Republican Party

The Republican Party (sometimes colloquially referred to both seriously and sarcastically as the "God Over People Guns Over People Greedy Old Perverts Grand Old Party") is — as of 2020 — one of the two major political parties in the United States. The party comprises several small, unofficial, and highly factionalized "sub-parties" with drastically different beliefs with a practically nonexistent partisan organization, all of which just so happen to (superficially, at least) maintain the illusion that they are a collective when, in reality, they are disjointed cliques and cabals who only have in common the fact that they all personally consider themselves to be "conservative" to some degree. With the rise of Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential election, this illusion of unity suffered damage, as not all of the GOP's cliques supported Trump as the nominee.[7]

The Republican Party animal. Refusing to adapt to a more sustainable lifestyle to cope with global warming, and having faith that it doesn't exist, threatens the party's and humanity's existence.

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“”How do you abandon deeply held beliefs about character, personal responsibility, foreign policy, and the national debt in a matter of months? You don’t. The obvious answer is those beliefs weren’t deeply held. … [I]t had always been about power. The rest? The principles? The values? It was all a lie.

—Stuart Stevens, former GOP campaign strategist, member of The Lincoln Project[1]

“”The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition.

—Thomas E. Mann & Norman J. Ornstein, 2012[2]

“”We oppose teaching of Higher order Thinking Skills [because they] have the purpose of challenging the student's fixed beliefs and undermining parental control.

—Texas GOP platform[3]

“”Facts are Stupid Things.

—Ronald Reagan on his party's ideology.

“”Samantha Bee: It's like the Republican party is a shit sandwich. How do you get Americans to eat the sandwich? Kellyanne Conway: You dip it in chocolate and you say it has no calories.

—Interview from c. 2007; Conway was Counselor to President Trump (2017–2020)[4][5]

“”If they were in America pushing the platform that they push, they would be Republicans.

—Iowa Republican congressman, Steve King[6]

Since the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower as POTUS, the party had been slowly descending into a complete embrace of anti-science and anti-intellectualism,[8][9][10] which has culminated in the anti-fact, fake news-dependent presidency of Trump.[11][12]

While there are various wings in the party characterized by different ideological viewpoints, some of which are completely rational, the most vocal "Republicans" these days tend to be right-wing populists, reactionary assholes, the psychotically religious, and, of course, white nationalists. There is an increasingly small center-right section representing moderate conservatives who generally happen to be the hawkish type, libertarian-leaning folk, and the tiny remnant of what used to be the establishment. That last faction generally includes those remnants of the establishment back when Ronald Reagan (RIP) was in office who have not fled over to the Democrats. Most of them, especially the last ones mentioned, are extremely confused, still pondering where in Lincoln's name it went all wrong. At the same time, the "normies" and the truly far-right vilify them as being "not true conservatives", or RINO for short. This wing had shrunk to almost nothing from when the New Right assumed direct control, causing the New Left to fall to the Third Way, causing a mass migration of moderates to the now-centrist wings of the Democrats, and culminating in the rise of the neoconservatives, the Tea Party, crypto-racist Trumpists, and the blatantly racist Alt-right faction, which, at this point, is probably close to getting a candidate of their own into Congress. (Oh wait!) Their slogan is "The party of Lincoln!", closely followed by "The South Will Rise Again!" in many, many cases. To put it simply, the Republican "Party" is an extremely complex and convoluted concept and notion for one to fully grasp, so we will do the best we can.

The decline of the moderate Republicans — the G. O. Party in itself had pretty much always been a party of moderates — slowly began during the aftermath of the 1972-onwards Watergate scandal.[13] This continued throughout the boom of the tax protest movement and the "Reagan Revolution", even though, by today's standards, Reagan's policies would be more comparable to those of the centrist ex-Republican Hillary Clinton.[14] Even so, Reagan was one of many factors in leading the Party to its current wingnut state, even if he was not one himself. This particularly had to do with his bringing into the party the Christian fundamentalists and evangelicals, who had once supported Jimmy Carter (President of the United States from 1977 to 1981) but who became disillusioned with the Democratic Party. Yet another Ronnie blunder. Either way, that caused the GOP as a whole to shift to the right at a far greater pace than the Democrats have moved to the left, and many of those centrist Reaganites and Rockefeller Republicans switched parties due to the more centrist policies of the Democrat Bill Clinton (President of the United States from 1993 to 2001). The final nail in the coffin came when Dubya, who was highly neoconservative, became President (2001). While many neocons like McCain remained with the party, the Republican Party, after McCain lost the 2008 U.S. presidential election, had completed its full transformation into the mess that it is today. Voteview and its sister sites have the statistics to back this up going back decades. Speaking of statistics, Republicans lie three times more often than Democrats.[15]

The old-style republicans (small "r") have become radical leftists without even trying (i.e. they're apparently trying to kill all white people because they think racism is bad).[16] Express any kind of socially progressive idea, and suddenly you've got your penis stuck in Karl Marx's beard. Some argue that moderate Republicans still exist and are waiting for a suitable figure to lead them. If so, it is hard to tell them from the faux-rebels running around.

The sane and the crazy

There isn't much sanity left. There was once a moderate, center-right faction that could actually comprehend freedom of religion and how having sanity doesn't make you a pinko commie; they're the remnants of the Eisenhower Era, and the public figure closest to this is Arnold Schwarzenegger.

This is not the Republican Party at large anymore. Since at least the 1980s, if not even earlier with the Southern Strategy, the "teh evul leebrals and illeegull alienz r destroyin' Murica oh noes #MAGA" faction has come to dominate the party, consisting of the neoconservative Reagan-style Religious Right, the Palin-style paleolibertarian Tea Party, and Trump's neo-fascist Alt-Right. This article is on the second type. Below is a list of ideological factions and general types of Republicans, from most moderate, by Republican standards, to the most racist wingnuts ever to exist in American history.

The Moderates

• Actual Centrists
• Fusionists
• Libertarians (so now you know we've reached full hellworld when "I'd like government not to work" is the good-guy option)

Conservatives

• Neocons
• The Swamp (businessmen, lobbyists, and consultants)
• Neoliberals (lawmakers whose policies explicitly empower corporations over workers)
• "Independents" who always find ways to support the party
• Religious Wingnuts

Far Right

• The Tea Party (an amalgamation of the libertarian, evangelical, neoliberal, and paleoconservative wings but with a stronger emphasis on conspiracy theories, racism, misogyny, and anarcho-capitalism, many of whom would later become part of the MAGA crowd)
• Paleocons (who first found their voices in Pat Buchanan and later through Sarah Palin)

There be Dragons

• Conspiracy Theorists
• Make America Great Again (MAGA) supporters
• Neoconfederates
• The Alt-right
• QAnon

No good deed, et cetera

Didn't the South use to be Democratic?[17] The "Southern Strategy" is the short-form US History 101 exam answer to this question. Before the Civil Rights Act (CRA) of 1964, major Democrat blocs came in two flavors:

1. Dixiecrats and some Republicans associated with the Abolitionist movement
2. Northeastern reformer-types, who we would understand as the modern Democratic Party

From 1940 onward, the Northeastern branch grew dominant, adding a pro-civil rights plank to the party platform and reversing its segregationist nature. So suddenly, you have this big clump of disgruntled southerners who feel abandoned by their party (whom they've been supporting for abstract reasons) and a GOP eager to snap up those votes by campaigning against the Civil Rights Act.[18][19] Republicans have a very comprehensive platform to get those voters out, but they obviously have a ceiling in terms of popular votes.

Interestingly, before (and shortly following) the CRA, many Democratic Parties in the South, while agreeing on segregation, differed significantly on economic issues. You had radical leftists like Huey Long and arch-conservatives like John Rarick under the same tent, even within the same state (in this case, Louisiana).[20] Also, there was a lot more diversity in primary elections. In Tennessee, for instance, Nashville tended to send more liberal Democrats to Congress (such as Estes Kefauver) who were more receptive to civil rights, while outlying rural areas supported Blue Dog Democrats. The problem for Democrats is that the white half of their coalition either switched to the GOP, moved away, or died, leaving the crusty, black civil rights leaders in charge. The end result is that party affiliation is now overwhelmingly determined by race and locality.

The story of the last half-century (1968-2016) will be the tale of how the GOP systematically turned white working-class voters against the Democrats. First, it was the Southern Strategy with race, then the evangelical movement with abortion, and now it's blue-collar whites with nativist populism. Bringing the Southern Strategy up in a debate is pointless since they just dismiss it as darkie lies liberal propaganda.

Despite all this, Republicans continue trying to dine out on their distant origin as the anti-slavery party; many will, with a straight face, offer their and the Democratic Party's pre-CRA history as proof that the Democrats are the party of racism, not the Republicans.

War machine

See the main article on this topic: Military-industrial complex

Although the Cold War has ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia remains a fearsome military power. Meanwhile, there is some tension between the U.S. and Red China over economic and military matters.[21] Some see a pivot East, and having China as a strategic partner against Russia is a sensible way forward.[22] With so many parts of the world looking increasingly volatile, it is not a surprise that shares of defense companies went up 15% right after Trump secured the White House.[23]

Kinder, Küche, Kirche

See the main article on this topic: Pro-life

“”If Planned Parenthood wants to be involved in providing counseling services and HIV testing, they ought not be in the business of providing abortions. As long as they aspire to do that, I’ll be after them.

—Mike "Deus Vult" Pence,[24] who thinks HIV is a useful deterrent[25]

Women make up just 9% of elected Republican members of Congress in 2016, which is down from 11% in 2006.[26]

This is the most hypocritical thing about "conservatism" in the U.S. If you want to reduce abortions, comprehensive sex education and birth control is the way to go, as is addressing the social and economic factors that drive demand for abortion, such as providing maternity leave. Republicans have fought against all of these things, instead pushing "abstinence-only education" (which is a farce),[27][28] banning birth control, and ratfucking Planned Parenthood.[29] Don't forget their crusade to destroy the social safety net.[30] (And then these retrocrat clowns will bleed public education so that those kids go to garbage schools, so they can claim public education is ineffective and continue the feedback loop.) Abstinence-only education and abortion restrictions are other examples of the state forcing people to either come to Jesus or suffer.

Megalophobia

See the main article on this topic: Reaganism

“”The policies Republicans loathed were actually quite popular. So, to garner support for their attack on an activist government, they turned to a mythological narrative that drew on America’s long history of racism and sexism. They won voters not by convincing them of the merits of returning to a world in which businessmen ran the country, but rather by insisting that taxes redistributed wealth from hardworking white people to lazy minorities and feminists who wanted abortions on demand.

—Heather Cox Richardson, historian[31]

Republicans will say they want smaller government while insisting on abortion or marriage restrictions, a more extensive security state, and more military spending.

Welfare for me but not for thee

Republicans justify specific policies by claiming they want smaller government when they really just don't want money going to the wrong people. Reagan cut the top marginal rate by over 40% and made deductions far more generous while simultaneously increasing spending. He found the secret sauce the GOP needs to keep winning: Cut taxes, but don't cut back on services your voters use, thereby driving the government deeper into debt.

To put it another way, Republicans' last push to privatize Social Security and Medicare was one of the driving forces behind the 2006 midterms that flushed their majorities down the toilet. They'd be insane to go near that again, no matter how much the Boy Wonder from Wisconsin loves the idea.[32]

Thanks, Obama

“”A lot of us woke up every morning thinking about how to kick Obama, who could say the harshest thing about Obama on the air. We ended up where any hint of nuance or maturity just proved you were incapable of being the bull in the china shop that our voters wanted.

—Ed Rogers, Republican "mega-lobbyist"[33]

Half of Obama's policies were positions the Republicans loved, then suddenly hated as soon as Obama supported them. Obamacare is the obvious example, but Trump won promising to spend $1 trillion on infrastructure.[34] The $770b infrastructure program Obama passed (with only 1 GOP representative voting yes) had $330b in tax breaks and credits,[35] and Republicans attacked him on it for the next 3 years.[36]

Although many laugh at how ridiculous the meme is,[37][38][39] Republicans are simply conditioning people to associate failure with Democrats. Every morning the headlines at Fox bleat about the awful things Democrats are doing. It works well in countries where education standards are low and freedom of thought is suppressed, and it worked to destroy Hillary Clinton's chances.[40] So, quite reasonably, the GOP thinks there are a few more drives left in the old jalopy.[41][42]

Penis envy

Supporting dictators like Putin, Assad, Duterte, and Kim is an important part of being a small government conservative.[43][44][45][46] But Obama was the real tyrant for making us buy health insurance.

You may recall plenty of Republicans claiming that Obama wasn't strong enough in standing up to Russia during the Crimean incident and is a modern-day Neville Chamberlain.[47] But that's a criticism of Obama being weak, not of Putin being strong. For a while, their stance has been that Putin is a strong ethno-nationalist and someone to look up to.[48][49][50]

Trump's views on NATO and the UN are one of the most dangerous things about his presidency.[51] The US isn't paying all this money as a charity; it buys global influence. Think of it like a rich vacationer passing everyone fifty-dollar tips for fetching a bottle of water or bringing fresh towels, so all the service people know that it's in their best interest to keep doing things that make him or her happy. If the U.S. doesn't fill that role, somebody else will, like, say, China. Indeed, there are signs this is already happening. Meanwhile, Trump will let Russia do whatever they want so long as Rosneft keeps sending his cut and his debts to Russian creditors don't come due.[52][53] The word for this sort of caper is "corruption".[54]

Live free or die

2016 shook everyone's faith that there's a correlation between economic well-being and voting patterns. There's clearly a correlation between perception of well-being and voting patterns, but that's a different thing.[55]

Republicans refused to do their jobs for 8 years; they were rewarded with all three government branches. They didn't pay the price for shutting down the government, damaging the US credit rating with their debt limit stunts, the sequester, or refusing to pass any stimulative measures to help the economy. They certainly won't pay the price for raping the environment[56] (a congressman who gets a 92 rating from the American Conservative Union can be kicked out of his district for acknowledging AGW). Flint happened because the city basically told the EPA to eat shit and mind its own business after the EPA said they needed to test the water quality.[57] Michigan was saved entirely by Democrats and the Obama administration, and it voted for the party that wanted to let their main industry go bankrupt.[58] Tangible, local improvements in life don't matter in elections anymore.

Party of No

“”His insight was that the way you beat Obama is by grinding things to a halt, which would hurt the Democrats more because they were the party in the White House and the party of government, and because it would undermine Obama's whole comity shtick. Which paid off beyond McConnell's wildest dreams by now electing someone who fed off voter anger with Washington dysfunction.

—Alec MacGillis[59]

Since 9/11, the parties controlling Congress have gradually pushed the envelope of obstructionism. When one party does it, that sets a precedent for the other party to do it, and they usually go beyond the precedent. So over time, obstructionism in Congress just gets worse and worse, and due to gerrymandered Congressional districts, 90% of Congressmen are more worried about their primaries than their general elections. Obstructionism is rewarded, compromise punished.[60]

After 2000, the Bush-McCain wing of the party ballooned the national debt to its highest level in American history. Their successor, Barack Obama,^{(not a Republican)} sought to clean up their mess by cutting the deficit by two-thirds. Since them, the GOP has done everything in its power to become known as the "Party of No":[61]

• Trade Adjustment Assistance to retrain workers displaced by free trade: blocked by Republicans.[62][63]
• Proposed free community college program: blocked by Republicans.[64][65]
• Infrastructure Bill, proposing $60b on highway, rail, transit and airport improvements + $10 billion in seed money for infrastructure bank: blocked by Republicans[66][67]
• Jobs Bill to "give tax breaks for companies that 'insource' jobs to the U.S. from overseas while eliminating tax deductions for companies that move jobs abroad": blocked by Republicans[68][69]

Hence why they want to impeach anyone and everyone they disagree with. Just look at Obama and Hillary: They had a laundry list of "unconstitutional" or unlawful things the White House is doing, and every time the motion got shot down, they just moved on to the next item.[70] It would not have been any different with Hillary; she would be constantly threatened with impeachment. It's really one of the few plays the Rs run.

Meanwhile, since Reagan's day, the American people have been told that the federal government can't fix the problem; the federal government is the problem, so they don't mind that their Congress is deadlocked and obstructionist. They don't see or understand how this cedes power to the Executive Branch. More and more decisions are being made by the President or the many unelected bureaucrats working under him/her.[71]

Go home, Republicans, you're drunk

“”I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but I fear that at least since 2010 we've been witnessing a quiet, slow-motion coup d'etat whose purpose is to repeal every bit of progressive legislation since the New Deal and entrench the privileged positions of the wealthy and powerful — who haven't been as wealthy or as powerful since the Gilded Age of the late 19th century.

—Robert Reich[72]

“”The outside groups don’t always move votes directly but they create an atmosphere of fear among the members. And so many of these [groups] now live in the conservative world of talk radio and Tea Party conventions and Fox News invitations. And so the conservative strategy of the moment, no matter how unrealistic it might be, catches fire. The members begin to believe they can achieve things in divided government that most objective observers would believe is impossible.

—Robert Costa, National Review[73]

Republicans pander to the right in the presidential primaries. Democrats have to move to the middle. Why? One theory is that Republicans have too many groups in their tent and end up talking out of both sides of their mouths to appease begrudging constituent groups. This leads them to spend political capital on VP picks just to keep segments of their base from staying home.

The problem with these big tent parties in a two-party system is that they are unstable. It's so difficult to bring people together, and hate for the other is often the glue that binds them into a single unit. The alt-right is the hidden "4th leg" of the GOP stool.[74][75][76][77] If the GOP cuts off that leg, will the party be able to stand? Nobody really knows.

What we're seeing today started as far back as the Reagan Republicans. They woke up, fought, and then went back to sleep.[78] They rose up again in the nineties under Newt Gingrich and forced Bill Clinton to the center (he started out much farther to the left). Then they went back to sleep.[79][80] They rose up again in 2008, "because of Obama" as Dems like to say, but as always, it was a backlash not against Democrats but moderate Republicans. They aren't going to sleep this time.[81][82]

The rise of support for authoritarianism and Trumpism

“”The so-called Christian Right, for one, just have a different agenda. And I think big business is worried about them: the C.E.O.s don't want that kind of fascism [...] these Newt Gingrich-types might go too far and start cutting down the parts of the state system that are welfare for them—which of course is totally unacceptable.

—Noam Chomsky[83]

“”They said I wasn’t born here. They said climate change is a hoax. They said that I was going to take everybody’s guns away [...] Donald Trump didn’t start it. He just did what he always did, which is slap his name on it, take credit for it, and promote it. That’s what he does.

—Barack Obama[84]

Tea Party politics has always been proto-Trumpism: It's never been about small government so much as about populism and disdain for the Washington cabal.[85]

The most logical place to mark the start of this particular "movement" is 2009 when the big money started moving to the Tea Party astroturf movement[86] and Obama was doggedly trying to reform health insurance. But in actuality, conservatives have become more uncompromising because campaign finance laws keep getting weaker over the last several decades. Bachmann, Huckabee, Cruz, Cotton, Jindal, Santorum, etc., have been around for a while, and their right-wing anarchist beliefs have become the norm.[87][88][89] This is also a result of the GOP using the culture wars as political fodder: This time, Baptist voters weren't going to "fall in line" and vote for Jeb! or Rubio, and the GOP can't win without them.[90]

The Democrats are disintegrating almost as fast as the GOP: their bases in Chicago, Seattle, and New York have finally turned on them, and the Bernie Sanders campaign was basically their worst nightmare.[91] (There's also questionable voting practices in some red states.) The Republicans should be euphoric, but they're in a similar rut: a large part of their base is to the right of their leadership. Unlike the Democrats, the Republicans have lost control of those people. The House/Congress has been a colossal disaster under the GOP majority: They managed to get rid of their own Speaker because he wasn't conservative enough and actually made deals with Democrats to force their own incumbents out.[92]

Republicans have recently rebranded themselves as a "worker's party" to deal with the shift toward automation and foreign labor.[93] It seems that the party lines are shifting to globalism vs. nationalism rather than just left vs. right; but with the Tea Party in Congress and Trump's cabinet of vultures, people are going to get more of the same.[94] "Trump Republicans" or "Ryan Republicans", whatever: both groups are about massive tax cuts for the rich that will, magically, pay for themselves by generating laughably delusional economic growth rates.[95][96][97][98]

There has always been an undercurrent of authoritarian behavior from Republicans beginning with, at the very least, Richard Nixon, who explicitly said, "When the President does it, that means it is not illegal." This all came to a head under George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, who used the 9/11 attacks to expand executive power under the auspices of fighting terrorists, including authorizing torture in black sites and warrantless surveillance of citizens. Many state Republican parties have undertaken voter suppression, stopping votes from counting, gerrymandering, gutting the Voting Rights Act, stopping recounts (as seen under Bush v. Gore), and unprecedented obstruction while in power, to make sure government never works. It wouldn't take long before this decades-long fostering of anti-intellectualism, identification of enemies, and vicious demonization of their enemies would lead to something far worse brewing over the years. Donald Trump is the most extreme and eager expression of this brand of authoritarianism, as his own dictatorial impulses are paired up with overt racism, an incitement of violence, glorification of the whites-only good old days,[note 1] vicious scapegoating of minority and oppressed communities, and a machismo cult of personality that has created a very American style of fascism that isn't going away anytime soon.

An analysis by international political scientists of support for authoritarianism within the two main US political parties from 1970-2018 found that opposition to authoritarianism among Democrats was high and unwavering during that period.[100][101] The same study found that Republican opposition to authoritarianism was slightly lower but similar to Democrats from 1970 to the mid-1980s, but that support for authoritarianism steadily increased after that until the mid-2010s when it began a steep rise, culminating in the election of Trump.[100] "This is a prime example of what political scientists call asymmetric polarization — a growing partisan gap driven almost entirely by the actions of the Republican Party."[100] The turning point in the GOP rise in support for authoritarianism was likely the Tea Party movement, which began in earnest in 2009.[100][102] The increased GOP support can also be found in two sub-indicators: increased demonization of the opposition and increased incitement of violence by GOP leadership (both beginning in the mid-2000s).[100] Authoritarianism within the Republican Party will likely increase as time goes on. Notice how senator Mike Lee had an increase of support among Republicans despite tweeting in October 2020 that that the United States is "not a democracy" and that "democracy isn't the objective; liberty, peace, and prospefity [sic] are."[103][104]

In October 2020 the V-Dem Institute reported that the Republican party has followed a similar trajectory to authotarian parties such as Viktor Orbán's Fidsez, Narendra Modi's BJP party and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's AKP. While the Democratic party has changed little in its attachment to democratic norms and has has remained similar to centre-right and centre-left parties in western Europe.[105]

Ties to Mammon

Despite their claims of being in the service of God, in recent times, the Republican Party has shown a stronger belief in Mammon, the personification or deity of greed in the Bible. Some within the GOP try to mask Jesus as one of them, altering his teachings to serve their political platform. A prime example of this would be one idiot and his "bible." Others are more open with their agendas, such as Sen. Jim Bunning.[106] Even some right-wing ministers encourage deceit.[107] The closest, thus far, of the GOP stating who they really pray to would be Glenn Beck encouraging his viewers to be greedy and leave their church if they talk about helping the poor (which he compared to Nazism).[108] And these people believe they deserve a place in heaven.

The early 2017 Republican decision to swiftly tie the hands of the Congressional Ethics Council[109] is assumed to have been done in preparation for as-of-yet untold mischief.[110]

Timeline

“”I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country; corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption in High Places will follow, and the Money Power of the Country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the People, until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands, and the Republic is destroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war.

—Abraham Lincoln[111]

Republicans always seem to be one step ahead in the game. They blackened Bill, God-bothered Gore, capsized Kerry, obstructed Obama, and hacked Hillary. The only times the Democrats seem to get a break is when Republicans implode from hypocrisy or corruption, which quickly leads to scandal fatigue. The general evolution of social conservativism in the modern era is perhaps best summarized by former-conservative Damon Linker:[112]

“”When social conservatives thought they were the moral majority, it made sense for them to dream of exercising real political power. When they recognized that they were a minority, it made sense for them to resign themselves to adopting a defensive posture and preparing to live out their days in a country as dissenters from the reigning liberal consensus. What makes no sense is for social conservatives to think they can be both weak and strong at the same time — a minority that wields the power of a majority. Unless, of course, social conservatives no longer care about democracy.

• 1854 — The party is founded.[113] (Contrary to its name, the GOP is in fact younger than the Democratic Party and not that grand either.) Times are very different from today, and people look to the Republican Party for favorable policies concerning slavery and trade as opposed to the Democratic Party, which, at the time, favored the interests of planter-slaveholders and the South.[note 2]

• 1860 — Abraham Lincoln, possibly the greatest president ever, is elected[note 3]. He is remarkably bipartisan (has a Democrat for Vice President[note 4]) and agreeable, acting on what he feels is best for America rather than what is best for his party. He still managed to be the most divisive President in the country's history as his election was the single event that led to the Civil War after it had been brewing for years, if not decades. Unfortunately, he was not bipartisan enough to escape the ire of a particular Confederate sympathizer, who assassinated him on April 14, 1865.

• 1868 — Ulysses S. Grant gets elected, and is arguably the first person to take the party in a clear fiscally conservative direction, having policies tough on inflation and focusing government resources to aid industry. Grant was much maligned later for being tough on the KKK and more enlightened on civil rights than many later presidents. Thus, the corruption during his administration gets played up for all it's worth.

• 1870s — The Half-Breeds, the RINOs of their day, opposed the mainline Stalwarts over civil service reform and ending the patronage system. The whole Reconstruction program is viewed by Democrats and Republicans alike as merely the most massive extension yet of the time-accepted spoils system. When President James Garfield was assassinated in 1881 by a disgruntled election worker who felt Garfield owed him a job, the Civil Service Reform Act was passed, ending the spoils system and political cronyism. Its implementation was the beginning of the Progressive Era; the Half-Breeds became the Progressive movement, which eventually became the Progressive Party.

• 1896 — William McKinley battles his famous campaign with William Jennings Bryan, clearly setting the party positions of the pro-populist Democrats and pro-business Republicans for the next century. McKinley backs a strong gold standard, which his opponents cited as favoring debt-holders and banks. McKinley is supported by (and arguably elected because of) powerful interests such as Standard Oil and JP Morgan. His foreign policy also pursues a course of imperialism that included the annexation of Hawaii and naval war with Spain. While opposed by the Democrats, this policy is eventually followed by both parties post-WWI.

• 1901 — Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt becomes president following the assassination of McKinley. He goes on to do many things that would be anathema to modern Republicans, including fighting big business and protecting the environment.

• 1912 — The Republicans are split between the conservative William H. Taft and the progressive Roosevelt. When Taft's convention moves, TR leads an exodus, fracturing the Republican electorate. Roosevelt comes in second, and the Democrats take the White House.

• 1920-1929 — pro-business Republicans retake the presidency and spend 9 years getting tangled up in scandals and presiding over a massive laissez-faire economic boom, which eventually fell over onto itself and led into... (Sound familiar?)

• 1929 — The Great Depression starts. The Republican Party applies the "just watch the country go down the crapper" strategy. Contrary to what most people think, Herbert Hoover moves immediately into action, attempting a bailout and donating large amounts of his own funds to charity to keep people out of poverty. However, he explicitly tried to keep the government out of it, while the private charities he attempted to bolster failed to help people.

• 1933 — Republicans coalesce against Franklin Delano Roosevelt (a Democrat), another candidate for the greatest president ever. Roosevelt greatly helps relieve unemployment during the Depression and has the luck of being in office when the U.S. is drawn into, and helps win, World War II. He brought many years of prosperity to America, along with hitherto unknown levels of national debt.

• 1961 — Dwight D. Eisenhower finishes his two-term presidency. While infamous for introducing the "Under God" part of the Pledge of Allegiance, as well as creating the "In God We Trust" motto, he was incredibly pragmatic, creating NASA, expanding Social Security, starting the desegregation process, and warning against a "military-industrial complex." He was also the last Republican president to balance the federal budget.[114]

• 1948-1968 — The segregationist Southern Democrats are abandoned by their increasingly tolerant party and gradually move to the increasingly conservative Republican Party.[115] In 1964, the Deep South is the only region captured by Republican Barry Goldwater (aside from his home state). By the end of the decade, the once solidly Democratic South has turned red (although Southerners Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton temporarily reverse the trend).

• 1969-1974 — Richard "Tricky Dick" Nixon is elected on a promise to end the Vietnam War. By the time of complete U.S. withdrawal from Southeast Asia, however, his "plumbers" were arrested for trying to bug the DNC offices in the Watergate complex, resulting in a cover-up so disgusting, and abuses of power so scary, that he had to resign or risk getting impeached. To his credit, though, he founded the EPA. Gerald Ford replaced him till 1976, when Democrat peanut farmer Jimmy Carter was elected President.

• 1973 — Roe v. Wade ruling coupled with 1962 school prayer ruling and opposition to feminism and civil rights leads to a wave of defections from traditional Southern Democrats and the birth of the modern social conservative movement and religious right.

• 1981-1989 — Ronald Reagan gets into office. At this point, the Republicans change from a center-right party to neoconservatism with the introduction of trickle down economics. Gets credit for delayed effects of the Soviet economy, delayed effects of previous presidents, and for being rude to other world leaders. Illegally sells weapons to Iran, which are used several years later by present-day extremists. Spends 1/4 of all military defense money allotted during the Cold War (in part by literally trying to build a space laser), and starts a 30-year trend of borrowing like a sailor without any regard for the consequences. Becomes principal deity to a new, cultish religion. Stops the horrible problem of 20-year-old adults drinking by signing the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1986, and vetoes a 1987 highway bill because it included 121 earmarks and was $10 billion over the line he had drawn in the sand.

• 1994 — The Republican Party takes control of Congress due to complacency and corruption in the Democratic Party. Begins a fourteen-year era where the Republicans really screw things up and destroy any chance of power for dozens of years after a Democratic president and a new Democratic majority is elected in 2008. (It took the Democratic Party 61 years to become fat and lazy, and it only took the Republicans 14.) (At least in theory.)

• 2000 — The Republican Party elects a monkey, chiefly due to Al "Doom and Gloom" Gore stealing votes that should rightfully have gone to Buchanan and Nader, and voter suppression in Florida. Republicans give way to big gub'ment ideas like increased defense spending, border control, and the worsening of the War on Drugs. Fiscal conservatism is put on the back burner. It's almost as if they actually want a big government, and all their bile about "small government" is just a ruse to defund all the programs they don't like...weird.

• 2005 — Bush signs a $286.4 billion highway bill passed by a GOP-controlled Congress, earmarking $24 billion for 6,376 pet projects. What line? What sand?

• 2007 — Bush presses for passage of John McCain's bill granting a path to citizenship for 20 million illegal immigrants. Only a grassroots effort by wingnuts who demand the border be locked down dials back the GOP drive for amnesty.

• 2008 — As his presidency was winding down, Dubya issued a series of executive orders with nasty environmental consequences.

• 2009 — Obama becomes president, and the next 8 years become an endless slog of fear-mongering and "whatever Obama wants, we don't!"

• 2010 — The Republicans begin their massive campaign of smears, fear-mongering and misinformation against the Democrats. The Teabaggers are spawned. The Republicans become the "Party of No" as they try everything they can to block important or useful legislation proposed by the Democrats socialists commies cultural Marxists sexual Bolsheviks leebrals. Unenthusiastic liberals stay home as angry conservatives turn out to elect enough scary people to Congress to take control of the House.

• 2011 — Control of the House achieved, congressional Republicans relax and enjoy preventing Obama from making any progress by not passing anything for him to sign. The nation shrugs as attention is drawn to the trainwreck that is the 2012 presidential campaign.

• 2012 — Mitt Romney becomes the Republican Party's nominee for President of the United States in the 2012 election. He loses the election to the incumbent, Barack Obama, with (in full irony) 47% of the vote.

• 2013 — Despite humiliating losses in the 2012 elections (they only won the House of Representatives because the boundaries were rigged in their favor), the Republican Party is continuing to stake out far-right stances on the deficit as well as social issues like abortion and gun control. No major attempt is being made to reconcile with Hispanics or African-Americans after the 2012 debacle (with many establishment conservatives fearing they're going to get "primaried"), and it is increasingly doubtful if they can retake the presidency in 2016.[116] Gun nuts, ancaps, and alt-righters have begun to take over the party and Republicans don't even realize it yet.[117][118]

• 2015 — Now in control of Congress, the Republicans help make America's chief legislative body into the single most anti-science institution in American history. [119] This includes having Ted Cruz oversee NASA and James Inhofe, the War on Science chief, as chairman of the United States Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. (Richard Nixon would be sickened right about now.) The Tea Party purges the last remaining "moderates", House Speaker included. Some conservative talking heads like Levin are now decrying Fox as a liberal bastion[120] and Reince Priebus as a secret liberal. This is one of the guys Cruz wants to moderate the GOP debates. Shit is bananas.

• 2016 — The party abandons all pretenses of being "small-government conservatives" and give in completely to authoritarianism, social Darwinism, and palingenetic ultranationalism. Even by Republican standards, the crop of Presidential candidates doesn't have any substance to it at all. Their platform is Screw The Dems because that's all the base wants to hear. As in 2012, the debates never yield a thought-out position, just "I'll have the opposite of what he's having." Inexperienced young dude leaving? We need the most establishment family dynasty ever! Super-established former Secretary of State running? We need some new blood, someone from outside the Beltway who doesn't play by the rules! The fact that a troll candidate is at the top of the polls for months on end says it all about this murderers' row.

• 2017 — The Democrats are a minority on all government levels, having been swept out in the national election. It seems like Republicans have been so disciplined the last four years that they'll be able to further cut taxes for the rich, gut financial regulations, weaken health insurance, and restrict immigration. However, their narrow Senate majority makes passing specific bills (such as Obamacare repeal) extremely difficult. At least most of their policies tangentially affect "the budget" and will therefore be eligible for reconciliation rules. They don't answer to the everyday pressures of "bringing home the bacon"; they answer to a kind of ideological wave rather than making deals. Right-wing populism is here to stay, at least for the moment. Things aren't all rosy for them, though; some well-known GOP strongholds in the House and Senate have been weakened, and Democrats were actually able to win seats in otherwise guaranteed Republican districts; Doug Jones versus Roy Moore for the senatorial seat from Alabama is a notable case. Finally, there's that whole possible foreign collusion not limited to Russia going on that brings a big question mark on the conflict of interest of the party, if not the eligibility of the president.

• 2018 — Despite benefiting from massive gerrymandering, voter suppression, and the structural advantage of being a rural party, the GOP somehow lost control of the US House of Representatives in November 2018. The specific reasons for this loss remain up for debate, but it certainly has nothing to do with the Very Stable Genius who occupies the White House. It's not all bad news for the GOP, though; Republicans did net two seats in the Senate, thanks to their unbelievable achievement of winning elections in North Dakota, Indiana, and Texas, though the Democrats weren't planning on fighting for those seats anyway, so the win isn't much to brag about. The GOP and Trump also partially shut down the government for 35 days, the longest ever in U.S. history, after Trump refused to sign any budget without $5 billion for his border wall. Get ready folks, this could go on for a while.

• 2019 - The Mueller Report is released. It shows damning evidence of Russian interference in the 2016 election and evidence of the Republican Party complacently accepting Russian interference (as the most charitable interpretation). It lays out at least 10 instances in which Donald Trump tried to obstruct justice. In August, an anonymous whistleblower presented phone recordings of Donald Trump asking Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate alleged corruption on Joe Biden, which are severe allegations and lead to Trump's impeachment late in 2019.

• 2020 - Where do we even begin? Donald Trump is impeached in late 2019 and early 2020 for attempting to elicit foreign interference from Ukraine to help him dig up dirt on his presumptive opposition in exchange for congressionally supplied military protection against Russia. While it's no secret that Trump is a very corrupt politician, and the evidence is damning, the vote in the Senate was still along party lines nonetheless (the only deviation being Mitt Romney), and Trump avoided conviction and removal from office. Polls before the election predict a shitstorm waiting to happen[note 5], almost consistently favoring Joe Biden in even bigger margins than they incorrectly did for Hillary in 2016 when she ran against Trump; polls from even traditionally Republican strongholds were too close for comfort, with Biden leading in some states. Also, the coronavirus is a thing, and the economy, whose strength Trump relies on far too much to try and keep his supporters, crashes, implodes, and burns up in a nuclear inferno visible from space (and economists had already predicted an eventual recession) in the worst downturn since the Great Depression, thanks partially to his complete botch job of "handling" the pandemic- as well as the decaying healthcare infrastructure Trump is only peeling more from. Meanwhile, Trump consistently downplays the risk the virus poses, continues to hold large campaign rallies amid the pandemic, sows doubt about science- and evidence-based ways to avoid infection by spreading dangerous misinformation that fact-checkers nationwide immediately scramble to correct, and publicly encourages his followers to oppose public health restrictions, such as tweeting that someone needs to "LIBERATE MICHIGAN!" from a closure of non-essential businesses. Several Republican Congresspeople and state governors follow his lead, with results ranging from individual politicians further beclowning themselves to red states experiencing much higher COVID infection and death rates than the blue states that Trump pretends are in "anarchy" due to communist socialist BLM media antifas. In the 2020 Presidential election, Democratic candidate Joe Biden wins the popular vote by a somewhat comfortable margin, and the Electoral College confirms his victory without a hitch. To the surprise of no one Trump, who has been telling his supporters for months that COVID is no big deal, injecting themselves with disinfectant cures it, and mail-in votes are insecure, decries the (widely expected) influx of Biden votes after mail-in ballots are counted as evidence of massive fraud; he then deploys a crack(pot) legal team to file dozens of lawsuits challenging the electoral results in various states to try and subvert the will of his own people (authoritarian much?)- nearly all of which (also unsurprisingly to anyone with half a brain) fail spectacularly. The Orange Snowflake, upon (privately) realizing this, promptly starts to scream at various Republicans he had once endorsed and stumped for as "beautiful, wonderful people" on Twitter with his caps-lock key as the process of confirming the votes moves further and further forward, in a manner akin to the bunker scene in the ever-parodied Der Untergang- all the while continuing to pretend that the election can still be stolen as a massive scam to siphon money off his supporters so he doesn't go to jail for tax evasion at the expense of people's respect for our democracy, further demonstrating how he doesn't care about his country or even what our future children will be taught about him in their history classes; only about his own instantaneous self-interests. The year ends with a feud between Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell over the size of COVID stimulus checks, and both Trump and the old turtle try to make one of the proposed bills all about the former, as if to further demonstrate their party's utter depravity these days.[121]

• 2021 - The GOP's year gets off to a rollicking start when Trump brags on Twitter about an election-related phone call with Georgia's Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger. Journalists at The Washington Post subsequently release audio of the hour-long call, in which Trump repeatedly pressures Raffensperger to "find" enough extra Trump votes in a recount to flip the state red.[122]. Days later, Democrats John Ossoff and Raphael Warnock narrowly prevail in runoff elections in Georgia, tying the Senate at 50-50 and meaning that upon her inauguration, Vice President Kamala Harris will cast tie-breaking votes, giving the Democrats control of the Senate for the first time since 2015 and control of the White House and both houses of Congress for the first time since 2011. Sadly, on the same day, the fruit of Trump's conspiracy theory-mongering about the election comes ripe as thousands of Trump supporters storm the Capitol during the counting of Electoral College votes, invading the building and resulting in the Senate being evacuated.[123] This horrified pretty much every decent person in the country (and plenty of indecent ones) and resulted in the introduction of articles of impeachment against Trump yet again, this time for incitement of insurrection.[124] On the bright side, Trump's iron grip on the party seems to have loosened somewhat, with most congressional Republicans voting to certify the election for Biden, and a small but growing number of Republicans calling for his impeachment or resignation.

An incomplete list of Republicans

“”The Republican Party is fundamentally crooked and might well be outlawed one of these days. Le Pen, you know, in France, who is an out-and-out fascist, the French have managed in some clever way to contain him... I don't know how they do it, but we've got to do that with the Republican base, the religious right. We don't want them running the country. Nobody does. Certainly not the founding fathers. And I think we have to ride herd on them and make sure they do not seize the state.

—Gore Vidal[125]

• Greg Abbott (Governor of Texas 2015-present): Deployed the Texas State Guard to Jade Helm to prevent the FEMA camps... or invasion... or somethin'
• Jack Abramoff: Busted felon.
• Roger Ailes: Nixon strategist and former President of Fair and Balanced Fox News. Remarked to fellow executives that "the GOP couldn’t organize a one-car funeral."[126] Update: Apparently his life force was entirely dependent on harassing women in the workplace.
• George Allen (Senator from Virginia 2001-07): He had a noose hanging in his office from 1998-2000. At first calling it "more of a lasso", in 2006, he came clean, calling it a "little noose." We all know about the Macaca story.[127]
• Dick Armey (Representative from Texas 1985-2003, House Majority Leader 1995-2003): Former #2 Republican in the House, now leader of the Astroturf group FreedomWorks, which organizes the Tea Party.
• Robert Bentley (Governor of Alabama 2011-17): They need a new prison to house their state government. (He's grinning because he gets to keep his pension.)
• Marsha Blackburn (Representative from Tennessee 2003-2019, Senator from Tennessee 2019-present): Anything Blackburn says might as well be, brought to you by AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon. Her intention is not to "protect state's rights", it's to keep the sludge moving.[128]
• John Boehner (Representative from Ohio 1991-2015, Speaker of the House 2011-15): Cries openly more than any other politician in memory (except Glenn Beck).
• John Bolton (Ambassador to the United Nations 2005-2006, National Security Advisor 2018-present): A man who thinks the United Nations shouldn't exist serving as Ambassador to the United Nations? The only reason it took Bolton two years to join the Trump Administration was apparently that Trump didn't like his mustache. He was National Security Advisor Number Three until September 2019, when he was unceremoniously fired and replaced by Robert O'Brien.
• Terry Branstad (Governor of Iowa 2011-2017): Wasn't the reasoning for voting Branstad because Culver couldn't balance a budget and ran us into a deficit, and Branstad would fix that?[129]
• Nancy Brinker (U.S. Chief of Protocol 2007-09): Such positions, like Ambassadorships to small countries, are handed out to folks who can raise a lot of money for political campaigns ("bundlers"). She's a professional networker amongst the rich and famous, which tends to be a perfect cover for running your "non-profit."[130][131]
• Sam Brownback (Governor of Kansas, 2011-2018): Destroyed the state so badly that his successor couldn’t win. In Kansas. Or two of their congressmen. In Kansas.
• Pat Buchanan (White House Director of Communications 1985-87): Archie Bunker lives.
• Ted Bundy: Misogynist serial killer who spent his last days before the chair with James Dobson groaning on about how porn ruined his life.
• Richard Burr (Senator from North Carolina 2005-present, Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee 2015-present): Burr is proud of blocking a federal court vacancy for 11 years, longer than any in the nation's history.[132] Burr also pledged to stonewall the Scalia vacancy if Clinton won.[133] He has stated that he won't run for another term.
• George W. Bush: (Governor of Texas 1995-2000, President 2001-2008). The 43rd President. Spends the rest of his days hoping he won't place 43rd on another list. Seems like he realized that the planet hated him because he's pretty much been a recluse since then. But any past, present, or future world leader knows that picking up a paintbrush is an invitation for comparisons to Hitler.
• Jeb Bush (Governor of Florida 1999-2007): He spent 27 years laying the groundwork for a Presidential run...until Trump threw shit into the cake batter. Please clap.
• Tucker Carlson: The mouthpiece for the right wing's belief that higher education is actually just liberal indoctrination.
• Jason "Chipmunk" Chaffetz: (Representative from Utah 2009-present, Chair of the House Oversight Committee 2015-2017): An ethics-violating[134] groundhog. He pops out of his hole, sees his shadow, and we get 2 more years of attempting to defund Planned Parenthood.[135] (And those are some of his better public appearances.)[136] Update: There's speculation that he will run in the 2020 gubernatorial election. Now he just needs to avoid bad press.[137]
• Dick Cheney (Representative from Wyoming 1979-1989, Vice-President 2001-2008): Enjoys "blowing up Alderaan small countries."[138] Maybe if he had some of the petroleum in his veins replaced with actual blood his ticker would behave itself.
• Gary Cohn (Chief Economic Advisor to the President 2017-2018[139]): It pays to be a Trump Whisperer.[140]
• Larry Craig (Senator from Ohio 1991-2009): Of "wide stance" fame.
• Chris Christie (Governor of New Jersey 2010-2018): Has shown the ability to set partisan politics aside at least some of the time, but in 2014, a series of scandals forced him to throw in with Donald Trump (to his later regret).
• Mitch Daniels (Governor of Indiana 2005-13): Responsible for the privatization of the state's highways, Right-to-work law, and voter ID laws. Tried to ban A People's History of the United States in Indiana's public schools.[141]
• Tom "The Hammer" Delay (Representative from Texas 1985-2006, House Majority Leader 2003-05): Hehe, I'll kill them, just show me where they are!
• Betsy DeVos (Secretary of Education 2017-present): Sister of Erik Prince, has invested millions in a company where you put a colander on your head to make your brain bigger.[142] If the tuition bubble pops at around the same time as another housing collapse, this country is screwed.[143]
• Lou Dobbs: Former CNN anchor who is anti-immigration and supports Trump in everything he does.[144] Liked by Alex Jones.[145]
• Bob Dole (Senator from Kansas 1969-96, Senate Majority Leader 1995-96): Wasn't it Bob Dole who went to the Senate to oversee the ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities? And they voted it down, with many Republican Senators fearing it would impact American sovereignty?[146] Madness. And now he's a Trump supporter.[147]
• "Scary" Mary Fallin (Governor of Oklahoma 2011-2019): Arguably was one of the worst governors in America during her tenure as Oklahoma's fearless leader. The state's government, road systems, and education system are all in shambles because of her inept leadership. But thank goodness we have Oilfield Prayer Day!
• Robert Fisher (State Senator from New Hampshire, 2014-present): Can we press pause on the Republican Party until they figure out what's going on? This guy is tied to an SPLC-designated hate group, shouldn't be in government.[148] (His picture confirms he's every bit the douche you thought he would be.)
• David Frum: Wrecked his party (and his country) by enabling Bush and loudly supporting the Iraq War. Now he's pissed at his party for continuing down the road he paved.
• Greg Gianforte (Representative from Montana 2017-present): Imagine being Gianforte and knowing you basically have to "not body slam someone the day before the election and you'll probably win", and just body slamming someone anyway.[149] Trying to polish up this turd as a "philanthropist" is laughable.[150][151][152]
• Newt Gingrich: (Representative from Georgia 1979-99, Speaker of the House 1995-99): Grand Poobah of the culture warriors—with a history of getting his wife sick philandering that makes Bill Clinton look like a choir boy.
• Rudy Giuliani (Mayor of New York City 1994-2001): A noun, a verb, and 9/11.
• Barry Goldwater (Senator from Arizona 1953-65 and 1969-87, Chairperson of the Senate Intelligence Committee 1981-85, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee 1985-87): Goldwater is responsible for "movement conservative" political theory, starting with Reagan (a Goldwater scion). He created this monster. But some of his views were light-years ahead of both parties: he was an environmentalist, pro-choice (endorsing a Democrat who held those views for Congressman), supported gay rights, and denounced the religious right. See, if you go full Goldwater, then you lose the Bible-thumpers whose most significant concern is putting God everywhere they can shove him, outlawing abortion, and outlawing gay marriage. So you can see why Republicans needed to smother him with a pillow.
• Sebastian Gorka (Deputy Assistant to the President 2017-2017): Drew a plan on a napkin to partition Libya into threes.[153] Yeah, this seems like the right guy to oversee Syria. Once they've all got their copies of the Federalist Papers,[154] they'll be constitutional republics in no time.^{[No, not The Onion]} Just think, someday this may join other important napkins in the Smithsonian. He left the Trump White House in August 2017 to join Fox News, because of course he did.
• Trey "Mr. Benghazi" Gowdy (Representative from South Carolina 2011-2019): The leader of the charge in the Hillary Clinton witch hunt. And that's his only real accomplishment, if you could call it that.
• Lindsey Graham (Senator from South Carolina 2003-present): An old-style Republican who is dismayed at the extremist wing of his party. Perhaps he thinks that they can win the presidency based on the substance of their plan and not rely on a bombastic reality TV pitch[155] Update: He fell in line as soon as the bombs started falling.[156] Graham is just a closet case looking for a strong daddy.[157][158] Almost certainly angling for a spot in the Trump administration at this point and willing to throw a tantrum on national television to get there. [159]
• Phil Gramm (Senator from Texas 1985-2002, Chair of the Senate Banking Committee January 2001–June 2001): Domestic terrorist in a banker's suit.
• "Fuck" Chuck Grassley (Senator from Iowa 1981-present): A two-dollar whore for Monsanto.[160] Grassley was also pivotal in hijacking the SCOTUS.[161] The only thing Grassley is good for is making innuendo about Dairy Queen[162] and tweeting volleyball scores.
• Dennis Hastert (Representative from Illinois 1987-2007, Speaker of the House 1999-2007): Dubya's Speaker of the House. He's also the highest-ranking American politician to go to prison. For what, you ask? Both bank fraud and molesting children!
• Orrin Hatch (Senator from Utah 1977-2019, President pro tempore of the Senate 2015-2019): Old mule with the full weight and support of the LDS church. He nearly got primaried last time and has indicated that he won't run again.
• Jesse Helms (Senator from North Carolina 1973-2003): The "Senator from South Africa."
• Mike Huckabee (Governor of Arkansas 1996-2007): Wait, Tricky Dick's back from the dead?
• Jon Huntsman (Governor of Utah 2005-09, Ambassador to China 2009-11, Ambassador to Russia 2017-present): As corrupt as they come. While he was barking at China to put sanctions on Iran, he was selling Iran parts for missiles under the table. He lost his "nice guy in the middle" reputation the moment he backed Trump. And unlike Ryan or Graham, Huntsman endorsed Trump early, well before Cruz dropped out. He's the definition of the "play both sides" type, and Trump has been a useful hand grenade for Huntsman. Update: He is now Trump's ambassador to Russia. Looks like his support paid off.
• Jim Inhofe (Senator from Oklahoma 1994-present): Al Gore's sworn enemy and head of the climate change denial brigade. Thinks snowballs are proof that global warming isn't real.
• Piyush "Bobby" Jindal (Governor of Louisiana 2008-16): A pro-life eugenicist? Haven't those people suffered enough? Like Brownback above, he ruined his state so much that Louisiana, yes, Louisiana has a Democratic governor now.
• John Kasich (Governor of Ohio 2011-2019): Took a swing at public unions and whiffed. Because Kasich is basically a dinosaur, everyone mistakes him for a friendly triceratops instead of the raptor he actually is.[163]
• Brett Kavanaugh (U.S. Supreme Court Justice 2018-present): He likes beer. A lot.
• John Kelly (Secretary of Homeland Security January 2017-July 2017, White House Chief of Staff July 2017-present): The states' rights nuts and the neo-confederates both went into a frenzy when Kelly said that Robert E. Lee was a hero who fought for states' rights. And because he's a former USMC officer, Trumpsters took him at face value....even though this is the most one-sided description of the Civil War ever.
• Alveda King: "I'm Martin Luther King's niece! That means I MUST be right!"
• Peter King (Representative from New York 1993-present): Yin to Geller's Yang.
• Kris Kobach (Secretary of State of Kansas 2011-2019): Kobach is the architect of Crosscheck, a program which has declared silent war on minority voters.[164] He wholly believes Trump's claim that millions voted illegally in 2016. In cooperation with the Justice Department, you can expect to see it implemented more and voter suppression to increase.[165]
• William Kristol: Disloyalty from neocons and Dan Quayle's staff contributed to their defeat in '92.[166] That's how Kristol earned his stripes. His role in the Iraq and Libyan invasions (sorry, "interventions") is well-documented; suffice to say he was fired from the NYT for unethical journalism.[167] Update: Bill has an erection that could etch diamonds right now due to the Syrian missile strikes.[168] Wasn't he the leader of the Never Trump movement?[169]
• Jared Kushner: (de facto Secretary of State Senior Advisor to the President 2017-present): Is this seriously him? Not sure how to feel about this country's most influential man being such a normie.[170] He always seemed like the rich amoral scion archetype.[171][172][173]
• Joe Lieberman (Senator from Connecticut 1989-2013): A Republican by any other name, no matter what he may call himself. He cheated on his wife with a pharma lobbyist and then immediately went super-Gingrich and had to leave the Senate before sundown (after he dumped his wife and married the lobbyist).[174] He was the clinch vote on killing the public option.
• Rush Limbaugh: Use birth control? You're a slut! (But can I see pictures?) And you shouldn't have the right to vote!
• Abraham Lincoln (Representative from Illinois 1847-49, President 1861-65): Lincoln can be a modern conservative or a classical liberal, whichever is convenient for you.[175][176][177] His entire existence is rubble, and they continue to bomb every day.[178][179]
• Trent Lott (Senator from Mississippi, 1999-2007, Senate Majority Leader 1996-2002, Senate Majority Whip 1995-96, Jan. 2007-Jul. 2007) : You just hear him say "Strom Thurmond" and know that sentence isn't going to end well.[180] Insurance companies must have been smiling when he resigned.[181]
• Lawrence Lockman is a short time Republican politician in the Maine legislature; he was elected in 2012. He is a long time bigot, misogynist, and generally ignorant hater.

In February 2014, Lockman expressed "regret" for his statement justifying rape based on the legality of abortion.

“”If a woman has [the right to abortion], why shouldn’t a man be free to use his superior strength to force himself on a woman? At least the rapist’s pursuit of sexual freedom doesn’t [in most cases] result in anyone’s death."^[citation needed] (1990)

He has said other things that might seem a bit stupid, ignorant, or just plain hateful, such as:

“”In the overwhelming majority of cases, people are dying because of their addiction to sodomy. They are dying because progressive, enlightened, tolerant people in politics and in medicine have assured the public that the practice of sodomy is a legitimate alternative lifestyle, rather than a perverted, depraved crime against humanity."^[citation needed] (1987)

• Frank Luntz: Author of "tax and spend", "climate change", and "government takeover of health care." He was instrumental in 1994's Contract With America, which led to the party controlling both houses of Congress. Lives in a miniature White House^{[No, not The Onion]} and rubs elbows with many celebrities.[182] He's still whining about being assaulted glitter-bombed at Trump's inauguration.
• James "Mad Dog" Mattis (Secretary of Defense 2017-2019): McMaster and Mattis are the canaries in the coal mine. If they go down, the future does not bode well.,[183]. UPDATE: We're all screwed.[184][185] He considers the proposal of a border wall with Mexico to be "uninformed".
• John McCain (Senator from Arizona 1987-2018, Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee 2015-2018): McCain was their last decent candidate, but then he went full Palin. (Never go full Palin.) Once he crawled back to Trump after being publicly humiliated, McCain stood no chance of being a leader.[186][187] Update: No tea, no shade, no pink lemonade: McCain is not fit for office. He elbows his way into a high-profile hearing to ask questions about something he doesn't understand ("President Comey"), causing Burr to get annoyed with him, banging his gavel a few times. Best guess is he's suffered a stroke and is keeping it quiet. ...hmm? What's that? He's dead now? ...well, we were half-right.
• Mitch McConnell (Senator from Kentucky 1985-present, Senate Majority Leader 2015-present): Chief demolition man of the ACA. McConnell warned his fellow Senators that their futures would grow dim if they passed any legislation under Obama. When Grassley and the others started writing furious op-eds about the plan, which Grassley co-wrote, Democrats understood that the "negotiations" were faux. Many assumed he was done after he criticized Trump, but fortunately, McConnell has buttered his ass sufficiently to stay in power. That Senate seat is his for as long as he wants it.
• H.R. McMaster (U.S. National Security Advisor, 2017-2018): Wapo: Trump Discloses Classified Info. McMaster: No he didn't. Trump Tweet (7am) : I totally did, and I meant to do it.[188] At a conference in Germany, McMaster told the crowd that there is "incontrovertible" evidence of Russian tampering with the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election.
• Robert Mercer: The Mercers tried to get an executive appointment for their favorite scientist in the world, Art Robinson, a biochemist who says that a little radiation is good for you, and is taking the Mercers' money to help stop aging. The Mercers also believe that black people were better off before the Civil Rights Act and favored the gold standard. Jane Mayer's article gave concrete examples of the Mercers being taken in by snake oil salesmen and conspiracy theorists, yet the White House hangs on this family's every utterance.[189]
• Sun Myung Moon: Cult leader, sushi tycoon, and owner of the Washington Times.
• Steve Mnuchin (Secretary of the Treasury 2017-present): ☑ Billionaire Goldman banker. ☑ Got rich off widow foreclosure scams, then sold the company before he could be caught. ☑ Ditched his wife so he could hook up with a Scottish model. He ticks all the boxes.
• Marilyn Musgrave (Representative from Colorado 2003-09): A nutty, hateful homophobe who ran bullshit negative ad after negative ad. She never actually conceded her defeat. Bye, Felicia.
• Richard Nixon (Vice President 1953-1961, President 1969-1974): "Well, I'm not a crook."
• Bill O'Reilly: Alleged "Independent." Consider him a placeholder for the entire Fox News lineup.
• Rand Paul (Senator from Kentucky 2011-present): Ron Paul 2.0 has lifelike hair, but can overheat sometimes.[190] (You're not going to like where you have to insert the heat sink that fixes the issue.) When Michelle Bachman's book outsells yours, maybe it's time to throw in the towel.[191]
• Ron Paul (Representative from Texas 1997-2013): The Pauls are like a rocket ship fueled with hate. The rocket can crash, but you can always fill the next one with just as much hate. Maybe even more. (Right now, it's time for Trump to get his turn on the launchpad.)[note 6] Was photographed with this guy in 2007.
• Rick Perry (Governor of Texas 2000-15, Secretary of Energy 2017-present): Best 2 out of 3? — Rick's attitude toward the Civil War.
• David Petraeus (CIA Director 2011-12): The guy is still serving probation under his plea agreement from 2015 (which was pretty generous considering that the FBI and Justice Department recommended felony charges against him). People are still chanting "lock her up", but where were those same people when Petraeus mishandled classified information, to the degree that he wasn't even considered for a role in the Trump administration? well, beggars can't be choosers. Particularly when the post is being vacated by a guy who violated the Logan Act.[192]
• Mike Pompeo (Representative from Kansas 2011-2017, CIA Director 2017-2018, Secretary of State 2018-present): What's worse than a Koch Industries-backed, torture-defending Islamophobe as head of the CIA? A Koch Industries-backed, torture-defending Islamophobe running the State Department!
• Colin Powell (Secretary of State 2001-05): Colin Powell could have been President.[193] His Eisenhower-like demeanor would have had a drastic healing effect in the post-Reagan era (which is the primary cause of the rabid partisanship we experience today). Like Gore, Powell represents another great "if" in American politics. Unfortunately, he appears to be a company man who gets misused by the establishment. The report he wrote on the My Lai massacre echoes his report before the U.N.
• Scott Pruitt (Oklahoma Attorney General 2011-17, Administrator of Environmental Protection Agency 2017-2018): Soon to be G6.[194] This is like a homeopathy shop telling you to take your child to a real doctor. It means you really fucked up.[195]
• Dan Quayle (Senator from Indiana 1981-1989, Vice President 1989-1993): There is no "E" in the word "potato."
• His Most Grand High Exaltedness, Slayer of the Dragon of Communism, and Defender of the Faith: Ronald Wilson Reagan (Governor of California 1967-75, President 1981-89): One of the most influential of American Presidents. He was an open-carry hero who lowered taxes, right?
• Mitt Romney (Governor of Massachusetts 2003-07, Senator from Utah 2019-present): In fairness to him, he really was the last hope the Republicans had to put a "moderate" in office, and they blew that chance in '12. They should have waited until 2016; they knew it's super-difficult to knock out an incumbent (and Obama was a popular one) but went ahead anyway. Now, all that poverty, poor education, and joblessness are at their front door. Voters see the economic realities, and the alt-right offers an alternative.
• Karl Rove (White House Deputy Chief of Staff 2005-07): Responsible for dumbing down the party so that his idiot boss could get elected. Current status: whining on Twitter. He's been left in the cold like Jack Torrence in The Shining.
• Wilbur Ross (Secretary of Commerce 2017-present): Ross is linked to Russian money laundering. Next.[196]
• Marco Rubio (Senator from Florida 2011-present): Rubio embodies the GOP's failure to understand the electorate. The GOP thinks that Obama got elected because he's a minority and a pretty face. They think Rubio can do the same. (Mexicans, Central Americans, Cubans....they're all the same, right?) More to the point, the GOP doesn't understand that they can put as many dark faces on the stage as they want, but when the camera pans to the crowd, it will be 90% white. All Rubio offered was to wean the Republicans off anti-immigrant sentiment, and he's already running in the opposite direction (a la Romney with Romneycare). Sub-Zero would have a hard time finding Marco's spine.
• Donald Rumsfeld (Representative from Illinois 1963-69, Secretary of Defense 2001-06): Talked to us about "known knowns" and related concepts. Knew about Abu Ghraib and tried to spin Pat Tillman's death as heroic. Generals on the field demanded his resignation. A "known" idiot.
• Jack Ryan: Tom Clancy super-spy Married that Borg chick from Star Trek. Hired a real-life spy to follow his opponent, Illinois State Senator Obama, around with a video camera in hopes of catching him in some misdeed. This plan backfired when Ryan was found to frequent bondage clubs.
• Paul Ryan (Representative from Wisconsin 1999-2019, Speaker of the House 2015-2019): Ryan, Cruz & Trump sort of represent the 3 'sides' to the GOP: Trump is the new nationalist faction, Cruz the religious faction (which was so powerful under GWB), and Ryan the "upwardly-mobile" faction, i.e., the corrupted, dying husk that had its heyday under Reagan. He looks like Matthew Morrison, meaning even his celebrity lookalike is a nobody.
• Mark Sanford (Representative from South Carolina, 2013-2019): Hiking the Appalachian trail... in Argentina.
• Rick Santorum (Senator from Pennsylvania 1995-2007): Religious Fundamentalist and failed 2012 candidate.
• Antonin "Nino" Scalia (U.S. Supreme Court Justice 1986-2016): A powerful and influential conservative who served on the Supreme Court till his death!
• Rick Scott (Governor of Florida 2011-2019, Senator from Florida 2019-present): Cut off access to voting with vapid, Banana Republic-style tactics.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger (Governor of California 2003-11): Hasta la vista, Governator! Don't worry! He'll be back!
• Richard Shelby (Senator from Alabama 1987-present): Originally a Democrat, Shelby jumped on the Republican bandwagon after Newt Gingrich's 1994 coup of DC. He's probably the last Gingrich Republican to have any bit of relevance.
• Adrian Smith (Representative from Nebraska 2007-present): Ugh, the poors want food now.[197]
• Rick Snyder (Governor of Michigan 2011-2019): Drink up, Governor Snyder.[198] It's great that Flint gets to foot the bill for his criminal defense (with an apparently unlimited spending cap).[199]
• Sean Spicer (White House Press Secretary 2017-2017[200]): German Jews weren't German — Spicy logic.[201] The only reason Spicer got the job is that someone in Donald's transition team Tweeted about the first pick (Jason Miller) having a baby out of wedlock. It wasn't leaked to WaPo or anything; it was just a vindictive Tweet.[202]
• Michael Steele (Lt. Governor of Maryland 2003-07, President of the RNC 2009-11): Upset a lot of old white people by suggesting the party should focus on younger, non-white people. Has also made many brain-dead gaffes and brought the RNC to visit a bondage club.
• Ben Stein: Visine salesman who called Obama "the most racist president we've ever had." He also made a documentary about how evolution is wrong. Likes to "mentor" young pregnant women.
• Roger Stone: It seemed almost inevitable that one of Tricky Dick's top strategists would work with Trump. Stone is as dirty as they come; he's been playing politics for the right wing since 1972 and doesn't show any sign of stopping any time soon....unless his involvement in Russiagate catches up to him.
• Robert "Sideshow Bob" Terwilliger (Former Mayor of Springfield): Convicted felon.
• Clarence Thomas (U.S. Supreme Court Justice 1991-present): Made Scalia look moderate.
• Strom Thurmond (Senator from South Carolina 1956-2003, President pro tempore emeritus of the United States Senate 1981-87, 2001-2003): Record holder for the longest-ever filibuster by one senator. He was opposing the Civil Rights Act at the time. Had so many kids (including a mixed-race daughter) that his nickname on the Hill was "Sperm Thurmond".
• Rex Tillerson (Secretary of State 2017-2018): A diplomat who won't look you in the eye, that's novel.[203] Tillerson is the Oil Lobby,[204] and he is happy to leave the State Department in ruins so he can sell missiles to countries with human rights violations.[205]
• Thom Tillis (Senator from North Carolina 2015-present): A huge hypocrite. He sings about the free market (Don’t require restaurant workers to wash their hands − the market will take care of that!)[206] but received sizable donations from three major car dealers in NC; as soon as he got into office, he shut down small independent dealerships for minor infractions.[207]
• Pat Toomey (Senator from Pennsylvania 2011-present): When even Santorum thinks you're too far gone,[208] you need to stop.
• Donald Trump (President 2017-present): The tri-state area's worst ambassador, carrying the torch for every dated stereotype you've ever loathed. That's enough to charm the mystics and morons who have too much influence in the GOP. Trump wanted to have tanks and missile launchers in the street for his inauguration. Just wanted to point that out.[209] Recently, he said he wanted a military parade against the Pentagon's express advice.
• Ivanka Trump (Assistant to the President 2017-present): Growing up, she was too rich to own her own lemonade stand.[210] Now just imagine that but with real estate instead of lemonade, and that's how her father was raised.
• Scott Walker (Governor of Wisconsin 2011-2019): Cut benefits for public sector workers, then banned them from unionizing.[211][212] Established voter ID laws in Wisconsin, supressing turnout and likely throwing the state to Trump.[213] Tried to give a ridiculous corporate welfare check to FoxConn, causing the voters to finally throw him out.[214] Now his state legislature is leading a coup on his successor.[215] Arguably the worst governor in recent memory.
• Bill Weld (Governor of Massachusetts 1991-1997): Finally someone on this list who isn't completely insane. Briefly left the party to join the Libertarian Party, but returned in an attempt to unseat Trump.

Former GOP Members

“”He sat at his desk, his hands palms upward, fingers slightly curved, as if cupping something in them. “I want Hagel.” he said, staring into the camera. “I want Hagel. I want him.” A casual observer might interpret this moment as O’Reilly expressing his fierce but tender desire for Chuck Hagel, the Secretary of Defense. More experienced O’Reilly viewers, however, will recognize it as a signal that the unfortunate Hagel had plummeted downward in O’Reilly’s estimation from pinhead to evildoer.

—John Haggerty on The O'Reilly Factor[216]

• "Sir" Charles Barkley: As a child, his grandmother told him they weren't rich enough to be Republicans, so he thought he had to be a Republican after making millions from basketball. He has since learned that the Republicans suck in general and is thinking of running for office in his native Alabama as a Democrat or Independent.
• Bruce Bartlett: Supply-side inventor, author of the book Imposter. It made the case that Bush is about as useful as the British were to Hitler: a total spanner in the works, taking Republicans in a direction they were already flirting with and sinking them. He still stands by his policy decisions during the Reagan administration but is savvy enough to know that different times call for different policies.[217] The fact that he's an outcast is proof of how dogmatic the GOP has become.[218] (The Bush administration was in lockstep and too well-organized; people who had the gall to say expanding Medicare, starting two wars, and cutting taxes is not "fiscally conservative" were blacklisted from think tanks forever.) Bruce had a brain transplant tumor in 2014, which changed his views on healthcare.
• Ben Bernanke (Fed Chairman 2006-14):[219] Jim Bunning (R-KY) accused Bernanke of trying to cover up a (non-existent) overruling of his staff's recommendation to bail out AIG.[220] So far, it has been profitable, and AIG has paid back the loan with interest.[221] In fact, it was such a sweet deal that AIG successfully sued the government, saying it was unfair.[222] Hilarious and awful.
• Lincoln Chafee (Governor of Rhode Island 2011-15): Elected as an independent, then joined the Democratic Party in 2013, who voted against the tax cuts and Iraq War resolution. Even as a Republican, he was a liberal on social matters, supported federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, opposed the austerity of the GOP and neo-liberalism of the DNC, voted against the death penalty, calls for a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine with the Israeli withdrawal from all occupied territories as a condition, voted for the restoration of Clinton-era tax raises on the rich, voted against arctic drilling, and voted against torture. He toed the party line on free trade, the Patriot Act, and partial privatization of Social Security, but he remained to the left of even the Democrats.
• Charlie Christ (Governor of Florida 2007-11, Representative from Floria 2017-present): Converted to Independent in 2010 and narrowly lost a non-consecutive term in 2014 as a Democrat.
• Hillary Clinton: Was raised in a conservative household but switched parties in 1968.
• James Comey[223] (FBI Director 2013-17): Trump can only nut while pointing at someone and saying "you're fired", and Comey just walked into the room at the wrong time.[224][225] (Frankly he should have been fired 10 months earlier, but Obama didn't want to look partisan.)[226] Trump reportedly asked Comey to arrest members of the press.[227]
• Robert Gates (Secretary of Defense 2006-11): Like Powell, he hasn't renounced his party allegiance, but serving under Obama and pushing for an end to DADT was not without an earful. However, he was one of the main — if not the primary — perpetrators of the intelligence community's utter failure regarding the Soviet Union's collapse. More particularly, Gates has been criticized for allegedly concocting evidence to show that the Soviet Union was stronger than it actually was. He was a key player in the Iran-Contra Affair due to being connected with many of its leading proprietors (thus fully knowing its activities) and advocating for "any and all" options against Sandinista short of an invasion. Gates directed the "troop surge" in Iraq as well.
• Chuck Hagel (Secretary of Defense 2013-15): He was one of the few Republicans who took pause at the Iraq War and the corroding influence of the Israeli lobby in Capitol Hill, although that didn't stop him from toeing the party line. As the Defense Secretary under Obama, he opposed escalating the conflicts in Syria and Ukraine, and refused to send soldiers or arm more rebels like the Obama administration wanted; Obama forced him out of his job as a result. Has not renounced his party allegiance, but definitively proved that he was to the left of the Democrats on foreign policy, which was not without an earful.
• Jim Jeffords (Senator from Vermont 1989-2007): Switched to Independent in 2001, likely the earliest national figure to jump the ship.
• Gary Johnson (Governor of New Mexico 1995-2003): Ignored by the Republicans during his attempt at receiving the 2012 Republican nomination for President due to his libertarian social views and use of polysyllabic words when speaking publicly. Was the candidate for, shock, the Libertarian Party.
• Richard Painter: The Bush Administration's chief ethics lawyer, Painter is the third Republican behind Joe Scarborough and James Comey to leave the Republican Party because of Donald Trump, but unlike Scarborough and Comey (who are both Independents now), Painter has become a Democrat and lost his race for the Minnesota seat in the U.S. Senate.
• Joe Scarborough (Representative from Florida 1995-2001): The first of many Republicans in the Trump-era GOP to (hopefully) wise up, Scarborough left the Republican Party in July 2017 following multiple verbal attacks from Donald Trump and is now an Independent.
• Arlen Specter (Senator from Pennsylvania 1981-2011): Switched parties in 2010 out of fear of losing the Republican primary...then lost the Democratic primary.
• Jim Webb (Senator from Virginia 2007-2013): Infamous for once bringing a loaded gun onto the Senate floor, Webb was so disgusted by the Iraq War that he became a Democrat. Ran for President in 2016 but never made it past the first debate.
• And all you "Obama Republicans" out there, whom the party has done nothing to win back.

See also

• Banking crisis and recession - Happens too often when they are in power to be an accident.
• Club for Growth, not to be confused with the Hair Club for Men.
• RINO
• K Street project
• Chickenhawk
• United Future Party — The S.Korean version of the Republican Party.
• Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) — The Japanese version of the Republican Party.
• Bharatiya Janata Party — The Indian version of the Republican Party.
• Log Cabin Republicans, a weird subgroup of Republicans who seem to believe the exact opposite of the Republican Party seem more in line with their younger counterparts [228].
• Theocracy Watch
• A list of Hollywood Republicans
• 2016 Republican Party presidential nomination‎‎

External links

• Vote Republican!
• All rise for the official GOP theme song.
• The GOP: Totally not racist.
• Why Do Republicans Defend Torture?, New York Magazine
• Why Republicans Keep Telling Everyone They’re Not Scientists, The New York Times
• Here's Why Congressional Republicans Let Ted Cruz Lead Them Off a Cliff, Business Insider
• Time for a Bull Moose: The Risk of Generational Realignment and a Path Toward a “New Republican” Party, Harvard Kennedy School Review

Notes

1. "You're not aware of any effort to go back to the good old days of segregation by a legislative body, is that correct?" — Senator Lindsey Graham in 2020, claiming sarcasm, but blowing a dog whistle nonetheless[99]
2. In fact the GOP was initially a big tent centrist party based in the North that had inherited the legacy of the Whig Party. Factions included business conservatives, moderates (eventually "led" by Lincoln), liberals (led by Horace Greeley), radicals (led by Thaddeus Stevens), and nationalists who all agreed on a general dislike of slavery but not on much else nor on how to deal with it (the conservatives and moderates wanted to try to compromise whereas the liberals and even more so the radicals were more willing to illegalize slavery immediately).
3. In one of the strangest elections in US history. The Democratic Party split in two, with the southern and northern factions each running their own candidates. Also, ex-Whigs who disagreed with the Republican Party's stance on slavery created a third (fourth?) party, the Constitutional Union Party. Lincoln won thanks to sweeping the North, Mid-West, and West Coast while the Democrats split their vote. Seriously, it was a mess. Check out the Wiki article about it.
4. In his first term, his VP was a Republican from Maine named Hannibal Hamlin. For his second term, he chose Democrat Andrew Johnson. Additionally, for his reelection in 1864, he essentially renamed his party as the National Union Party to help non-Republicans get over their hangups about voting for the evil Lincolnite Republican Party.
5. And happen it did.
6. It really shows what the priority for libertarians is. Trump is pro-war (unless it's an odd-numbered day, then he's a peacenik) and against legalized weed, wants Snowden executed, even more spying and possibly a way to shut down the entire internet, has proposed higher taxes than Rand, etc. Trump doesn't even care about auditing the Fed or returning to the gold standard as far as anyone knows (even Donald Fucking Trump isn't that stupid). So really, all they cared about was the racism and regressive attitudes toward women— and Rand didn't deliver on those decisively or soon enough in his campaign.

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26. A bunch of men telling women what’s good for them
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38. Edelman, Adam, "Many Louisiana Republicans blame President Obama for Hurricane Katrina response — even though the storm occurred more than 3 YEARS before he took office", NY Daily News (8/21/13 at 5:47 PM).
39. Wemple, Erik, "‘Daily Show’s’ Jordan Klepper blows the lid off Trumpworld", WaPo 9.21.16.
40. Spinelli, Dan, "Benghazi victim's mother blames Clinton for son's death", Politico (07/18/16 08:44 PM EDT).
41. Sneed, Tierney, "McConnell: Americans 'Will Not Tolerate' Dems Blocking SCOTUS Nom", TPM (1/4/17 at 3:20 PM EDT).
42. Balluck, Kyle, "Trump blames Obama for protests, leaks — 'He is behind it'", The Hill (02/28/17 07:00 AM EST).
43. Tharoor, Ishaan, "Why U.S. conservatives love Russia’s Vladimir Putin", WaPo 9.25.14.
44. Solomon, Jay, "Where the GOP Candidates Stand on Syria’s Assad", WSJ (12/16/15 at 3:53 pm ET).
45. Rauhala, Emily, "Duterte: During phone call, Trump praised my drug war as the ‘right way’", WaPo 3 December 2016.
46. Campbell, Colin, "TRUMP: You've got to give that 'maniac' in North Korea some credit", Business Insider (1/9/16 at 4:20 PM).
47. Goodwin, Michael, "Obama has his Munich moment with Putin and Crimea", New York Post (3/15/14 at 11:47 AM).
48. Rudy Giuliani praises Putin's leadership.
49. Blake, Aaron, "Vladimir Putin polls better with Republicans than Obama does. That’s not unprecedented.", WaPo 1.4.17.
50. Johnson, Jenna, "Mike Pence says it’s ‘inarguable’ that Putin is a stronger leader than Obama", WaPo 9.8.16.
51. Revesz, Rachael, "Donald Trump to sign executive order to dramatically reduce funding of United Nations", Independent (1/26/17 at 8:09 BST).
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57. Fonger, Ron, "Documents show Flint filed false reports about testing for lead in water", MLive (11/19/15 at 3:57 PM).
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72. Robert Reich: Chicago Tribune.
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80. Steven Thomma, "Religious Right Feels Betrayed By Gop Christian Conservatives Helped Put Republicans In Power. Now They Say Their Social Agenda Is Ignored", Inquirer Washington Bureau.
81. Mike Lofgren, "GOP insider: Religion destroyed my party", Salon.
82. Justin Sink, "Family Research Council says 'don't send a dime' to GOP", The Hill. (They're smartening up. Time to stop being useful dupes.)
83. Chomsky, Understanding Power (2002)
84. This will help rile up the base
85. Senator Sanders' town hall with Trump voters, 53:30.
86. Harry Reid: "Sen. Harry Reid: American politics is currently just a war between billionaires", Raw Story.
87. Jonathan Chait, "Anarchists of the House", New York Magazine.
88. Thoma, Mark, "GOP Candidates Would Sacrifice the Social Safety Net for Tax Cuts ", The Fiscal Times 3.22.16.
89. Drum, Kevin, "The Koch-Fueled Plot to Destroy the VA", Mother Jones (3/13/16 10:55 AM).
90. Mantyla, Kyle, "When Conservative Christians Take Control Of Government ('Oh, The Demons Shudder!')", Right Wing Watch (3/16/2015 12:31 pm).
91. Jeffrey Sachs: “On many days it seems that the only difference between the Republicans and Democrats is that Big Oil owns the Republicans while Wall Street owns the Democrats", The Economist.
92. Jeanne Cummings, "Dems accused of tea party tampering", Politico.
93. Gass, Nick, "Trump: GOP will become 'worker's party' under me", Politico (05/26/16 07:44 AM EDT).
94. Oyedele, Akin, "One of Trump's biggest plans to stimulate the economy won't be great for most Americans", Business Insider (12/21/16 at 1:48 PM).
95. Kurtzleben, Danielle, "Analysis: Trump Tax Plan Would Cost Trillions, Boost Incomes For The Rich", NPR (9/19/2016 at 1:41 PM ET).
96. "Republican plans to cut corporate taxes may have unpleasant side-effects", The Economist 12.17.16.
97. Cole, Alan, "Could Trump’s Corporate Rate Cut to 15 Percent be Self-Financing?", Tax Foundation, 25 April 2017.
98. Hennessey, Keith, "President Trump’s tax reform vs. his balanced budget", 23 May 2017.
99. Senator Lindsey Graham defends reference to 'the good old days of segregation,' claims he was being sarcastic: 'I want to assure the people of South Carolina, that statement was made with dripping sarcasm' by Chris Riotta (14 October 2020 19:03) The Independent.
100. GOP leaders’ embrace of Trump’s refusal to concede fits pattern of rising authoritarianism, data shows: Research by a team of international scholars shows the Republican Party’s shift away from democratic norms predates Donald Trump but has accelerated since by Christopher Ingraham (November 12, 2020, at 4:00 a.m. PST) The Washington Post.
101. New Global Data on Political Parties: V-Party by Anna Lührmann et al. (October 2020) V-Dem Institute.
102. Rage Grows in America: Anti- Government Conspiracies (November 2009) ADL.
103. https://morningconsult.com/2021/02/16/gop-senate-approval-2022-polling/
104. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/21507713/mike-lee-democracy-republic-trump-2020
105. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/26/republican-party-autocratic-hungary-turkey-study-trump
106. Is Sen. Jim Bunning's stand against unemployment extensions in line with his past votes?, CNN
107. "THE DEVIL was the tempter and Jesus was NOT a deceiver," Doug Giles
108. Yeah.
109. With No Warning, House Republicans Vote to Gut Independent Ethics Office
110. It’s simple, we kill the Batman
111. U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, letter to Col. William F. Elkins (Nov. 21, 1864).
112. How the intellectual right is talking itself into tearing down American democracy by Damon Linker (June 4, 2019) The Week.
113. Republican Party founded on February 28, 1854, Politico
114. Federal Budget Receipts and Outlays, UC Santa Barbara
115. How the politics of resentment created a crisis in conservatism, The Globe and Mail
116. The 'Emerging Democratic Majority' Isn't Assured—Unless the GOP Refuses to Change, The New Republic
117. Robert Draper, "Has the Libertarian Moment Finally Arrived?", New York Times.
118. Rick Pearlstein, "A new sort of conservative has taken over the Republican Party from the ground up—and they don’t give a goddamn about anything the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says", Alternet.
119. http://motherboard.vice.com/read/meet-the-most-anti-science-congress-in-modern-history
120. Michael Van de Gailen, "Corporatism For the Win — Mark Levin Blasts Fox News for Attacking Ted Cruz", PJM
121. [https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/12/why-did-mitch-mcconnell- block-usd2-000-stimulus-checks.html What’s McConnell Up to on the $2,000 Stimulus-Check Proposal?] Intelligencer. 29 December 2020.
122. 'Trump heard on phone call urging Georgia officials to "find" enough votes to overturn presidential results. Melissa Quinn & Tim Perry, Jan. 4, 2021, CBS News
123. Senate evacuated, National Guard activated, person shot after pro-Trump protesters storm Capitol. NBC News.
124. Trump charged with impeachment count as FBI warns of armed protests. Lauren Gambino, Tom McCarthy, and David Smith 12 Jan, 2021, 'The Guardian
125. Gore Vidal, interview with Paul Jay (Aug. 1, 2007).
126. Bad News, The New Yorker
127. Tim Craig and Michael D. Shear, "Allen Quip Provokes Outrage, Apology", WaPo 8.15.06.
128. Byers, Alex, "House votes to revoke broadband privacy rules", Politico 28 March 2017, 6:05 PM EDT).
129. Forbes, John, "Forbes: $927 million state surplus is now $130 million deficit", Des Moines Register (Updated 3 April 2017, 9:41 a.m. CT).
130. Sheppard, Kate, "Susan G. Komen's Founder Is Major GOP Donor, Ex-Bush Ambassador", Mother Jones (1 February 2012, 4:05 PM).
131. Edwards, Stassa, "Susan G. Komen Foundation Urged to Cut Ties with Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club", Jezebel (17 October 2016, 5:05pm).
132. "Editorial: If Burr won't fill court vacancies, pick someone new for his Senate seat", WRAL 2 November 2016.
133. DeBonis, Mike, "Sen. Richard Burr apologizes after Clinton ‘bull’s eye’ remark"], WaPo 31 October 2016.
134. https://twitter.com/ericbradner/status/829877715859681280
135. Video. The moment where Celia Richards basically said "your source is shit" was beautiful and well-publicized.
136. Here's a video of a 10-year-old girl asking Chaffetz if he believes in science. He does not answer the question but does say that the future of energy is coal.
137. Michael L. Price and Brady McCombs, "Chaffetz to resign next month, raising doubts about Trump probe", Chicago Tribune via Associated Press (18 May 2017, 7:55pm).
138. Baker Peter, "The Final Insult in the Bush-Cheney Marriage", New York Times 10.10.13.
139. Trump economic advisor Gary Cohn resigns. CNN. March 6, 2018.
140. David Sirota and Josh Keefe, "Warren Demands Trump Aide Gary Cohn Recusal From White House Proposal That Could Benefit Goldman Sachs", International Business Times (26 May 2017, 4:59 PM).
141. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/07/17/e-mails-reveal-mitch-daniels-governor-tried-ban-howard-zinn-book
142. Boser, Ulrich, "Betsy DeVos has invested millions in this ‘brain training’ company. So I checked it out.", WaPo 26 May 2017.
143. McKay, Peter A., "$1 Trillion Monopoly", Vice 28 May 2017.
144. https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2018/01/25/sinister-pro-trump-propaganda-lou-dobbs/219153
145. https://www.mediamatters.org/video/2018/01/25/alex-jones-some-best-and-most-hard-hitting-information-fox-business-and-lou-dobbs-total-patriot/219165
146. Steinhauer, Jennifer, "Dole Appears, but G.O.P. Rejects a Disabilities Treaty", NYT 12.4.12.
147. Gass, Nick, "Dole on Trump support: 'I can't vote for George Washington'", Politico (06/10/16 08:04 AM EDT).
148. Sheehan, Eleanor, "A Republican State Senator Has Been Outed as the Creator of a Misogynistic Subreddit", Popsugar 26 April 2017.
149. McDermott, Matt, Tweet 24 May 2017 at 7:40pm, @mattmfm. (Guess it helps if the lead investigator is in the bag for the GOP.)
150. Bernes, Whitney, "Bozeman businessman sues Montana Democratic Party over ‘false’ statements", Bozeman Daily Chronicle 25 October 2012. This is a guy who, when people point out that he made his fortune outsourcing jobs, he sues them.
151. Stern, Eric, "Right-wing billionaires, creationism and pseudo-science: Why is a wingnut giving commencement speech at Montana’s best tech college?", Salon (27 March 2014, 1:11 PM PST).
152. Lange, Jeva, 21 "550 more years until retirement!: The Montana Republican running in the special election doesn't believe in retirement because Noah was still working when he was 600", The Week April 2017.
153. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/10/libya-partition-trump-administration-sebastian-gorka
154. https://twitter.com/AmarAmarasingam/status/848925991124832258
155. Nick Gass and Adam B. Lerner, "Donald Trump gives out Lindsey Graham's cellphone number", Politico (Updated 07/22/15 09:54 AM EDT).
156. Sutton, Kelsey, "Lindsey Graham heaps praise on Trump: 'I am all in'", Politico (19 April 2017, 9:48 AM EDT).
157. Sneed, Tierney, "Senate GOPer On Comey Firing: ‘A Fresh Start’ Will Serve Nation ‘Well’", TPM 9 May 2017, 6:03 pm.
158. Vladimirov, Nikita, "Graham: Trump 'calls me when I'm asleep'", The Hill (13 May 2017, 3:40 PM EDT).
159. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTBxPPx62s4
160. Hopkinson, Jenny, "Biotech's big six were generous to Grassley", Politico (15 November 2016, 10:00 AM EST).
161. Godfrey, Eliane, "https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/chuck-grassley-scotus-garland/478038/", Atlantic 13 April 2016.
162. Kristian, Bonnie, "http://theweek.com/speedreads/583712/sen-chuck-grassley-once-again-doing-know-what-dairy-queen", The Week 16 October 2015.
163. Gray, Kalli Joy, "Surprise! Huggy Cuddlebear John Kasich Actually Giant Jerkface", Wonkette (3/25/16 at 10:30am).
164. Pierce, Charles P., "This Is the Man Spearheading the Newest Voter Suppression Effort", Esquire31 August 2016.
165. Hirchfield Davis, Julie, "Trump Picks Voter ID Advocate for Election Fraud Panel", NYT 11 May 2017.
166. Rosenthal, Andrew, "Quayle's Moment", NYT 5 July 5 1992.
167. Horton, Scott, "Kristol Gets the Pink Slip", Daily Beast (26 January 2009, 6:01 AM ET).
168. Nathan-Kazis, Josh, "Prominent Jewish Bureaucrat Spurned By Trump Praises Syria Strike", Forward 7 April 2017.
169. Bump, Phillip, "Bill Kristol is ‘semi-serious’ about launching a new third party. That’s a bad idea.", Wapo 26 December 2015.
170. Hey, do you like Huey Lewis and News?
171. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-israel-palestinians-kushner-idUSKBN15G4W2
172. Shontell, Alyson, "How to lose friends and 'exfoliate' people", Business Insider (29 March 2017, 8:31 AM ).
173. MacGillis, Alec, "Jared Kushner’s Other Real Estate Empire", NYT 23 May 2017.
174. Horton, Scott. "Lieberman Shills for the Healthcare Industry", Harper's (28 October 2009, 9:07am).
175. Lowry, Rich, "The Case Against the Critics of Our 16th President", National Review (6/5/13 at 4:00 AM).
176. Carroll, Lauren, "Ohio Gov. John Kasich puts words in Abraham Lincoln's mouth about tax policy", Politifact (1/25/15 at 4:01 p.m.).
177. Gebelhoff, Robert, "Donald Trump praised the protectionism of Abraham Lincoln. I call foul.", WaPo 6.23.16.
178. Rich Lowry, "The Rancid Lincoln–Haters of the Libertarian Right", Daily Beast.
179. Walker, Hunter, "GOP Candidate For AZ Governor Misquotes Lincoln On 'Class Hatred'", TPM (12/31/13, 10:25 AM EST).
180. Edsall, Thomas B., "Lott Decried For Part Of Salute to Thurmond", WaPo 12.7.02.
181. "Senator Trent Lott on Tort Reform: "Justice" for Him, "Frivolous" for You", Laufenberg Law Group.
182. Barragan, Bianca, "Political ‘guru’ Frank Luntz built an Oval Office replica in his LA home", Curbed (10/12/16, 12:36pm PDT ).
183. Starr, Terrell Jermaine, "Trump Doesn't Like The Smartest Military Mind He Hired: Report", Foxtrot Alpha (12 May 2017, 3:39pm EDT).
184. Cooper, Helene, "Jim Mattis, Defense Secretary, Resigns in Rebuke of Trump's Worldview", The New York Times (20 Dec. 2018).
185. Woody, Christopher, "Trump national security adviser McMaster resigns, Bolton replaces", Business Insider (22 Mar. 2018, 6:27 PM).
186. Burgess Everett and Seung Min Kim, "McCain on tape: Trump damages my reelection hopes", Politico (05/05/16 05:17 AM EDT).
187. "At least he found a way to impress people that didn't involve groping women!"
188. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/05/16/trump-acknowledges-facts-shared-with-russian-envoys-during-white-house-meeting/?utm_term=.da7e1efcc76b
189. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/27/the-reclusive-hedge-fund-tycoon-behind-the-trump-presidency
190. Joy Gray, Kalli, "Rand Paul Teaches Lady Reporter How To Talk To Him, Again", Wonkette (4/8/15, 12:30pm).
191. Sarah Jones and Jason Easley, "Rand Paul’s New Book Bombs By Selling Less Than 500 Copies In Two Weeks", PoliticusUSA.
192. Greg Miller and Phillip Rucker, "Michael Flynn resigns as national security adviser", WaPo (2/14/17 at 12:30 AM).
193. Apple, R. W., "Life in Iowa May Not Have Changed, But the Political Turf Is Another Story", NYT 10.28.95.
194. Brady Dennis and Chris Mooney, "Scott Pruitt calls for an ‘exit’ from the Paris accord, sharpening the Trump White House’s climate rift", WaPo 14 April 2017.
195. Davenport, Coral, "Top Trump Advisers Are Split on Paris Agreement on Climate Change", NYT 2 March 2017.
196. Cay Johnston, David, "Wilbur Ross Is Another Trump Cabinet Pick With Underexamined Russian Ties", Daily Beast (27 February 2017, 11:36 AM ET).
197. Simon, Scott, "Rep. Adrian Smith On Farm Subsidies And Food Stamps", NPR (27 May 2017, 7:59 AM ET).
198. Eggert, David, "Flint water has fallen below federal lead limit", Lansing State Journal via Associated Press (Updated1/24/17 at 2:38 pm).
199. Fonger, Ron, "Gov. Snyder adds $1.5 million to contract for his Flint water criminal defense", MLive (Updated 12/21/16 at 1:56 PM).
200. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/21/us/politics/sean-spicer-resigns-as-white-house-press-secretary.html
201. No matter, it's just locker room talk (or shower room talk in this case).
202. Resnick, Gideon, "Why Did Top Trump Aide Jason Miller Suddenly Quit?", Daily Beast (25 December 2016, 1:41 PM ET).
203. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/secretary-of-state-rex-tillerson-spends-his-first-weeks-isolated-from-an-anxious-bureaucracy/2017/03/30/bdf8ec86-155f-11e7-ada0-1489b735b3a3_story.html?utm_term=.ae2ad33acfe8
204. Lerner, Adam B., "ExxonMobil CEO mocks renewable energy in shareholder speech", Politico (Updated 27 May 201, 3:29 PM EDT).
205. Michaels, Samantha, "Torture Allegations Shadow Rex Tillerson's Time at Exxon Mobil", Mother Jones (11 January 2017, 7:00 AM).
206. Edwards, David, "GOP senator: Let restaurants ‘opt out’ of handwashing after toilet to ‘reduce regulatory burden’", Raw Story (2/3/15 11:29 ET). The unwashed invisible hand just gave someone salmonella.
207. Choma, Russ, "LLCs Donate To Pro-Tillis Super PAC", Open Secrets 1.13.14. Free market capitalism when it suits him, protectionism and cronyism when the monopoly is challenged.
208. https://www.politico.com/story/2012/01/santorum-confronts-arlens-specter-071455
209. Oppenheim, Maya, "'They were legit thinking Red Square North Korea-style parade,' says inauguration planner",Independent 1.20.17.
210. Tolentino, Jia, "Ivanka Trump’s Terrible Book Helps Explain the Trump-Family Ethos", New Yorker 29 November 2016.
211. https://web.archive.org/web/20110303115942/http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=13017077&page=3
212. https://web.archive.org/web/20110221125613/http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/02/18/6081693-wisconsin-how-we-got-here
213. https://www.thenation.com/article/wisconsins-voter-id-law-suppressed-200000-votes-trump-won-by-23000/
214. https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/29/18027032/foxconn-wisconsin-plant-jobs-deal-subsidy-governor-scott-walker
215. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMET-u0FYjc&t=623s
216. Haggerty, John, "My personal Fox News nightmare: Inside a month of self-induced torture", Salon (1/28/14 at 2:00 PM UTC).
217. Morrisson, Patt "Can Bruce Bartlett save the GOP by bursting its 'bubble'?", L.A. Times (6.3.15 at 5:00 PM).
218. Sargent, Greg, "Publicist confirms it: Fox News blacklisted Bruce Bartlett over book critical of Bush", WaPO 11.28.12.
219. I have surpassed Partisan Politics. Now, I am become Bernanke, Destroyer of Worlds
220. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/26/is-bernanke-hiding-a-smok_n_437509.html
221. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/jan/02/american-international-group/aig-says-it-has-repaid-government-plus-profit/
222. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-aig-bailout-greenberg-suit-20150615-story.html
223. Gass, Nick, "FBI director says he's no longer a registered Republican", Politico (7 July 2016,11:58 AM EDT).
224. Warsh, David, "Comey’s Choices, One More Time", Economic Principles 7 May 2017.
225. Barrett, Devlin, "President Trump dismisses FBI Director Comey", WaPo (9 May 2017, 6:23 PM).
226. Duvosin, Marc, "Here's what James Comey said about Hillary Clinton's emails back in July", L.A. Times (9 May 2017, 5:15 p.m.).
227. http://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/16/trump-allegedly-asked-comey-to-consider-imprisoning-members-of-the-press.html
228. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/03/10/61-of-young-republicans-favor-same-sex-marriage/

United States political parties

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