MAGA crazies!
A few things...
You have advised us that you are socially liberal. That is not an old school Republican. Reagan, Bush I, Bush II, etc. - none were socially liberal.
You are wrong that MAGA has nothing in common with Republicans. Regardless of what you think about MAGA, fiscally you share much more in common with MAGA than today's Democrat party. They also share a lot more in common with old school Republicans (not you) on social policy.
MAGA 25-35% of the GOP base, and has always been around.
JR is just embarrassed to have to caucus with them.
Democrats tend to be able to put such vanities aside and work together. But moderate Republicans? Ironically, they can be some of the least pragmatic people on the planet, when it comes to compromising within their own team.
Yup. If this board is any indication, the Never Trumpers would rather see the house burn to the ground than cast a vote for pragmatism and the lesser of the evils.
Conservatives can be a strange lot.
This is what scares me the most. The "Nero Effect", Trump will fiddle as the GOP burns.
Does that really stand the reason? Does the man not benefit from a robust GOP? Is he not harmed by a divided, weakened GOP? Has he not powerful incentive to heal and build the party stronger? Yeah, he took some shots at McConnell. Justified. McConnell is the bigger part of the failure to take the Senate, yet blamed others. But note that Trump supported McCarthy for speaker last week, stifling some of the more vocal Maga-heads to avoid a forlorn hope challenge that would only have divided a narrow majority. Trump can and does "play ball."
Trump wants your money. You sent him $100 million and he spent less than 10 on his candidates.
Just to recap, Trump recruits 5 losing candidates for the US Senate and that's McConnell;ll's fault? McConnell raises and spends more than $250 million trying to drag the Dear Leader's recruits across the finish line & and they were bad candidates, but that is McConn ell's fault?
When do you take ownership? (I know Trump won't, but you'll believe him until he loses in 2024)
Yet again we see the neverTrumper rule change to fit their needs. Trump was/is running for president, in what will be a billion dollar campaign. ALL candidates do what he did....raise money during campaign season. How much money did DeSantis donate? How much money was donated by Pence, or Pompeo, or Haley, etc....? How many candidates preparing to run for office have given away substantial portions of their campaign funds to support other candidates? (not many). That he gave away millions should be to his credit, not his deficit. The idea that it was his responsibility to fund GOP candidates in 9 hotly contested Senate races and an equal number of Gov races is amusingly preposterous.
Same for history. He did not "recruit" any candidates." He did what any responsible leader should do - let primaries run for a bit until it was clear which candidate appeared to be the strongest, and then he endorsed to clear the field. (Just as he did with DeSantis and others. Just as Obama did with Biden). He in fact received at that time some criticism for jumping in front of the band....waiting to pick obvious winners rather than a more principled approach. (again, the ever-so convenient neverTrumper double standard....) The overall record of Turmp's endorsements is highly impressive - and include many now being proposed as better alternatives, to include DeSantis and Youngkin. But rather than drone on, I'l quote Spectator, who summed up the duplicity of the neverTrumper narrative quite nicely:
"
The official narrative of the election is meant to drive the right to suicide. Democrats, NeverTrump ex-Republicans, and critics of the populist right who remain in the GOP have all blamed Trump voters for the party's failure to take the Senate and claim a commanding margin in the House. Donald Trump himself was not on the ballot, but he made endorsements, and voters who followed those endorsements chose weak candidates, the story goes.
The anti-right narrative is a remarkable thing: when a candidate Trump supported lost, like Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania, it was Trump's fault; when a candidate Trump opposed lost, like Joe O'Dea in Colorado, it was Trump's fault. When a candidate Trump supported won, such as J.D. Vance in Ohio, pundits discounted the victory; when a candidate Trump opposed won, such as Brian Kemp in Georgia, the same pundits found it enormously significant. Ron DeSantis's nearly 20-point margin of victory in Florida, a big win for the right, was mostly hyped as a defeat for Trump, even though Florida is Trump's home base." (and to that I would add, even though DeSantis was EXACTLY the kind of candidate Trump is now being criticized for endorsing.)
We have to fix the problems. The REAL problems. Official RNC narrative is, as sombear has noted, "we hit all our metrics." If so, and we lost, doesn't that indicate a flawed plan by the RNC? If we accept the narrative that Trump alone is responsible for last Tuesday, in the face of a mountain of evidence to the contrary, then the real problems slumber on into 2024 to encumber whoever the nominee might be. So, again, we see that one of the bigger parts of the "problem" are the neverTrumpers, who will scorch their own underwear to destroy the object of their rage, engaging in precisely the kind of behavior they claim renders others unfit, while the party drifts further and further behind Democrat GOTV efforts under newer/looser election laws. The Democrats got a slobbering imbecilic Bernie-bro elected in PA, while we failed to get Paul Laxalt, a former statewide elected offiicial in NV who is the son of TWO former GOP Senators and grandson of another GOP Senator who was the best friend of one Ronald Wilson Reagan. And we have people telling us Trump is responsible.
Such is beyond unserious.
