What happened to the Republican Party?

[OtterMan68]

They used to be pro-free trade and pro-free markets.

They used to be in favor of local control of gov and schools, not state control.

They used to hate dictators and people like Putin and Orban

They used to talk about morals and values, now they don't care as long as they like the candidate's rhetoric and issue stances.

They used to at least give lip service to a balanced US budget.

Now, they are protectionists, want gov to subsidies coal and oil and gas and ethanol.

They love Putin and Orban.

They excuse Trump's lies, insults, multiple marriages and affairs.

When Trump was president and the GOP was in charge of congress 2017-2019 the debt and deficit grew BIGGER

[MrOracle]

All of these issues are significantly more complicated than the surface-level way you are looking at them.

It needs to be recognized that BOTH the Dems and Repubs are MOSTLY made up of "establishment" members - DC insiders who are far more concerned with consolidating and exercising their own personal power than they are with running the country for the benefit of the citizens. There are only a handful of exceptions. Many members of both parties keep getting voted in because they have so much money and political power that they crush any primary opponents, or their party simply won't even allow anyone else to run. It's not exactly a secret that the parties themselves can largely kill a candidate at the primary level unless they already have a LOT of public recognition AND a lot of political power of their own. Dirty politics on both sides of the aisle mean that most elected officials at the federal level are corrupt.

Most people would be SHOCKED if they knew what was going on behind closed doors. Many people DO know at least a percentage of this and they're furious. This is why so many back Trump.

Trump isn't, and never was a perfect candidate. Most Trump supporters don't particularly like his personal life, or his big mouth. Most would much prefer a more articulate candidate, and someone who is more "presidential." But that's what Obama was, and he was a DISASTER for the US, but most people have no idea that this is true, because the media refused to report on what he was doing behind the scenes.

The reason people support Trump is not because he's articulate, or presidential, or a great husband - it's because Trump can identify the BIG, MOST IMPORTANT problems this country is dealing with - the ones that the establishment on both sides don't want to deal with because THEY get lots of power from those problems personally, at the expense of citizens and personal liberty - and he will actually work to fix these issues. No one else is prepared to fight for these things like Trump.

Of course, he can't do everything on his own - he needs support in Congress, and he definitely didn't have that in his first term - not even from Republicans. You have to understand that establishment Republicans HATE Trump - they don't want to lose, but they also don't want him to win. They would much prefer a candidate like Bush, who will get involved in more wars (which is where so much of the establishment's money and power comes from) and allow the government to keep growing. Trump is trying to shrink the government (and its power), shrink the budget, and improve the US economy, and most importantly, keep us out of the wars.

Keeping the US out of the wars is THE reason the government and the media have been against Trump - people just don't grasp how much tax money wars cost us, and how many laws and rules get passed to take away people's liberty in the process of these wars, and how much the ruling class enriches themselves with these wars. Stopping wars is a direct threat to their money and power, and they cannot allow that.

Eisenhower warned the US about the Military-Industrial Complex - he saw this coming 70 yeas ago - and that's where we are today.

[OtterMan68]

Trump never once vetoed a budget. He bragged about his increase in the military budget.
He supports ethanol mandates and wants to use subsidies to "save" coal.
rump said he is a "tariff man and is now talking about a 10% across the board tariff on ALL imports.
He wants to mandage all cars have AM radios (I'm not making this up).

[OtterMan68]

you also don't explain the move of people like DeSantis and Abbot to take away local control of gov and schools and put it in the hands of the state whereas the GOP used to favor local control over state control.

[MrOracle]

I don't agree with the ethanol mandates or coal subsidies, but I understand them. Trump supports those because he's trying to support *US* jobs. I support that, but I don't agree with HOW he did that. I also agree with having a strong military - you may not realize how Obama gutted certain parts of the military budget (long-term provisioning stuff) to pay for Afghanistan and other adventures. That's like if your adult child completely neglected maintenance on their house and car so they could spend their money on travel and partying. Even if you cut off the travel and partying, there's still going to be a bill to fix all of the things in the house and car that got ignored before. Deferring maintenance means those bills stack up and have to be dealt with later - and that's what Trump inherited.

[MrOracle]

And, while I normally would not like government control of the schools, the fact is that the schools went INSANELY, ILLEGALLY woke, and was causing direct harm to the children (as continues to happen in my state). FL and TX (and other states) were forced to rein that in, but they certainly aren't the ones who initiated the problem - that was 100% the left and their identity politics - which is pure evil.

[OtterMan68]

when Obama was president, the US far, FAR outspent every other country on the planet for military spending. There wasn't even a close second! The US under Obama spent more than twice what the Chinese spent.
Protectionism and picking winners and losers in the eocnomy protects some jobs while costing other people jobs and more money. The free markets are better than poltiicians playing favorites.
Trump and the GOP spend money like mad. Trump NEVER vetoed a budget. NEVER

[OtterMan68]

so you don't support local control and parent control over schools. You like top down state control. Got it.

[MrOracle]

"when Obama was president, the US far, FAR outspent every other country on the planet for military spending"

Yes - he was continuing a huge war that W had escalated far beyond what was warranted (the Bush's are solidly establishment), but an unbelievable amount of that money was completely wasted, while other parts of the military were vastly underfunded.

Here's an example: my little town has an MRAP - a huge, million-dollar mine-resistant armored truck. It was brand new. Lots of cities have these now. Why? Because under Obama, these were being cranked out like mad. And thousands and thousands were left in Afghanistan - many that had been used as little as a couple of weeks. They didn't want to spend $1000 per vehicle to bring them back, when they could spend $1M to build a new one - transferring tax dollars to contractors who would then hire a family member for $500,000 a year and contribute $40,000 to their campaign.

As I said, it's a lot more complicated than you're making it seem. There's PLENTY of blame to go around. Republicans are not innocent - not by far - but the Dems are even worse. Mostly, though, it's the entire establishment that's the problem. And Trump's biggest crime is not being establishment.

[DryGermanGuy]

It's sad, isn't it? That's the Trump effect, destroying the Grand Old Party single-handedly with his psychopathic behaviors, bullying and snake-oil bullshit. There recently was a GOP primary for state elections somewhere. Six of the seven candidates had felony convictions and the crowd was cheering to that fact! The party of law and order, ffs!!!

[exitseven]

In the last 3 de ades the Republican party became the party of the rich. They opened trade relationships with China to get cheap labor for American industries. Whole sections of the manufacturing sector was shipped over seas. The middle class has been hollowed out and labor unions have lost most of their power. This continued through every presidential administration until Trump was elected. He was the only one to try and bring back manufacturing to thr US. Putting a tariff on foreign made steel was bringing the steel industry back in the Midwest. Making new trade agreements with China as well as Mexico were designed to increase Amwrican exports.
Republicans still talk about morals and values. They are against pornograohy in our public schools and want to ban abortion the day before the due date. The deficit has been an issue since Clinton was president. Everybody talks about it but it the Washington Kleptocracy that is to blame. The spending of the last 3 years was to blame for not only a larger deficit but also runaway inflation. Then to fight inflation they printed more money which had the opposite effect.
Most people are willing to excusecPresident Trump's mean tweets. He is not a politician and does not care who he pisses off. Most of the people he insults deserve it anyway and it's not like the press does not constantly spread lies, about him and insult him. I really don't fault him for giving it right back. It is his policies that most of his supporters would like to see returned

[OtterMan68]

so Trump had NOTHING to do with budget deficits, the debt, or inflation?
His trade policies are conservative free-market policies?

[OtterMan68]

you also don't explain the move of people like DeSantis and Abbot to take away local control of gov and schools and put it in the hands of the state whereas the GOP used to favor local control over state control.

[exitseven]

Trump was trying to make people more prosperous so they pay more taxes During his administration reall wages rose across all demographics. The IRS collected a record number of money during the Trump years. The income dropped in 2020 and 2021. Some can be attributed to covid. It has since began to recover. A country that has prosperity can pay more in taxes and bring down the deficit. 9/11 was a big driver of the deficit and Covid really created a feeding frenzy in Washington

[exitseven]

De Santis is in favor of school choice. That takes control of the schools away from the teachers union and into the hands of patients. They can use the per pupil expenditure to send their kids to a private school.

[OtterMan68]

Did Trump's policies lead to the inflation that followed him?
Trump's anti-free market trade policies cost jobs
www.msn.com/.../ar-BB1j1VUc

[OtterMan68]

he took control of schools away from school boards and gave it to the state gov. He and his GOP legislature also banned local governments from enacting policies they don't like as did Aboot and the GOP in TX

[exitseven]

*parents*

[genericname85]

i don't see how what you said they "used to do", they're not doing anymore.

i don't see them to be protectionists of government but a government has to exist and do it's job proper. i don't see them "love putin" but they avoid just assuming the man is crazy when he actually successfully and to this day still continuously improves the wealth of the nation that he leads (which our politicians should start doing). they don't "excuse trumps lies". they just say that trump is still way better than biden with these obvious problems.

[OtterMan68]

The GOP used to be pro-free trade and free-markets.
They used to vility tyrants and autocrats. They love and adore Putin and Orban, and kiss their butts along with the prophet Tucker Carlson.
Putin has cracked down on civil rights and civil liberties and assassinated his political rivals, but people like you and Tucker Carlson don't care as long as the subways are clean and safe. How many of his people have died to expand his borders into Ukraine. Why do you admire that so much?

[genericname85]

politics is always tyrannical in some sense. "listening to a person" should not be confused with "loving" that personl. that's dumb. as dumb as not talking to a person who's a major leader in the geopolitical arena, which has lead to this war in the first place.

"putin was cracked down own" the fuck he has. he's doing better than ever. and the FBI helped him by toppling the ukrainian government to replace it with a pro American dud to give him a reason to attack. and since he didn't even attack after that, they had to add the insult of making ukraine part of nato xD

yes many people died and i hate that. but i understand why putin acts the way he does and america is at fault for that because they put him in a situation that he couldn't ignore without completely losing his authority as a leader.

that does not mean "i like" putin or what he does, if you think that, that is very very stupid.

[OtterMan68]

Ask Tucker Carlson and his GOP sycophants what they think of Putin. Also, Russia's civil rights record
freedomhouse.org/country/russia/freedom-world/2021
The FACT you don't consider Putin anti-civil liberties and civil rights shows how far the GOP has gone from anti-authoritarian to pro-authoritarian

[genericname85]

so in essence you're stating a completely false representation of what people actually think and then you go on about how stupid that opinion is, when really what is stupid is your idea of peoples opinion.

[OtterMan68]

what people think and what is actually happening on the ground can be two different things.

[genericname85]

yes. and what you think soeones opinion is and what their opinion actually is are very very different evidently.

[OtterMan68]

by all OBJECTIVE measures, Russia is not a place where civil rights and civil liberties are respected.
by most OBJECTIVE measures, protectionism and picking winners and losers in the economy is bad economic policy

[Anonymous]

Don't talk about Republicans excusing Trump if Democrats excuse Biden

Dems now excuse Biden for his dementia, getting lost, inability to speak without stuttering or forgetting, shaking hands with air, sniffing children's hair and his perv actions towards women and girls, and also his racist remarks like "If you don't vote for me you ain't black"

They also excuse the inflation (which is , if you do your research much higher than Trump era), The murders and crimes by illegal aliens because he loves them to stop them from entering and the Billions he gives to Ukraine and welfare of these aliens

[OtterMan68]

whataboutism!
True or False: The GOP used to be pro-free market, but now they are protectionists and for corporate and farm welfare.
True or False: Trump didn't even try to address the debt and deficit as President, and the GOP kept their mouths shut.
True or False: The GOP used to favor local and parent control over schools and government, and now they are pro-state control.
If you want to post a question about how democrats have changed their views over the past 10 years, go ahead.

[normalice]

The problems started with Reagan. He made a deal with the devil and basically brought Christians into the republican party to grant them reach on the condition they provide the votes needed for giving the rich more money and power. They cheerfully accepted and now christian nationalists have taken over the party alongside a few billionaires.

[Soteris]

Did they though? Did they really? I mean, its still mostly the same old fossils up there that there used to be. Mitch for example was a senator since 1985. This was basically how the Republicans always were, they were just more competent in upholding a public image and restrained themselves somewhat.

[msc545]

Trump happened. I think Trump happened as a result of authoritarianism and I think authoritarianism began to increase as a result of the United States failing to enforce antitrust laws beginning with Reagan which completely trashed the economy.

[gorydetails]

There's a good chunk of the republican party who is in cahoots with the democrat party to ruin the country. The rest supports Trump.

[Anonymous]

What happened to Democrats. They used to be opposed to war and genocide

[OtterMan68]

Obama

[JayBones]

The same thing that happened to the Democrat Party. Jews.

[Anonymous]

They got lots of smarts! Now, maybe the dems will follow their lead.

[Agape93]

Nothing happened, they just stopped pretending.

[laly520]

ask trump

[riverrat3]

tRump