Republicans Love to Lose

The long-time office holders and lobbyist class prefer to be in the minority.

Republicans love to lose. That’s a startling statement but it’s true, at least at the establishment level. The long-time office holders and lobbyist class prefer to be in the minority. It’s much easier for them to just blame the Democrats for everything. It makes for an easy life. They don’t need to govern and they can promise their short memory constituents that, if you just vote for them this fall, they’ll stand up to the Democrats once and for all! They never do of course, but before the widespread use of social media, they could get away with it. The mainstream press censored dissent and the few constituents paying attention had no voice. One of the few people paying attention with a voice was Rush.

“Ladies and gentlemen, there is a reason why Ronald Reagan challenged Gerald Ford in the Republican presidential primary in 1976. There is a reason why Bob Michael stepped aside so Mr. Newt could become speaker. House Republicans, leader of the House of Representatives. And that’s because Gerald Ford and Bob Michael come from an old school of Republican. They represent a Republican party that was used to being in the minority. They represent a Republican party that was used to losing. They represent a Republican party that made deals with the Democratic majority to get along and be happy. And as long as they stayed losers, as long as they remained in the minority, the Democrats treated them with respect now and then, and everything was hunky-dory. They were happy to be second fiddle to the Democrats. They were happy to be the lap dogs of the Washington elite and the media because they were given respect because they lost with grace and understanding.”

Rush is precisely correct in every detail except one. This is still a description of the Republican party. The Republican party leadership does not want to win. Ronna McDaniel is living proof of this. She wasted millions of donor dollars giving lavish events and failed to support good candidates. Yet she was reinstated as head of the Republican party. The Republican party is profoundly an unserious party. Only in the Republican party would the focus be, not on winning elections, but on throwing big parties. While corruption is rampant within the Democratic party, it is a different kind of corruption. Cronyism is fine, but dollars always go towards winning elections. In the Republican party, its apparently cronyism and parties all the way down the line.