Why the GOP Needs No Agenda

[bomberfox]

Here, I think, is something that addresses the central issue in the thread. Is it because they have "achieved their agenda"? Is the agenda to not have any check on their authority?

That is one part of Gingrich’s agenda yes.
The other part lies mostly in how districts work.

I think we should look at partisan gerrymandering as a violation of every American’s right to vote.

Deliberately mal apportioning representation is still disenfranchisement.

 

[Lloyd Christmas]

The only thing that has changed is the damage the Biden pukes have done in less than two years. That may take an entire term or two to correct.

LOL, yeah, infrastructure bill, climate bill, ended the pandemic and got the vaccines out, pulled out of Afghanistan,etc

Yeah, real failure LOL

 

[yankintx]

The only thing that has changed is the damage the Biden pukes have done in less than two years. That may take an entire term or two to correct.

So

LOL, yeah, infrastructure bill, climate bill, ended the pandemic and got the vaccines out, pulled out of Afghanistan,etc

Yeah, real failure LOL

Biden's ability to negotiate with Congress has given him some huge legislative victories.

One of the reasons Joe got my vote, his looong tenure in the Senate, it's paid off for America.

 

[Evilroddy]

@NWRatCon

The US Republican Party and powerful Republican organisations more generally invested heavily since the mid-1990s in being able to articulate and diseminate two powerful sets of notions that have negated any rational policy platforms or political agendas in American politics. Through building networks of think-tanks to craft these notions, through networks of talk-radio stations to diseminate them, networks of TV stations to do the same and networks of social media, the agents of the Republican Party have built the infrastructure to shape and sell one unholy political trinity of notions to its own followers and another unholy political trinity to its opposition. These notions are so effective because they disable many voters' capacity for reason, they moot political platforms and they win a minority party power more often than it should win.

The Republicans have realised that far more than reason, emotion sways and motivates voters. To that end they have very successfully sold three emotions - fear, rage and a pack-defence-mentality (belonging) which has allowed the party to create ersatz political issues that motivate and unite their voters under false emotional banners and which convinces those emotionally conscripted folks to vote against their own self-interests. They have further disabled reason by allying with the American Evangelical bloc and reactionary branches of other religious groups to combat reason with faith. Simultaneously they have jammed their political opponents political efficacy by selling them another trinity of alienation, polarisation/atomisation and a false sense of inferiority which saps their opposition's belief that they can win.

This is why no agenda or platforms are needed for Republicans to win. They're campaigning on emotion and tribal loyalty, not issues and policy rooted in reason. On rational issues they would lose badly because the Republican Party is so far removed from mainstream rational politics. This is emotionally driven, tribal politics.

Cheers and be well.
Evilroddy.

 

[gbg3]

This is my first visit to the Loft. I heard it is a place for respectful discussion, so I'll give that a try.

I think Republicans are, indeed, the boring party. We tend to like America and we tend to think our founding fathers had some excellent ideas. We don't necessarily want big or abrupt changes.
We don't think it wise to have 1st graders come to school and be encouraged to choose whether they'd like to be a boy or girl for the day.
We don't think it's wise to stop drilling for oil before a good alternative is ready to go and equipped to handle the needs of the nation such that the nation won't be crippled.
We do like small government.
We do believe in personal responsibility.
We feel it's important to have a secure border.
We think a business should feel safe that people won't just walk in and help themselves to whatever they want.
We like our flag and our national anthem.
We think our statues represent our history and should remain - to remind us of what we've worked on and fixed and from where we've come.
We think if a landlord and renter have reached an agreement, it should be honored, and the government shouldn't have the ability to step in and tell the renter you're excused and the landlord too bad.

These are just examples of things we tend to think are or were better, shouldn't have undergone radical change, and now need to be restored and/or tended to.

Change can be good, but it can also be very unnecessary and even quite detrimental. Once we've experienced years of Dem leadership, we often feel the most important thing we need to do, is move into correct mode. A perfect example is the border. It's a complete mess and it's going to need immediate and focused attention to try to return it to any type of normality. Because it's gotten so bad, it will now be a monumental task.

 

[Rogue Valley]

The Republican party platform is whatever Donald Trump says it is.

We just witnessed the Supreme Court taking away a woman's right to abortion throughout the country.

Trump appointed conservative Justices played a major role.

 

[Donatello]

No reason to be shocked...just get informed.

The GOP did NOT declare it had no agenda for 2020. It declared that the 2016 agenda...AKA Trump's agenda...was still in effect.

The rest of your post is irrelevant because it is based on your ignorance.

What were the top 3 of the GOP's 2016 Agenda?

 

[Donatello]

This is my first visit to the Loft. I heard it is a place for respectful discussion, so I'll give that a try.

I think Republicans are, indeed, the boring party. We tend to like America and we tend to think our founding fathers had some excellent ideas. We don't necessarily want big or abrupt changes.
We don't think it wise to have 1st graders come to school and be encouraged to choose whether they'd like to be a boy or girl for the day.
We don't think it's wise to stop drilling for oil before a good alternative is ready to go and equipped to handle the needs of the nation such that the nation won't be crippled.
We do like small government.
We do believe in personal responsibility.
We feel it's important to have a secure border.
We think a business should feel safe that people won't just walk in and help themselves to whatever they want.
We like our flag and our national anthem.
We think our statues represent our history and should remain - to remind us of what we've worked on and fixed and from where we've come.
We think if a landlord and renter have reached an agreement, it should be honored, and the government shouldn't have the ability to step in and tell the renter you're excused and the landlord too bad.

These are just examples of things we tend to think are or were better, shouldn't have undergone radical change, and now need to be restored and/or tended to.

Change can be good, but it can also be very unnecessary and even quite detrimental. Once we've experienced years of Dem leadership, we often feel the most important thing we need to do, is move into correct mode. A perfect example is the border. It's a complete mess and it's going to need immediate and focused attention to try to return it to any type of normality. Because it's gotten so bad, it will now be a monumental task.

When did the Republicans ever do anything to make Govt. smaller?

 

[Bullseye]

It seemed shocking in 2020 when the GOP literally declared it had no platform for the election (while Democrats continue to promulgate agendas with staggering amounts of eye-straining minutiae). But, it should not actually have been a surprise. As has been commented on in numerous articles, television programs, and on these forums, the Republican party has not had a "policy agenda" for decades, and even now just opposes anything promoted by Democrats even when they originally suggested it.

This would seem to be electoral suicide, and, indeed, "Republican senators have not represented a majority of the population since 1999, yet, from 2003 to 2007 and again from 2015 to 2021, Republicans had a majority of members of the Senate itself." Why The Republican Party Isn’t Concerned With Popularity (538). With the exception of 2004, Republican presidential candidates have not won the popular vote this century, and before that the last time was 1988, when George Bush, Sr. won 53% of the vote. His son, on his second try, only got 50.7% - the best showing by the GOP since 1988.

How is this possible? Why hasn't the party heeded the advice of it's own 2012 "autopsy" to be more inclusive? How has it continued to have power while opposing extremely popular policies? And how is it that historically unqualified and unpopular candidates continue to be nominated and elected?

That is what this thread is intended to explore.

When the White House and both houses of Congress are held by the opposes party AND the nation is still fighting COVID what good would a platform do. The Republican Party did release a summary of legislative objective a few months back, BTW,

 

[NWRatCon]

What were the top 3 of the GOP's 2016 Agenda?

Good luck.

 

[Nickyjo]

No reason to be shocked...just get informed.

The GOP did NOT declare it had no agenda for 2020. It declared that the 2016 agenda...AKA Trump's agenda...was still in effect.

The rest of your post is irrelevant because it is based on your ignorance.

That's the problem with what happened (or didn't happen) in 2020. They proposed nothing -- as if nothing had happened in the four years 2016-2020 that needed addressing -- because, as some admitted, they knew whatever platform they put forward might be contradicted or ignored by Trump. It's always bad to go Nazi in a discussion, but when that happened in 2020 it immediately brought to my mind how German soldiers pledged loyalty to Hitler over loyalty to the constitution and country. The GOP opted for Trump Uber Alles.

 

[Nickyjo]

When the White House and both houses of Congress are held by the opposes party AND the nation is still fighting COVID what good would a platform do. The Republican Party did release a summary of legislative objective a few months back, BTW,

I am gonna go out on a limb and suggest without looking that the GOP did come up with a platform in the past when the White House and both houses of Congress were held by democrats. Hint: your platform proposes an alternative to what the other guys are doing.

Republican Party Platform of 1964 | The American Presidency Project

www.presidency.ucsb.edu

Republican Party Platform of 1968 | The American Presidency Project

www.presidency.ucsb.edu

 

[NWRatCon]

It's interesting to see that the lack of an agenda has had such a profound impact on the GIP's (Grand Insurrectionist Party) prospects. While they may attain a simple majority in the House, those gains are entirely attributable to gerrymandering (and skewed courts to maintain it), which added at least 6 seats. Had they not done so, the Democrats would have retained the House as well as the Senate.

"Republicans started off with control of 187 seats, and Democrats only could draw 75. And that's because of who controls state legislatures. So Republicans had a very big advantage. And thanks to the 2019 Supreme Court ruling that greenlighted partisan gerrymandering, Republicans in states like Texas, Georgia, Florida and Ohio were able to take advantage of that and draw maps that really are skewed in favor of their party. In Florida, Governor DeSantis pushed a very aggressive map that gave Republicans four additional seats. And it's not only the big states. It's Tennessee, for example. Republicans eliminated a Democratic seat in Nashville. In Utah, they eliminated the competitive seat in the Salt Lake City area. So all of that adds up. And so Republicans this election have an advantage that I think will play out. It almost certainly looks like to be a very, very closely divided House.)

The impact of redistricting and new congressional maps on the midterms (NPR)​

As the old saying goes, "If you can't beat 'em, ...
manipulated the process until you can."

See also,

How redistricting affected the outcome of the elections (PBS)​

"WASSERMAN: Redistricting was destiny. And, you know, Republicans were able to manipulate the lines in Texas and Georgia and Tennessee and Ohio and especially Florida in their favor. And Florida Governor Ron DeSantis passed a map that will likely give Republicans - it has given Republicans - an additional four seats in that state, converting the delegation from 16-11, in Republican's favor, to 20-8. And that alone right there is likely to be the size of the Republican majority, if Republicans are able to hold on and win at least 218 seats. Now, that's half the equation."