Monday, September 04, 2017

Who We Thought They Were, Part II


I was right.









1 comment:

EW said...

Ain’t that the way it goes? It’s just the racist 80% who give the rest a bad name.

Thesis: White nationalism has been a winning electoral strategy since—well, pretty much forever, but obviously since Nixon’s Southern Strategy. But it was always a strategy that would generate wins in the near-term, but loses in the long-term. Initially Democrats held the White Nationalist hand, but their affiliation with the working class led them to support civil rights and bet on the long-term. So Republicans opted to take the short-term strategy.

The question becomes, what price will Republicans pay for their choices?

Strategically, as the power of various minority groups grow, it would make sense for Republicans to begin to soft-pedal their White Nationalist affiliations, seeking to make a smooth hand-off to a less White Nationalist future just as the costs of the strategy become greater than the benefits. Alas for the Republicans, this is also precisely the point at which White Nationalists will become the most alarmed and demand ever more overt statements of fealty. Trump (and if it hadn’t been Trump, it would have been Cruz or someone else) figured this out, and was able to exploit this dynamic to attack the moderating voices in the Republican Party.

Because White Nationalism insists that it will die with a bang rather than a whimper—that it must rage, rage against the dying of the White—it will be most associated with the Republican Party just as it becomes least politically palatable. So I see a long-term problem for the “Republican Party.” But who knows? Maybe people are so partisan that they’ll continue to cling to the label Republican even as it taints all its candidates with the smell of racism. But maybe not.

But that doesn’t mean the end of conservatism. Conservatives may live to fight another day, provided they’re willing to abandon the label “Republican.” I could imagine most Republicans continuing to ride the great ship of Republicanism/White Nationalism even as it takes on more water, only to gracefully step off onto the ship of Libertarianism (or Christian Democrats?) just before the GOP submerges for good. They’ll then wash their hands of that naughty, naughty Republicanism, and embrace their new label while paying no penalty for their past associations. They’ll be like Spicer showing up at the Emmys, poking fun at his prior wildly anti-social behavior and being embraced by the rest.

This is the nature of forgiveness: It reduces the cost of collaborating with sociopaths.