found online by Raymond
From PZ Myers:
Trump is a bad man, corrupt and immoral. But putting the focus solely on his action in Finland is misleading. Russian meddling might have given him a slight boost in the last election, but really…lots of Americans voted for him. The Republican party is supporting him. All the howling aimed at one man is a distraction from the long term problem.
Why were Americans susceptible to Russian propaganda? Why do they vote for a criminal political party?
Someone like Trump should never have gotten close to the presidency or any other political office, but since he actually won, Republicans are seeing that the Trump style works and that they can get away with pretty much anything they want. What can we do about it? Convince non-voting liberals to vote, convince voting liberals to vote for the candidate who can actually win, and convince independents that this is not the way to go. Republicans have proven themselves to be a lost cause, so unless turnout for Democrats is high and stays high for future elections, this may indeed happen again.
If the 2018 and 2020 elections are bad for Republicans, they might realize that the backlash against Trump types isn’t worth the benefits. Then again, maybe it is: look at what Trump has done in under two years to just our judicial system. If voters forget all about it 2-4 years later, it’ll be time for the next crazy Republican. And if Republican voters fill Congress with Trump supporters and enablers, we can’t rely on their politicians to try to control Trump types at all.
We can still be hopeful about demographic changes, but we’ve been saying that for years and the advantages that our electoral system confers upon Republicans outweigh them anyway. Furthermore, the younger alt-right has gained influence and feels more comfortable out in the open, so the decline of the old GOP may simply become the rise of a new, nastier GOP.
I disagree with Myers on one point. He suggests that people voted for a destructive radical because of various bad government policies. But the policies he listed are all things for which Republicans reliably vote and which Trump pledged he would continue to do. This is what they want. *They* are the system he criticizes. They are the problem.