I recognize I’m pathological on the subject, but I think Erick Erickson is a sort of barometer for the far-right. He’s more honest in his evaluations, has some relevant expertise as a former elections lawyer, and I hope – but not expect – that others will gradually follow him down the path of reluctant rationality:
I am truly disappointed with my own side for the hucksterism, lies, and denial of reality. Too many friends have no knowledge they are wet. They cannot appreciate the real world around them and live now in a fantasy land of grievance, theft of elections, and mythology. Principles have been abandoned and all that remains is coveting power and keeping power.
Some good friends have even signed a letter wanting multiple states to ignore their voters and appoint replace electors to the Electoral College. It is disappointing to see.
I just assumed my side was better than the left, which has spent four years lying about 2016, engaged in petty grievances, and screaming about stolen elections and Russia. Turns out, in the end, everybody sometimes disappoints. Lord knows a lot of you are disappointed in me for merely trying to tell you the truth.
He’s not all that far down the path, though, is he? That last paragraph is worth contemplating for how he clings to his own truths, while admitting his fellows are worse than himself. Perhaps he needs to review the Mueller Report and its indictments, particularly of the Internet Research Agency. Asking voters to operate on false information does, indeed, result in a stolen election.
One of my minor themes when it comes to political blogging – which I hope will decrease as the Biden Administration takes its place and begins to undue the damage of the Trump Administration – is that the third-raters leading the far-right “conservative” movement are well aware that they are third-raters, and for that reason they try to paint the Democrats as similarly third-rate. It’s part of the strategy of retaining relevance and position as the years pass and demography works against them. For that reason, I assume nothing will come of the recently announced investigation into Hunter Biden.
And Erickson made the mistake of thinking that, because his fellows were ideological brothers, they must all be great. Or good. Or at least passable.
And now he’s coming to the bitter realization that many are fairly awful: arrogant embracers of victimhood. Unwilling to learn, unwilling to leave the right-wing epistemic bubble, they have the taste of Trumpian power in their mouths and they find it addictive.
This problem is the result of three conservative mistakes in confluence. We’ll start with the mistake of prioritizing ideology over competency and character. Look, I agree a competent Communist is not what we want in a legislature, as their description of the world, humanity, and how it all works is at serious divergence from how most Americans think about it.
But a corrupt or incompetent Democrat or Republican is little better. But the Democrats – strictly from informal observations – appear to be better at not electing despicable specimens such as Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), or Paul Ryan (R-WI). Why? Long time readers may be surprised to see me not cite toxic team politics, which, given the performance of Republican Congressional candidates vs the performance of President Trump, may be fading a bit if the ballot-splitting hypothesis holds true, but rather single-issue voters.
I suppose I should stop right here and say that, having made this observation to myself a few days ago, I then asked if I was a single issue voter. It’s a bad phrase, in a way, because nearly everyone will have an issue which will be their sticking point.
Mine? It’s this: If a candidate campaigns on the promise to abolish democracy if they win, well, no vote for you, dude. I’ll either not vote at all, or, if your opponent isn’t equally bad (think Cthulhu), I’ll vote for the opponent.
Does it seem ridiculous? Yes, it does. But it’s worth discovering and acknowledging that my sticking point is one which I don’t expect will ever come into operation. Now, back to the flow:
Right now, I consider single-issue voters to be the knife between the shoulder blades of the United States. The most popular issue appears to be abortion, and so what we see in the storm of deeply radical Republican candidates is the ability to do the anti-abortion polka with great facility. Add in a bit of the 2nd Amendment Absolutist rag, and a trifling bit of Christian Paranoia waltzes, as demonstrated at various times by Erickson, as well as recent candidates Reprensentative-elect Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Senator Kelly Loeffler (R-GA, currently in the runoff for reelection to her seat), and many, many others, and there’s no need for any candidate to demonstrate their competency and character. I hate abortion (Erickson), I love machine guns (Kobach – he lost his race for governor of Kansas, but he’s emblematic of so many others), I hate experts (Ryan) – hell, on this last one, if you’re willing to conflate competency with expertise, the conservatives loathe this key American virtue.
The point is that these positions determine the voting preferences of many, many voters, with no reference to character or competency. In Republican primaries, everyone must take these positions and demonstrate just how conservative they have become, for fear of being RINOed. Here’s just one example – one I actually admire for its artistic merit in a political context – during Loeffler’s run against Rep Doug Collins (R-GA) for the Senate seat to which she was appointed, in the jungle primary which left her and Rafael Warnock (D-GA) as the runoff survivors:
If they don’t, they fall victim to ridiculous accusations – and this is from their own ideological cellmates!
This required ideological rigidity by single-issue voters is vividly illustrated by the pathologies on display by the far-right that currently controls the GOP. I hope we’ll be seeing a gradual diminishment in the numbers of single-issue voters, particularly with regard to abortion and gun control, as more and more of these mistaken voters come to the reluctant conclusion that the dancers, no matter how loudly they shrill their favored issues, do not get to advance without demonstrating other positive attributes.
And, if those attributes are not demonstrated, perhaps their rivals, whether in primary or the general election, deserve their votes more than the merely power-hungry dancers.
