Kevin Drum thinks he knows why the GOP is pushing a tax reform bill which doesn’t earn the adjective reform and has hardly had any thought given to it: demographics are pushing the GOP into irrelevance.
Republicans aren’t idiots. They can read a demographic report as well as anyone. They know their white base is shrinking and they know they’ve reached a critical point. The problem is that remaking their party is a long-term project, and while it’s happening they’re going to lose elections. It will take years to regain the trust of communities of color, and efforts to do so will alienate the whites who support them today. They could be in the wilderness a long time while this project is ongoing.
And so it never got off the ground. It was just too hard. It looked more and more as if Republicans would shamble slowly into minority party status for a long time as they struggled to remake themselves.
There’s a hidden assumption here, though, and that’s the idea that the GOP leadership is fixed, or at least has a fixed perspective. I find this dubious, given how FiveThirtyEight has documented the strong rightward slide of the GOP Congressional members over the years (for which I can’t find the link of which I’m thinking). I think that under the influence of ideologically driven radio talk show, Fox News, and other conservative outlets, the leadership, through the process of personnel turnover, has substantially changed. Indeed, I think the late Senator Goldwater was right on the mark:
Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t and won’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.
Back to Kevin:
But again: Republicans aren’t idiots. They recognize just how unlikely [Trump’s] victory was and they know it won’t repeat itself. Demographic trends won’t slow down and midterm elections always go against the party in power anyway. They’re probably going to lose unified control of the government in 2018, and even if they hang on they won’t make it past 2020. This is their last chance to control the levers of power, quite possibly for a decade or two.
That’s why they’re pushing an unpopular tax bill. That’s why they’re focused like a laser on confirming judges. That’s why they might even take on entitlement reform. They’re going to lose power shortly no matter what they do, so they’re trying to put their stamp on the future while they still have the chance.
Which is weak because it doesn’t explain why the Republicans are doing it so poorly, not only with the tax reform bill, but with the failed AHCA bill as well. Kevin assumes there’s a rational leadership in place for the Republicans, but for me, it’s become clear that they’re an ideologically driven pack of second- and third-raters, incapable of deep and subtle thought, driven by the lust for power.
If there was a real and rational concern about the demographic future, the Republicans would be busy demonstrating their seriousness about governance. There’d be a serious move to exercise McCain’s “regular order,” a process, developed over time, by which serious legislators hope to produce legislation which will be effective.
That is, to leave a real legacy.
But we’ve seen, instead, GOP leaders completely bypass the traditional approaches to legislation; fail to exercise their judicial nominee overview responsibilities until just the last week; and blindly attack the institutions of government which contribute the most to stability, safety, and progress.
A political party which puts the country first would never tolerate the attacks on the FBI, the CBO, and the collective intelligence agencies that we’ve seen not only from Trump, but from GOP legislators as well. This has been done to preserve President Trump from charges of Russian collusion, when a truly responsible legislator would be investigating those charges, or supporting those who have been appointed to do so, with energy and celerity.
If the tax reform change bill passes, and the Democrats take over in 2018, there’s only Trump’s veto pen to stop the Democrats from putting into law legislation reversing the GOP tax reform law, and if the recession I suspect will result from the this tax bill does occur, it’ll result in having GOP Incompetence and Trump stamped all over it and the tax bill.
And thus discrediting the GOP even more.
