Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson recently made the point that, despite the doomsayers who believe the Republican Party is on the verge of destruction, the “body” of the Republican Party — meaning state and local governments across America — is in fine shape. Thirty-one states have Republican governors and 70 percent of state legislatures have Republican majorities. In addition, Republicans control both branches of Congress.
It is the “head” — the presidency — that is problematic. After eight disastrous years under President Obama, the White House was ripe for the taking, yet our two remaining presidential candidates, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, have very little chance of winning.
Gerson notes that each candidate represents an ideological strain in the GOP that virtually ensures defeat. Most of Cruz’s supporters are die-hard conservatives who think the only reason the GOP lost the last two presidential elections was because the two candidates, John McCain and Mitt Romney, were squishy RINOs who were so uninspiring millions of voters who otherwise would have ensured a Republican victory stayed home on Election Day.
Unfortunately for that theory, there are simply not enough purebred conservatives to elect a Republican president. Independents, moderate Democrats, and a dash of minorities and young people are critical, and Cruz doesn’t appeal to them.
As for Donald Trump, his core following is mostly whites, guys especially, angry at the state of the country, disillusioned with “politics as usual,” and either have lost their jobs or fear they soon will. As a result, they buy in to Trump’s message of nativism, protectionism and isolationism.
The problem there, of course, is that nativism turns off everyone who isn’t basically a white guy, and Trump has certainly done his best to alienate Hispanics, African-Americans, Muslims, Jews and women. Try gaining the presidency with all of those groups voting against you.
Protectionism may also appeal to the out-of-work (or soon-to-be) white voter, but most voters know it also means the possibility of a global trade war, possibly resulting in a global recession. And raising tariffs on imports from China by 45 percent — a Trump campaign promise — means every made-in-China product Americans buy, and we buy a lot of them, will be 45 percent more expensive. And isolationism in a world in which the Middle East and North Africa are in chaos, Russia is becoming more imperialistic, and radical Islamic terrorism is pervasive, is madness.
So will the modern-day Republican Party end in the wake of a disastrous presidential election? I actually think not, but if so it will be ironic. The last time a politically party dissolved was in the early 1850s, when the dying Whig Party was replaced by a new party called the Republican Party.
