GOP donor billionaires have primaried all the moderates out of the party. It's all extremists left. Who could claim to be moderate? McCain? He's an old-time Republican but a hawk who never really had much to say about domestic issues, which is where today's GOP has gone off the rails.

Steve Schmidt and Frum are doing good work. Even maybe Kristol.

But Will is a piece of crap, even his never trump articles throw in some GOP talking points about liberals.

We need to rip the throat out of the Republican Party, not "resurrect it" with "nice Republicans." The ENTIRE PREMISE of the Republican party is a conglomeration of the Ghengis Khan, Mongolian hordes, German Nazis, ultra-White Supremacist mindset into the most destructive organization in the history of the planet. No less a legend than Noam Chomsky said those VERY words, so they aren't just my opinion. We need to destroy the tenet of white oppression, capitalism, restructure "property rights" into "human rights" and repatriate the 95% of money controlled by strictly white interests and redistribute it to a more diversified, progressive stance. We need to destroy the concept of a radicalized, frenziedly-worshiped fetish of "patriotism," replacing it with a more progressive, socialistic globalist agenda that puts the needs of the rapidly-changing ethnic balance of the Western world. Finally, we need to completely destroy the construct of White privilege, including the proposed dissolution of the United States as a republic, changing its government to a progressive democratic socialist partnership with other nations of the planet.

This is the ONLY way that humanity has ANY chance of surviving beyond this century. Bottom line: If the Republican Party remains intact, then humanity will die a HORRIFIC death by the end of this century, if not long before.

The GOP is a hard right ultra-nationalist party.
They must be treated as such.

Republicans must be held to account for their White Supremacist positions. They must ALL be tied in with Trump and Hitler.

During the 1920's, the GOP put restrictions on legal immigration.

Teddy Roosevelt strongly believe in eugenics.

Never be fooled, the Republican Party is a far right organization that is not in line with most other mainstream center right parties.

They are the face of unchecked capitalism, which to paraphrase Chris Hedges exists to exploit humanity and the natural world to the point of exhaustion or collapse.

Regulated capitalism, as developed by FDR, does somewhat better. But the pukes--in their current incarnation--are dead set against any checks on the mythical 'free market', aka the rich getting their way and the rest of us suffering for it.

As an aside, capitalism serves many in America very ill. There are alternative ways of organizing societies. America has shut down debate on that topic.

that any -ism, whether it be Socialism, Capitalism, Communism, or any other -ism, left without checks and balances will become a disaster that benefits a very few at the expense of the vast majority.

Progressive socialism and true communism involve putting the needs of the many, particularly the historically oppressed (minorities, women, non-hetereo, non-Christian), over the needs of the privileged few (whites, males, heteros, Christians). In short, you can NOT have ENOUGH of a system that promotes the stated. Capitalism and Western nationalism, all based upon white supremacist oppression, MUST be destroyed for humanity to have ANY chance at survival.

not what you describe.

There is no ultimate victory in this game of politics unless you desire to live under a totalitarian regime.

I suspect those who don't remember it are too young to do so or are not students of history.

You need only look at the Northeast to know who some of these people were. The very last of them was Chris Shays, a congressman from Connecticut. He voted against all four articles of impeachment against Bill Clinton.

People the folks at FR would refer to as GOPe.

It was just "dressed" more nicely.

It was pretty far into the right-end of Conservatism, but not into loony-toon land, just very Conservative.

Once I convinced them that I wasn't there to troll them, but was there to engage in real, serious dialog, it was a fascinating experience for all of us. If you wanted to make an argument, you better will do it well or it would be picked to pieces. We had some truly epic discussions. Occasionally they would be mildly heated, but with very few exceptions, we were all respectful of each others positions, even when we wholeheartedly disagreed with that position.

You can't do that today, and that is the real problem today. They managed to at least make me question some of my basic assumptions, and I think I made them to reassess some of theirs. Can't do that today. There doesn't seem to be any way that the left and the right can engage in meaningful dialog, we can only seem to say 'I'm right and you're wrong and that ends it'.

Until we can get back to honest dialog and a willingness to engage with other willing people with differing opinions, we will never MAGA.

there is a minority who want total victory even if that victory is driving all those with differing views from a forum. Look how nasty DU got during the primaries and that fighting continues today.

IMHO one of the all-time best TV series, if not the absolute best.

When they decided to hire Ainsley Hayes, the GOP operative who handed Sam Seaborn his ass in a Sunday morning talk show, I though it was the most brilliant thing that Sorkin ever did. She was a fierce, intelligent dyed-in-the-wool Republican. She could argue a GOP position with facts and logic, not talking points. She didn't win a lot of arguments, but she won a few.

I also saw a former Congressman on one of the talking head shows. I can't even remember an (R) or a (D) but he called himself a Centrist. He was bemoaning the fact that we have fractured the political spectrum to where there are no more Centrists and that's why we can't get anything done. He was saying that you put a moderate (D) and a moderate (R) in a room and they can usually find more things that they agree on that disagree. One fascinating suggestion he had was that to get elected Speaker of the House you would need to get 60% of the vote instead of the current 50%+1. His argument was that now you have to start at the fringe and work your way toward the center, whereas if you needed 60% you would have to start in the center and work out. IOW, you would need at least some support from the minority party.

The majority of our country is basically Centrist with a lean toward the Left, but with Gerrymandering, voter suppression, and the like, we end up electing wing-nuts who say, effectively 'my way of the highway' and so we Congress ends up doing nothing.

In the immortal words of Rodney King, "Why can't we all just get along"?

In order to get the position, a candidate for the office would have to build a coalition amongst members of both parties which would marginalize the extreme wings of both parties. And to expand on that, the Speaker does not have to be a member of Congress. I could see an elder statesman with a lot of gravitas putting together a coalition and getting elected to the office. And that could happen now with the current 50% +1 requirement. Former congressman Ray LaHood would be a possibility. A moderate Republican who had the reputation of being a straight shooter.

That explains the absolute hypocrisy and destructive goals that Republicans have for society if they can't even garner enough gonads enough to join DU and debate us.

Your comment:

"Including the proposed dissolution of the United States as a republic,"

A country cannot remain isolated in today's progressively socialist society, and the U.S. is no different. To that end, once the GOP is neutered, a NATURAL progressive of governmental society is to shed the oppressive nationalism that encapsulates a singular entity, such as the United States republic, and transform it to a more inclusive, collaborative world partner in today's global community. That means shedding the "republic" (ie, white nationalist) aspect of the country, and not to the actual progressive governance of the region that encapsulates the United States. I would like to eliminate governors and state legislatures, whom are overly white nationalist, and the ability for states to make their own laws without global input, but that does not make me advocate for a (presumedly violent) overthrow of the US government.

You are in favor of eliminating our current form of government.

You are creating as straw person argument: "Either you are for the current US government, or you are for an overthrow of the government by violence." I reject and thoroughly repudiate the premise of that argument.

I WOULD like to see the TRANSFORMATION of governance migrate from our current white spupremacist model of a federated republican, fueled by capitalism and fossil fuels, that suppress non-white, non-male, non-Christian, and non-cisgendered individuals who shut out every other nation on the planet to our economic and social decisions, to that of a progressive democratic state, with socialist human need and environmentally sustaining energy, that promotes the values of non-white, non-male, non-Christian, and non-cisgendered individuals, including a wealth transfer from the holdings of the former to the latter.

I will repeat: I am NOT advocating an overthrow or "elimination" of our current form of government. Rather, I advocate using the (relatively few) tools of our current government structure so that the economy, medical, and popular culture become more global-centric and in line with the very principles that Democratic Underground stands for. Period.

The core principle of DU:

"Democratic Underground is an online community for friendly, politically liberal people who understand the importance of working together to elect more Democrats and fewer Republicans to all levels of American government."

In an earlier post you said:

" I would like to eliminate governors and state legislatures, whom are overly white nationalist, and the ability for states to make their own laws without global input, but that does not make me advocate for a (presumedly violent) overthrow of the US government."

I doubt you'd find more then a handful of Dems who would support you.

Your values seem to be more in line with the Green Party then with the Democratic Party.

The Republican Party you are missing no longer exists. It has been replaced by Koch brothers loyalists who ascribe to their extremist ideology that has nothing to do with democracy. Their goal is to create a country run by oligarchs, where wealthy corporations and a few ultra-wealthy individuals dominate--the economy, the government, courts, and answer to no one--and where the will of the voters is suppressed to non-existence.

And our society has been crumbling since

bring back the fairness doctrine.


And in the meantime, we should all tell our family and friends -- don't listen to Limbaugh. He's a liar who is willing to say anything that will get him ad revenue and ratings, no matter how much it will harm America.

The absolute worst president in history, Ronald Reagan. Far worse than even George Bush, and Donald Trump, as bad as he is, has a considerable way to go to surpass Reagan. If it weren't for Mikhail Gorbachev who heroically stood up to Reagan to initiate the end of the Cold war, a nuclear exchange would have been perpetrated by Reagan and his Iran/Contra military fanatics, and the world would have ended for most of us.

Regan at least had responsible advisors and Nancy to keep him for going off the deep end. tRump's credo is 'either you tell me I am the greatest leader in recorded history or I'll fire you'. tRump is truly terrifying and is rapidly destroying the US.

We would have easily been able to tranform our capitalist destruction to a more progressive society had Carter won in 1980, who would have cooperated with Mikhail Gorbachev and transformed the USSR to a more progressive co-op with its former soviets. Congress would have permanently moved to the left, and our computer revolution that happened in the 80's would have been more directed to anti-capitalist concerns. The Republicans would have been completely repressed and never have the ability to assert itself before the US would have become fundamentally transformed, the Middle East would never have exploded to its current state, and the environment would have been well on its way to global stability. The recent hurricanes would have been nothing more than small storms, and Donald Trump would have had his wealth redistributed if he wanted to maintain any sense of control, and certainly never would have sniffed the Oval Office quest.

In short, Reagan was the single biggest reason we face our dystopic situation nowadays. And don't believe that aides make the president, the president is his own man or woman. The aides themselves may be honorable if they are under Democratic administrations, and conversely dishonorable if they are under Republican regimes, but they don't usually affect the president him or herself.

things being the way they are. He did not want anyone fraternizing across the aisles. I think that destroyed a lot of the cooperation and the art of compromise. Not all backroom deals are bad. Knowing each other as human beings with differing view can be valuable and it can help get things done.

they are now the Party of Putin

I warned about this more than a decade ago to Chris Bowers on the now-defunct website MyDD.com. He was leading the move to cleanse the party by removing moderates, particularly in the northeast. It sounded wonderful and he received tons of praise but the eventual widespread impact could only be devastating for our side. I was going nuts because it felt like I was in a room with nothing but tunnel vision types.

Essentially it was ignorant handicapping. Once both sides polarized and pushed from the edges it was going to be markedly easier to Republicans to nominate and elect their loonies than it would be for Democratics to nominate and elect the most progressive. I can't believe that was so difficult to comprehend or forecast. While I didn't fathom a Donald Trump as president the overall trend like Roy Moore as senate favorite is absolutely what I knew would happen, and it hasn't come close to peaking yet.

The bar was moved. Their unelectables are now electable, simply because there are more conservatives than liberals and more red than blue districts and states. A moving bar could never benefit our side. Moderates and complacency were our friends.

Granted, even if Bowers had stayed out of the way and liberals hadn't pushed first the other side eventually would have figured it out. But I doubt it would have advanced this far by now.

Even with the Trump steal of the election, we are proving that the US, and frankly all of Western Civilization, is one massive White Supremacist oppression of the masses. Since 1492, and especially since 1776, the vast majority of non-white humanity have suffered under the oppressive destruction instigated by white capitalists, with the US leading this purge of humanity. It is ONLY NOW that we are FINALLY understanding this. Keep in mind that the US Republican Party is an anomaly on this planet. The average socialist country is run as if Bernie Sanders were running the show, and the tenets of the Republican Party would not only not exist, but most of its tenets are illegal by international standards, such as gun control, massive limits on tax rates for the wealthy, and absolute destruction of the planet on an environmental scale.

And that leads to this: The absolute MOST IMPORTANT thing we can do is to destroy the Republican Party, mostly by regulating content put out by its perpetrators. Facebook and Google have rightfully started to demonetize their content, we are making it harder and harder for them to spew out their vile in academia, we are eliminating TV shows that highlight this disgusting behavior such as Tim Allen's "Last Man Standing" and "Duck Dynasty," eliminating cash in favor of electronic fund transfers that we can control, and in the near future, even legally confiscate from the ultra-rich, and finally, to ensure that the fundamental transformation of this country from an oppressive white nationalist/supremacist oligarchy to integrate with the progressive cooperation with the mostly-non-white environmentally sustainable community of nations.

I know people who knew that Trump was a disaster in the making even during the Republican primary. But they still voted for him in the general election because of the tax cut issue. I don't think these Republicans get enough criticism and too much blame has been put on the working-class people who voted for Trump, mostly because they are easier targets and easier to stereotype as "dumb hillbillies" or whatever.

Plenty of well-educated, old school Republicans were willing to look the other way on Trump because they put getting a tax cut over everything. To me they are worse than the desperate people who voted for Trump to "bring the jobs back." I can see why a struggling person might make a gamble on somebody like Trump because they feel like they have nothing to lose and bought into his nonsense, but I don't have the same feelings of sympathy for the tax cut über alles people.

She was expecting 20-25 based upon every poll.

In the end, the GOP showed it's partisan tribal loyalty. Until Democrats have their own Trump, they would be wise to close ranks and do the same.

My life has been almost exclusively around Republicans. I know the difference of then and now.

different than in the past. I do agree that a lot is exposure. I also think they are able to get validation on the net, unlike in real life.

saboteurs. We can return to a more normal state, and probably faster than we can imagine now. People can be hateful, yes, but when it comes to public affairs we're also mostly extremely ignorant, malleable, fickle, shallow, forgetful and well meaning.

We can detox society back to a more functional level. But first we have to stop the flow of Kool-Aid out of most, corrupted cable and TV political programming. No one should own 30 newspapers or radio stations, much less 300. And then there's the internet. The most insidious, effective tool has reportedly been those mostly occult, poison emails spread like wildfire from home to home by their recipients. But they start somewhere.

I remember the days when we had actual lawmakers who took their jobs seriously.
Now, many are in congress just push ideologies and so the bidding for their sugar daddies. It is not to work to help people or to make the country work well and for all. It is not about laws to address the needs of the days.

They are there only to help the sugar daddies pocket our tax money and to rob it from things like education, road improvement, ect.

Last year we were downgraded to a Flawed Democracy in the democracy index.

They enabled everything we have now that sucks whether naively, inadvertently or on purpose.