Devolution of the GOP featured on Frontline last night
Ostensibly it was a documentary on John McCain but there's an unavoidable thread running through its narrative: the Republican Party has gone off the deep end.
By showing the nature of Congress when McCain first made headway into politics, including interviews with folks like William Cohen and Gary Hart, it is laid bare how polarized and uncivil things have become. The "Party of Lincoln" has turned into the "Party of John Wilkes Booth."
Glaringly obvious is a dramatic polarization, a shift away from the "big tents" more common decades ago. For those who keep up with politics, it's clear that it's being driven by the GOP solely by looking at their ideological purity as compared to the other side of the aisle. It's far easier to find more conservative Democrats than it is to find more liberal Republicans.
I admit I had issues with the film. I think they glossed over the path to this untenable position that was laid in the Reagan and Bush 41 eras. I thought they should have employed interviews with former McCain presidential campaign strategist Steve Schmidt for insights. But the documentary made no bones about laying the blame for the emergence of Donald Trump on McCain giving Sarah Palin a national stage.
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/mccain/
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