Bitter Clinger Swan Song

Via all over the iNterfestation, a "G.O.P. Lifer" spells out the Elephant split so that even bitter clingers ("a declining electoral bloc of aging, white, rural voters") might get it:

This is an age built for Republican solutions. The global economy is undergoing a massive, accelerating transformation that promises massive new wealth and staggering challenges. We need heads-up, intelligent adaptations to capitalize on those challenges. Republicans, with their traditional leadership on commercial issues should be at the leading edge of planning to capitalize on this emerging environment.

Ha ha, funny huh? "Traditional leadership on commercial issues" is esp. good; note that business becomes "commercial interests" as they realize business is a filthy (Literally: Have you "done your business"? Did you wipe?) word & reframe it. "Commerce" just sounds so much more Main Street-y, doesn't it?

Noting the details of Newspeak is fun (& were it not for digression nothing new would ever be conceived) but wandering to the point, the illustration here is that even a glibertarian tax-fearer spouting the greed agenda knows better than to swallow the codswallop.

What are we getting from Republicans? Climate denial, theocracy, thinly veiled racism, paranoia, and Benghazi hearings. Lots and lots of hearings on Benghazi.

It is almost too late for Republicans to participate in shaping the next wave of our economic and political transformation. The opportunities we inherited coming out of the Reagan Era are blinking out of existence one by one while we chase so-called “issues” so stupid, so blindingly disconnected from our emerging needs that our grandchildren will look back on our performance in much the same way that we see the failures of the generation that fought desegregation.

Something, some force, some gathering of sane, rational, authentically concerned human beings generally at peace with reality must emerge in the next four to six years from the right, or our opportunity will be lost for a long generation. Needless to say, Greg Abbott and Jodi Ernst are not that force.

“Winning” this election did not help that force emerge. This was a dark week for Republicans, and for everyone who wants to see America remain the world’s most vibrant, most powerful nation.

Let this reporter know when a party official, office-holder or even a candidate or nominee of the Party of Lincoln (Hear that spinning sound?) makes any statement that reflects sanity, rationality, concern or even the vaguest connection to reality.

Many interesting (& entertainingschadenfreude-y) bullet points (& an electoral map of the hopelessness):

- Almost half of the Republican Congressional delegation now comes from the former Confederacy. Total coincidence, just pointing that out.

- In Congress, there are no more white Democrats from the South. The long flight of the Dixiecrats has concluded.

- Democrats have consolidated their power behind the sections of the country that generate the overwhelming bulk of America’s wealth outside the energy industry. That’s only ironic if you buy into far-right propaganda, but it’s interesting nonetheless.

The fossils in the fossil-fuel industry are the last hold-outs. Come 2020, President Hillarity will have outlawed guns, banned cars & taxed the carbon-polluters out of existence by executive order, right?

Two yrs. of trial & tribulation, comrades, then the New Socialist Dawn!