Tom Nichols: Why I'm Leaving the Republican Party

[Miles Archer]

Why I’m Leaving the Republican Party
The Kavanaugh confirmation fight revealed the GOP to be the party of situational ethics and moral relativism in the name of winning at all costs.

2:00 PM ET
Tom Nichols
Tom Nichols is a professor at the U.S. Naval War College



https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/tom-nichols-why-im-leaving-republican-party/572419/

Unlike Senator Susan Collins, who took pages upon pages of text on national television to tell us something we already knew, I will cut right to the chase: I am out of the Republican Party.

I will also acknowledge right away what I assume will be the reaction of most of the remaining members of the GOP, ranging from “Good riddance” to “You were never a real Republican,” along with a smattering of “Who are you, anyway?”

Those Republicans will have a point. I am not a prominent Republican nor do I play a major role in Republican politics. What I write here are my views alone. I joined the party in the twilight of Jimmy Carter’s administration, cut my teeth in politics as an aide to a working class, Catholic Democrat in the Massachusetts House, and later served for a year on the personal staff of a senior Republican U.S. senator. Not exactly the profile of a conservative warrior.

I even quit the party once before, briefly, during what I thought was the bottom for the GOP: the 2012 primaries. I didn’t want to be associated with a party that took Newt Gingrich seriously as presidential timber, or with people whose callousness managed to shock even Ron Paul. It was an estrangement, not a break, and I came back when the danger of a Trump victory loomed. I was too late, but as a moderate conservative (among the few left), the pre-2016 GOP was the only party I could call home.

[manor321]

1. No one cares

He's a nobody and he already has the Supreme Court for a generation. So who gives a shit?

[Boomer]

4. Speak for yourself only

I find it interesting and would like to read the entire commentary.

[bitterross]

18. You should read it. He's very insulting to the Democrats

He repeats the theory that the Democrats did the late release of the letter intentionally and that they were doing away with due process. In short, he's not an entirely "awoke" person. He's still a GOP ass.

[Boomer]

21. Well that's the whole point

If I could read it, I'd know the context of the quote in the OP. But I couldn't find the link to get more background.

[recentevents]

19. I'm with you

Don't let them wash the stink off themselves. Where were they 10 yrs ago when things started getting really ugly?

[Boomer]

2. Link?

Where is this from?

[Denzil_DC]

8. It's from The Atlantic:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/tom-nichols-why-im-leaving-republican-party/572419/

Here's Nichols' Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/RadioFreeTom

As for who he is, here's Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Nichols_(academic) (copy and paste the whole link)

He recently wrote the book The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters.

[Hoyt]

3. Why the hell did it take you that long Tom?

[grantcart]

14. Read the entire article. He quit when Gingrich was in contention

Rejoined to try and stop Trump from getting the nomination

[Hoyt]

15. Thanks, I'll give him a little break. Should have read the article first.

[Le Gaucher]

5. He did not quit when Trump became the nominee

Hmmmm

[ZZenith]

6. Situational ethics and all...

[WhiteTara]

16. I see what you did there!

[Denzil_DC]

9. He says he rejoined the Repubs when it looked like Trump might become the nominee,

in an effort to head it off.

He's been a consistently outspoken neverTrumper ever since.

[FakeNoose]

10. He couldn't bring himself to vote for Hillary, because ...

... well, you know!

[grantcart]

12. He actually returned to the party to join the never Trump wing of the Republican party

His message is that is futile.

Pro choice and against the death penalty.

[brush]

26. And he's just quiting now after TWO WHOLE YEARS of trump?

Too little, too late if you ask me. WTF took him so long?

If he votes Democratic and not some right wing third part I might give him some slack.

[BeckyDem]

7. You have a link, Myles? Thanks

[Miles Archer]

11. Updated the OP.

[BeckyDem]

13. Much thanks!

[Scurrilous]

17. K&R

[SylviaD]

20. People here cheering this Repug scumbag while deriding a good man like Joe Manchin. smh.. nt.

[tenderfoot]

22. Interesting, I have that guy blocked on Twitter...

I still think he’s a douche.

[BumRushDaShow]

23. Ironic that he doesn't see that they ARE carrying out the GOP agenda

the same one that's been around for decades - i.e., "pre-2016". It's just that their implementation is now on steroids, where it's being done with shock and awe, carpet bombing, and turkey shoots. He just doesn't like the method but he would still support the end result.

[Demovictory9]

24. Kick

[hatrack]

25. Oh, goody, America is SAVED now that Tom Nichols has renounced the GOP!

Tom Nichols (who?) has condescended to descend from the Olympian realm he inhabits and scorn, I say scorn the Republicans!

“As an aside, let me say that I have no love for the Democratic Party, which is torn between totalitarian instincts on one side and complete political malpractice on the other. As a newly minted independent, I will vote for Democrats and Republicans I think are decent and well-meaning people; if I move back home to Massachusetts, I could cast a ballot for Republican Governor Charlie Baker and Democratic Representative Joe Kennedy and not think twice about it.

But during the Kavanaugh dumpster fire, the performance of the Democratic Party—with some honorable exceptions like Senators Chris Coons, Sheldon Whitehouse, and Amy Klobuchar—was execrable. From the moment they leaked the Ford letter, they were a Keystone Cops operation, with Hawaii’s Senator Mazie Hirono willing to wave away the Constitution and get right to a presumption of guilt, and Senator Dianne Feinstein looking incompetent and outflanked instead of like the ranking member of one of the most important committees in America.”

And we should be, what, grateful that this “Ah didn’t leave the GOP, it left me!” Mardi Gras mask of pomposity has finally noticed that the circus train is not just late, but has in fact left the rails and burst into flames?

[JDC]

27. He sure gets his licks in on Dems on his way out. F him

This artcle blows.