I’ve said it before I’ll say it again. Of all the Republican weirdness in recent years, I truly don’t understand why they seem to have made a conscious decision to become the biggest-asshole-in-the-room party.
It used to be that those guys were on the fringes of the party. Nixon was a crook, but he established the EPA and OSHA. That was just a normal thing for a Republican to do in the 1970s.
The GOP is a big tent party, and so they’ve always had room for the extreme right wing. These days, the tent is getting smaller, and unless you’re an out-and-out fascist you’re not really welcome. Unfortunately, half the country feels a stronger tie to that party than to their country, so they’re squeezing into that smaller tent.
Seriously an all too common overlap on the venn diagram. I might also add receiving public assistance. Yet they vote for the party trying to limit or stop that assistance 🤦♂️
“Of all the Republican weirdness in recent years, I truly don’t understand why they seem to have made a conscious decision to become the biggest-asshole-in-the-room party.”
Recent? They’ve been doing this shtick since at least Newt Gingrich in the 90s.
The thing is, I was alive and an adult then, and I knew otherwise OK people who were single issue voters who therefore voted republican. I may have disagreed with them on a thing or three, but we could get along OK. It either wasn’t as pervasive, or somehow didn’t hit my sphere. (And I was living in the south at the time)
Now - everyone who I know is a republican is just a raging confrontational asshole.
I made the comment because Gingrich took confrontational politics and brought it to the National level. The era of Fox News and the 24hr news cycle was starting and he was the architect of the sensational hyper partisan angry Republicanism that we see today on right wing media. I don’t think Gingrich actually believed what he is pushing. He pushed it because it got the results he wanted.
Fast forward 30 years and now we have social media and the internet all vying for attention. Only the most extreme views that are controversial enough get noticed and commented on.
Some of the people I know who were Republicans have moderate enough views that they don’t feel the party is in step with them anymore. But I know Republicans who are true MAGA supporters and just parrot the grievances of their party. They all seem to emulate that anger
Trump showed them that giving in to your base desires and letting your asshole flag fly gets you great success and makes you a good person. In their eyes anyway. Unfortunately.
Speaking as another older adult in Canada and witnessing the slide in both countries my controversial opinion is it’s not about politics at all. Politics are simply a symptom of an underlying problem with the society we have built.
What you’re seeing is classic behaviour of when a person is unheard, stressed and angry. It is scientifically proven when you experience those struggles you are less likely to think clearly and what options you have become limited. You start looking at every problem like a nail and you’re a hammer.
Individually we all deal with adversity different and I’d argue one party is heavily weighed with those who struggle with dealing with the adversity meanwhile since the 60’s governments have been doing nothing to improve life and lessen the adversity people deal with.
Then you have all those people struggling… And you throw in predators taking advantage of them, feeding into their struggles and weaponizing them.
At some point we all need to acknowledge we can’t fix this overnight and these people for the most part aren’t crazy. They’re you just a few medical bills behind or a few months laid off from your job. Hurt people hurt people.
I’ve said it before I’ll say it again. Of all the Republican weirdness in recent years, I truly don’t understand why they seem to have made a conscious decision to become the biggest-asshole-in-the-room party.
In recent years? brother they’ve been the “biggest asshole in the room” party since at least Nixon; they just have to keep outdoing themselves
It used to be that those guys were on the fringes of the party. Nixon was a crook, but he established the EPA and OSHA. That was just a normal thing for a Republican to do in the 1970s.
The GOP is a big tent party, and so they’ve always had room for the extreme right wing. These days, the tent is getting smaller, and unless you’re an out-and-out fascist you’re not really welcome. Unfortunately, half the country feels a stronger tie to that party than to their country, so they’re squeezing into that smaller tent.
I mean yes, but this feels intentional.
They’re paying the price for all their education funding cuts.
Nixon was scummy and a little bit too evil… but he was well educated and wasn’t dumb
Because it works. Acting like a childish bully still gets the adoration from the “peaked in high school” MAGA voter base.
Seriously an all too common overlap on the venn diagram. I might also add receiving public assistance. Yet they vote for the party trying to limit or stop that assistance 🤦♂️
They represent people that are also actively trying to be the biggest assholes in the room
“Of all the Republican weirdness in recent years, I truly don’t understand why they seem to have made a conscious decision to become the biggest-asshole-in-the-room party.”
Recent? They’ve been doing this shtick since at least Newt Gingrich in the 90s.
The thing is, I was alive and an adult then, and I knew otherwise OK people who were single issue voters who therefore voted republican. I may have disagreed with them on a thing or three, but we could get along OK. It either wasn’t as pervasive, or somehow didn’t hit my sphere. (And I was living in the south at the time)
Now - everyone who I know is a republican is just a raging confrontational asshole.
I made the comment because Gingrich took confrontational politics and brought it to the National level. The era of Fox News and the 24hr news cycle was starting and he was the architect of the sensational hyper partisan angry Republicanism that we see today on right wing media. I don’t think Gingrich actually believed what he is pushing. He pushed it because it got the results he wanted.
Fast forward 30 years and now we have social media and the internet all vying for attention. Only the most extreme views that are controversial enough get noticed and commented on.
Some of the people I know who were Republicans have moderate enough views that they don’t feel the party is in step with them anymore. But I know Republicans who are true MAGA supporters and just parrot the grievances of their party. They all seem to emulate that anger
Trump showed them that giving in to your base desires and letting your asshole flag fly gets you great success and makes you a good person. In their eyes anyway. Unfortunately.
Speaking as another older adult in Canada and witnessing the slide in both countries my controversial opinion is it’s not about politics at all. Politics are simply a symptom of an underlying problem with the society we have built.
What you’re seeing is classic behaviour of when a person is unheard, stressed and angry. It is scientifically proven when you experience those struggles you are less likely to think clearly and what options you have become limited. You start looking at every problem like a nail and you’re a hammer.
Individually we all deal with adversity different and I’d argue one party is heavily weighed with those who struggle with dealing with the adversity meanwhile since the 60’s governments have been doing nothing to improve life and lessen the adversity people deal with.
Then you have all those people struggling… And you throw in predators taking advantage of them, feeding into their struggles and weaponizing them.
At some point we all need to acknowledge we can’t fix this overnight and these people for the most part aren’t crazy. They’re you just a few medical bills behind or a few months laid off from your job. Hurt people hurt people.