It will still exist in some form--as the Trump party in aspect if not in name--going forward--but there is clearly no going back. There is no picking up the pieces and there will be no foreseeable reconciliation. The GOP has gorged itself on conspiracy theory and racism and having become a bloated hateful shell of itself, there is no way to return to normal.
How does The Omnivore know?
The numbers don't lie. Trump improved his vote-share over four years of destruction with the number of dead still climbing, our military dishonored among almost every viable axis, and our relations with our allies in flames while our executive branch seeks comity with dictators--the more murderous the better, if they're flattering.
That "Republicans" could turn out for that in huge numbers--although, thankfully not as huge as Joe Biden's--is telling.
Biden is not lacking in charisma--he has that quantity and you can see it when he is acting one-on-one with people--a glowing humanness that, of course, Trump utterly lacks. However Biden doesn't have the video-friendly wattage of Obama or, to be fair here, Donald Trump.
Certainly, Trump's is manufactured--his reality TV program--his decades of being a synonym for "rich,"--his carefully cultivated appearance (Home Alone 2) in various media (Professional Wrestling) has made him something singular that, perhaps, only David Copperfield in today's world accomplishes: a man whose name is a signifier for an idea (for Copperfield it's "master magician").
Biden's turn-out means that as a country we are not beholden to the Golden Idol (both literally: have you seen his living room?) and spiritually (the rise of QAnon--a competitor with Christianity, it places Trump as its God Head). But even if America isn't entirely enthralled, the Republicans are. They have collectively bought in to the lie that Biden stole the election.
They have aided and abetted Trump's every worst impulse. Never mind the Lodestar anonymous guy (now known, but The Omnivore doesn't even care to look up his name). No one who stayed on in any position of power under the regime has retained any dignity nor deserves any grace. Everyone is exposed--as their worst self--all the generals who tolerated him even as he abused them--and held their tongues when it could have made a difference--all the book writers who were kicked out and then Told All--the same spirit of the Stairwell courage that has all the retiring politicians suddenly finding their honest voices--none of them have shown themselves to be anything but craven. Anything but opportunistic--anything other than a hero.
But the worst exposure is reserved for the voters who stayed by him from his trip down the escalator when a solid portion of the GOP base found, at last, a man willing to be racist enough, petty, enough, and vindictive enough to make up for indignity of Barack Obama, the existence of Muslims in America, and the emotional wounds inflicted by decades of listening to Fox News and other Republican media outlets tell them they were disrespected by liberals they likely never even met.
We know that the core group that preferred Trump to the other establishment politicians was more racist and angry as a whole--and that they were enough to make Trump the candidate--but it was the rest of the party--so eager to win and never mind the cost--that made him president.
Now, of course, we have a case where four years of lies have created not a parallel world--but an anti-world--in which they reside. The difference between the Republicanverse and the real world isn't one that is simply out of alignment: it is one that, were there to be any actual reconciliation would explode in an annihilation reaction.
A person who, today, as polling tells us the vast majority of Republicans do, believes Joe Biden and his communist cohort, literally stole the election cannot later come to believe they are wrong and that they--and their friends--were misguided.
That can't happen because the social reinforcement is too strong--the damage of admitting you were taken too severe--so it's locked in. Now, for those people, Biden will forever have literally destroyed American democracy . . . and, of course, it's them.
David? Was it worth it? In the end?
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