What is the real reason the GOP loves Trump?

[NewsCenter28]

It’s not fear of the base. That’s bull. The Republican Senators could convict him and bar him from running for office ever again federally. Thus, he’d pretty instantly be out of their hair forever. The base is not going to vote for Liz or Bernie or Pete. So, why are they letting him destroy America?

[rzemanfl]

1. Kompromat. eom

[dhol82]

2. I will go with anybody who has a minimal grasp of control of a narcissistic personality can

manipulate the Orange turd at will.
The conservatives have an agenda that they can implement by manipulating the idiot.
There is nothing more.
Trump is an ass. He can be manipulated by the real forces in the government.
Thank you Mitch McConnell.
How can we get rid of the turtle?

[dawg day]

3. I actually think maybe it comes down to "owning the libs"

All the supposed GOP values= free markets, low taxes, American influence-- have dripped away. They really seem to want merely to "own the libs". They get pleasure from that, but it's so much like masturbation-- kind of isolating.

[rufus dog]

20. But this game is rigged

They media allows it, due to ownership. Pack the courts and you have the referees to cover you.

Repukes, and those with that mentality, don't care until it impacts them. And they are too self centered to see that it will impact them until it is too late.

[rufus dog]

29. and the electorate needs to be educated

de Tocqueville called out the weakness in Democracy, Repubs and Russians exploited the weakness with a huge assist from Hate Radio and Fox News. If the electorate is uneducated, biased, flat our ignorant we have a huge problem.

The current electorate is uneducated, biased, flat out ignorant. So it become a win/lose situation.

Point being, fuck the perfect case solution. The current electorate clings to their guns and bibles, are deplorable. We lost that battle. We aren't going to educate the 63 million ignorant/selfish Americans who voted for tRump. We need to embarrass 1 to 2% of them and outvote the rest.

Playing on their terms is a fools game. They disenfranchise voters and we battle that. Playing on their terms. We need to fucking embarrass the shit out of their ignorant asses so a percent or two don't vote Then outvote the rest. Thus, we don't play the BS games on their terms. Everyone can vote, no systemic voter restriction at all. But if you are an ignorant voter, they need to be called out as an ignorant voter.

[rufus dog]

38. The electorate didn't get ripped off

The electorate was ignorant. Exactly the concern of de Touqeville. The electorate is ignorant based upon Fox News and hate radio. Wilful ignorance. This isn’t the fault of Democrats. And taking the blame means taking ownership. I FUCKING DON’T OWN THEIR IGNORANCE! They do, I’m not giving them an out.

[uriel1972]

48. Wilful ignorance...

It's worse than just not knowing stuff, they didn't want to know. Didn't want facts to get in the way of their hate and prejudice.

The ones that complain now that Trump betrayed them, do you really think that they will come to our side? Do you think that they have grown up and accepted the different people that make up a cosmopolitan society?

No, they still want to hurt us,. It's just that Trump has taken their personal binky away and they boohoo. They hate us, that's very unlikely to change.

[CrispyQ]

59. The GOP has been playing the long game.

They started focusing on filling school board positions back in the 80's, while the dems were running as fast as they could from the word liberal, cuz a two-bit actor poked fun at it. The right funded think tanks to craft their message and bought up radio stations to broadcast it. Ignoring hate radio may be the stupidest thing the dems/left have done.

The GOP had a decades long strategy while our side has been in reactionary mode.

[GaYellowDawg]

51. You're right.

But that doesn’t mean that Republicans will treat it with the seriousness it deserves.

[Progressive Jones]

52. This is certainly true of the Bottom Feeders on the right.

The "Tea Party" types, the Evangelicals, the entire "white supremacy" coalition, are the ones who have a need to "own the libs".
The Big Money people have their own agenda. Little to no regulation and taxes.
Big Money pulls the bottom feeders into the tax fight, but they could care less if the working class gets a tax break, or not.
The GOP in general pulls in the bottom feeder vote with promises of "borders" and making abortions illegal and keeping their guns safe from the libs. These are the only things the Bottom Feeders really care about.

[MerryBlooms]

4. Money, always follow the money...

Shitloads of trump's congressional lackeys have major russian dollars in their campaign funding. republicans are neck deep in putin/trump $$$.

[Mike Nelson]

5. They like...

... how he's treated Obama and Hillary. They want a whiter country, where women obey men. He is a hero, to the Deplorables.

[dchill]

55. They will overlook ANYTHING to get that kind of performance.

[LonePirate]

6. Yes, it is the racist, ignorant base. They love 45 and couldn't care less about any other Repub.

If Moscow Mitch unleashes the Senate to a secret ballot or a vote your conscience at the impeachment trial, 45 will rain down hell and fury against him and every other Republican. They will be swept away during the 2020 primary season. Granted, 45 may have dirt on Mitch but having dirt on him does not explain why the entire Repub caucus in the House and even Repub Senators support him lockstep. It's all because of the base.

[Blue_true]

43. The point that you raised about repugh in primaries may be why McConnell and some others

want to slow walk the Senate trial. They may suspect there is enough for a conviction of Trump or to be very damaging to Trump. They may want the primary season to be over so that their base only has a choice between one of them and a democrat in each Senate race of 2020. By getting the actual trial out of primary season, they get to accuse democrats, but won't get accused by their base of not protecting Trump. The current theatrics in the House hearing seem to expose their gameplan, make a show of protecting Trump even as his criminality becomes more obvious to everyone, that way they avoid an extreme rightwing challenger that their fuckedup base warms to.

[Efilroft Sul]

7. Because he's giving them everything on their wish list.

Whacked-out conservative judges, wrecked environmental regulations, rollbacks on civil rights, draconian immigration measures, tax cuts for the wealthy — need I go on?

[enough]

8. Simple. By being in office while they control the Senate,

he enables and facilitates them in carrying out every part of the GOP’s most desired agenda that they have been working for for several decades. There is no mystery here. They love him because he has finally given them exactly what they have been openly working for for years.

[FirstLight]

9. I don't fucking know... but I don't think it is "love" for sure...

Somehow these men (and some women) have decided that they can ignore their own Oath of Office to help this narcissist-in-chief do whatever he wants. It is staggering.

It's can't ALL be kompromat, there has to be more to it than that. But I am disgusted that they would rather make this a partisan battle than one for the fucking CONSTITUTION...IMO ALL of them are just as traitorous as the bastards being named in these proceedings and indictments and convictions!

[jeffreyi]

45. Hear, hear.

I think you got it.

[moondust]

12. They love their nascent kleptocratic dictatorship?

[dhill926]

13. everyone on this thread....

is right....

[KY_EnviroGuy]

14. They are power mad. Mickey Mouse would have suited them equally as well so they can...

continue their efforts to "shrink the government until they can drown it in a bathtub". They're all ultimately under the thumb of the ultra-wealthy and that's the core of it.

But, I don't think this is what they would have preferred to buy into. A Bush or Rubio, for example would have done their dirty work much quieter.

KY.............

[guillaumeb]

15. He is appointing the far right Judges that they will use to remake

the Judiciary for decades to come.

And, he is delegitimizing government for the Libertarian wing of the GOP.

[StarfishSaver]

23. So would Pence

It must be more than that

[Hermit-The-Prog]

24. money

They get the dribblings from Donald's grifting. They also get the benefits from his ties to Putin.

Plus:
https://www.salon.com/2019/11/08/trump-tries-bribing-the-jury-and-no-republican-seems-bothered-by-it_partner/

[Blue_true]

44. Nixon and Reagan tried packing the Courts. As did FDR before them.

Longterm it has not worked. Likely for two reasons, the judges were older and die or retire and get replaced, or they were younger and had kids and their views changed as they grew older. Some of the most devastating rulings against Trump have been delivered by Reagan appointed Judges that are nearing the end of their careers.

[RainCaster]

16. They want a zero-sum game, and that is how he lives

He's always been that way- if you don't agree with me, I will destroy both of us.

[Garrett78]

17. Trump represents their best chance to keep the White House.

If they turn on him, a portion of Cult45 will revolt and either abstain or vote 3rd party. Plus, Trump could cause them serious problems unless he's imprisoned.

Also, it's just ideological. The Republican Party has been trying for decades, with quite a bit of success, to undermine faith in government. Run up debt so as to cut entitlements, have corporations write legislation, deregulate industry, install heads of departments whose mission it is to erode those very departments, deny the stark reality that past and present injustice is not evenly distributed, etc. 

Since the likes of Putin also wish to undermine democratic institutions for the purpose of self-enrichment, Putin and Republicans make for interesting bedfellows. 

This is a war of ideologies: we vs. me. "It takes a village" vs. "every person for themselves" (cheating permitted...nay, encouraged). The likes of Barr, Bannon, Pompeo et al. are especially dangerous--they're white nationalists, isolationists and despise secularization. 

They've seen the writing on the wall (social progression, increased secularism, changing demographics, etc.), so their tactics have become increasingly extreme in recent years (intense voter suppression and gerrymandering, full-throated attacks on science and public education, persistent attacks on the "liberal media" to help shift the Overton Window, stealing a Supreme Court seat and packing the judiciary with right wing ideologues, aligning with dictators who share the goal of undermining democracy for personal enrichment, replacing the dog whistle with a bullhorn, and so on). They take comfort, though, in a tyranny of the minority system which, paradoxically, makes major structural reform nearly impossible to bring about for the very reasons why such reform is so desperately needed. 

In Trump and his narcissistic appeal to the tens of millions of racists, sexists and xenophobes, the GOP has found an ideal (diseased) carrier pigeon for their ideology.

[bdamomma]

30. Very interesting

post to read. You have connected all the dots, but I believe we still have the power to change all this.

[Garrett78]

34. I guess it depends on what is meant by "change all this."

We (Democrats) can be successful in 2020. We can get rid of Trump if we overcome the inevitable shenanigans, though we'll have to continue fighting the ideology that made Trump possible. We might even be able to narrowly take the Senate, while keeping the House.

But the US is in desperate need of major structural reform. Most of us probably won't live to see such reform realized. Because that's such a distressing notion, I think many people deny the reality of it, which keeps people from doing the work of planting the necessary seeds for life after us. It's not just the tyranny of the minority political system and the dark money that runs it; it's also our education system, our health care system, and so on.

And then there's climate change.

[bdamomma]

39. Yes, we have a lot

of work to do to clean up after this POS hopefully leaves.

[CrispyQ]

60. The Republican Party is the most dangerous organization on the planet.

They have the power and influence to completely change the course of (in)action on climate change, but they choose to put their personal agenda above that.

[Blue_true]

46. Even with their attempts to go back to the 1800s, the

country has become more diverse and cities one after another have become blue, even in red states. They are now starting to lose all of the inner and outer surburbs around cities and are holding on only in the exburbs and rural areas.

What can we do? When our candidates win office, they need to lead ethically, no stealing, lying or graft. Our leaders must care about budgets and keeping taxes fair. If our leaders do those things, that will kill off the modern Republican Party because even the exburbs and rural areas will eventually abandon them.

[bluestarone]

18. Because too many involved in HIGH CRIMES

It's ALL or NOTHING they are ALL IN!! This is their only way of protection! They need the whitehouse!

[mopinko]

19. because he can sic the algorithms on them.

the pinpoint targeting that got him elected persists.
also, the eavesdropping.
so, yeah, kompromat, plus a robot army.

[diva77]

25. I haven't seen any interviews lately with Craig Unger - would like his take on this question

[JPK]

26. My personal belief is

Money. One thing the GOP understands is money and their love for it. They don't care where it comes from as long as it fills their pockets. The Russians were illegally giving the GOP money over the years and now they are petrified it will get out they have been had by the Russians. All you have to do is look at the NRA. They have been laundering Russian money for years.

[Kurt V.]

27. white supremacy. its that fucking simple.

[nini]

28. A big part of it is they hate liberals

Trump pumps them full of the same hate and they eat it up. They hate liberals more than they value this country. They'd rather take the whole republic down than 'lose' to us.

He know that and plays them like a fiddle.

[bdamomma]

32. Well Stephen Miller

and Steve Bannon hate liberals, at the moment I can't recollect where I have read that. Thus going after everything we care about even our environment and our most precious children, to the point of illegally tearing children away from their families and trafficking.

We are dealing with monsters.

[BuffaloJackalope]

31. Totalitarians love their dictators.

[live love laugh]

33. He's a lightning rod that distracts from their malfeasance. nt

[Ferrets are Cool]

37. I've said it 1000+ times and will repeat it once again...

he has every secret in their huge closet of skeletons. On the day of the inauguration, the President is awarded with every state secret on every person. Cheney gathered every secret on every Senator and Congress critter when he was in power. Now it belongs to the orange buffoon.

[NCLefty]

40. His distracted Americans while GOP pushed through tax cuts for rich, massive de-regulation, judges.

Distracted us with his fat mouth and endless outrages.

[GemDigger]

41. It's the judges. Nothing but the judges. That comes from the republicans because trump has NO idea

on most of these people. It's just republicans who know a lot of anti abortion people who would make fantastic judges who in his (trumps) mind would owe him a favor or ten for giving them the job in the first place.

[radius777]

42. Trump is the logical conclusion to GOP white-identity politics,

which began with the Southern Strategy as a backlash to the civil rights movement, whereby racist white Dems left the party for the GOP steadily, to Nixon and then Reagan, whose politics could be described as white flight politics, and relied on dogwhistles, whereas Trumpism is outright white nationalism and shouts it with a bullhorn.

So the GOP knows that Trump is who they are. There are differences in economic and foreign policy, where Trump is more 'populist'. But understand that white hegemony is what drives the GOP as well as Trump, they simply have different opinions on how to get there.

[Blue_true]

47. Even as the Republican Party has pushed white nationalism, the country has steadily become more

diverse. In my area there are a lot of interracial children. So on a micro level, their attempts to divide isn't as successful as they want and from what I am witnessing, is bound to fail.

I think the issue may be as much about political identity as it is about race. Kentucky elected a Black republican as their AG, he won comfortably as voters rejected a white governor. South Carolina has a republican Black US Senator whose seat may be safer than his White counterpart. So, it is not all about race because the above would not be happening if that was the case.

[radius777]

49. a Repub PoC is merely a RW white man inside a black/brown/female body,

basically an Uncle Tom who will further white hegemony, and the GOP voters know that.

America has indeed become more multicultural, internationalist and diverse over the past 50 years - which culminated in the election of Obama - and Trumpism is at the heart of the backlash to it all. It's not just about that, but mostly.

[Sogo]

50. I recall

early on in trump‘s presidency, there was a gathering in the Rose Garden (for what I don’t recall) and at one point Trump, standing at the podium, reached his arm out pointing and gesturing at everyone there and said, “I know stuff about all these guys.”

[Tiggeroshii]

53. He represents what they truly are.

And have always wanted.

[SMC22307]

54. They've been gunning for Social Security and Medicare for decades...

Trump's just the 'man" to destroy both programs and his idiotic base will cheer him on.

[DFW]

56. Trump appeals to the "wannabe" ideals of a lot of frustrated people

People unhappy with their lives for one reason or another sometimes want someone convenient to be responsible for the fact that they are not living in luxury with gold-plated sinks and chauffeur-driven limousines.

Trump blames everyone but himself for the reason things are not perfect, and this connects with the frustrations of many people. His fans prefer the fantasy to the reality. Reality requires hands-on work to change. Fantasy does not.

Trump's wealth is largely fictitious. His beautiful wives do not love him. His Russian friends find him useful, not cordial. Immigrants are not an imminent danger to him or to us, they are a convenient scapegoat. He is not secure in his beliefs. He has no beliefs, only insecurities. His base doesn't love the man. They love the illusion.

[uponit7771]

57. ****THEY'RE TAKING RUSSIAN MONEY !!! **** McCarthy ADMITTED to taking Russian money already !!

[CrispyQ]

58. For GOP leadership, it's tax cuts & the judiciary.

For the base, it's owning the libs.

[beachbumbob]

61. because the federal courts are beign changed for generations to come for starters, then

the wholesale destruction of govt agencies, rules and regulations, What is there NOT to love????

[retread]

62. simpatico.

[Captain Stern]

63. Because when he's on the ballot, there's an 'R' after his name.

Bottom line is, they hate Democrats more than they love their country.

If they turn on trump, it would be great for our country, but it would be a win for us Democrats too....so that's not happening. trump actually could shoot somebody on Fifth avenue, and not lose a lot of support. That's not a joke. That's real.

[bearsfootball516]

64. Yes, it's fear of the base.

You're right that they won't vote for Liz or Bernie, but those Republicans will get primaried by Trump-loving Republicans and lose to them. There have already been several cases since Trump took over of Republicans vocally speaking out against him, then getting primaried by a Trump Republican and losing their seat.

[Hotler]

65. He's a selfish racist just like them. nt