# Bannon's War: The Fight for the GOP **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [October 21, 2017, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437 "2017-10-21T13:40:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2017, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/21 "2017-10-23T15:47:14Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The left is pretty tiny, actually, about 20% of the population. Big enough to have a major role in one party, but the right is big enough to have a major role in BOTH parties, and does. Plus almost all the moderates are now in the Democratic Party as well, further weakening the left. > > On the good side, the left’s party will be more likely to win in the future, which as we saw during the Clinton years, bought them free trade, smaller government, tax cuts, welfare reform, a record number of countries bombed up to that point, and a crime crackdown. That’s just what the Democratic Party looks like when it’s a true majoritarian party. Lots of Blue Dogs running around punching hippies. > > I look forward to entering your tent with my bros(neocons, libertarians, free trade conservatives) and making you sit in the corner.🙂 On one tentacle that’s what I see happening. Democrats under Clinton in the 90s almost felt like Republican right. If free trade, economically conservative Republicans move to the Democratic Party the Bernie Bro wing will be further marginalized. On another tentacle I see that tribal/brand identity is very strong and the parties might not shed that many members and just remain weird coalitions. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2017, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/22 "2017-10-23T20:47:22Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The left is pretty tiny, actually, about 20% of the population. Big enough to have a major role in one party, but the right is big enough to have a major role in BOTH parties, and does. Plus almost all the moderates are now in the Democratic Party as well, further weakening the left. > > On the good side, the left’s party will be more likely to win in the future, which as we saw during the Clinton years, bought them free trade, smaller government, tax cuts, welfare reform, a record number of countries bombed up to that point, and a crime crackdown. That’s just what the Democratic Party looks like when it’s a true majoritarian party. Lots of Blue Dogs running around punching hippies. > > I look forward to entering your tent with my bros(neocons, libertarians, free trade conservatives) and making you sit in the corner.🙂 How do you define the left and the right? According to pew, the left has one anchor and the right has two anchors. > **[Beyond Red vs. Blue: The Political Typology](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2014/06/26/the-political-typology-beyond-red-vs-blue/)** > > Our latest political typology sorts voters into cohesive groups based on their attitudes and values and provides a field guide for the constantly changing political landscape. The left anchor makes up 21% of voters. The right anchors make a combined 36%. Steadfast conservatives are the white nationalists, I don’t know if the business friendly conservatives will go along with them. Also I’m unsure why they aren’t listing black voters as part of the democratic base. They make up about 13% of voters and are reliable democrats, voting democratic 85-95% on average. Liberals tend to be white. Generally white liberals and black voters combined make up 30% of the electorate and make up the base of the democratic party. Anyway, I guess my point is this. Do you think there are enough nativist white nationalists to sustain a party? Keep in mind only 71% of voters in 2016 were white and that number is declining. And off the bat, about 1/5 of those whites are white liberals, so the gop has to build a coalition of 56% of the electorate because I don’t see non whites joining a white nationalist movement. Trump got 8% of the black vote and 28% of the Latino vote. The gop, after losing white liberals has to have a near monopoly on the remaining white voters. I’m upset that you may be right and the democratic party may abandon liberals and blacks to appease moderate Republicans. I don’t want a center right democratic party or a return to Clinton triangulation. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2017, 11:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/23 "2017-10-24T11:30:08Z")
I don’t know who is going to turn out. I see the factions as follows: 1- Fascist Bigots. This group hates blacks, Hispanics, Muslims- basically anyone who isn’t a straight white male Christian. This is the Dumb Donald - Bannon wing. They don’t have the deep pockets of the business wing, but they’ve got loyalty in spades. What they lack in numbers they make up for in turnout. Every single one of the comes out and votes and every single one of them votes Republican. 2- Business. They don’t give two shits about social issues, their sole concerns are cutting taxes and regulations. As long as any millionaire pays a nickel in taxes and as long as a single environmental regulation exists, they will keep the money flowing to the Republican Party. Mitch McConnell and Romney are their patron saints. 3- Social Conservatives. All they care about are guns and abortion. Nothing else really matters. Think Sarah Pallin. I would throw the “moderates” like Collins/Kasich into camp 2 and ignore the libertarian types as insignificant. I see the Fascist wing as having broken off from the social conservative wing. I don’t see the anti-abortion types as being racist at all and many in this wing are a bit uneasy with the Fascist wing. As for now, the business types have the seats in Congress and the Fascists occupy the White House. Neither type particularly likes the other. The business types were more than happy to get the votes from the racist camp as long as they ran the circus. The question is, can they survive primary challenges from the Fascists? My prediction is that in the end, the business wing will win out, as it always does. The social conservative wing will go along with them as long as they get to dictate the social issue conversation that the business wing doesn’t give two shits about. This leaves the Fascists who will wither in power as their disgraced hero fades into oblivion. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2017, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/24 "2017-10-24T12:25:22Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **adaher** : > > The real fight is now over the soul of the Democratic Party, and the establishment is going to get a huge boost from defecting Republicans. All it takes is 10% of Republicans deciding maybe they’d be better off voting in Democratic primaries and the Sanders insurgency is doomed. That depends on which 10% switches over. A lot of Trump’s supporters were blue-collar folks who saw themselves as having been screwed by The System, and so voted to destroy The System. Those voters are certainly winnable by Democrats, if they start seeing Trump as a personification of The System instead of as its destroyer (in fact, historically they largely have been Democrats). And those voters lean pretty strongly towards Sanders. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/25 "2017-10-25T00:26:33Z")
Here’s a post from 2012 about why liberals can’t even win primaries in the Democratic Party: > **[Chart: Why Liberals Lose Primaries More Often Than Conservatives](https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/06/chart-why-liberals-lose-primaries-more-often-conservatives/)** > > Question, answered. > [@](#): > > There’s an answer! As Bernstein no doubt knows, the GOP is more ideologically unified than the Democratic party. Self-identified conservatives make up a much larger portion (71 percent, as of 2011) of the Republican party than self-identified liberals make up of the Democratic coalition (39 percent as of 2011—up from just 29 percent in 2000). Moderates and conservatives easily outnumber liberals within the Democratic Party. Throw in a few million ex-Republicans in 2020 and the primaries start to look pretty fun. Although really, the Sanders forces would be doomed anyway because African-American voters back the establishment choice almost every time, the lone exceptions being Jessie Jackson’s 1988 run and Barack Obama’s 2008 run. Sanders has zero chance of winning the African-American vote, which is decisive in Democratic primaries. With the exception of 1988, the winner of the black vote has won the Democratic primary every cycle since blacks could vote in the South. So start reconciling yourselves to Cory Booker or Joe Biden now.🙂 Of course, there’s a wildcard: a primary challenge to Trump that could make voters like me register as Republicans to go knock Trump out of the White House before we even get to the general election. That might even draw in some conservative Democrats, which could actually help Sanders. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/26 "2017-10-25T03:48:58Z")
According to the newest Pew study, half of democratic voters are liberal now (they make up 19% of voters, but because they turn out at higher numbers they make up 25% of voters). They are also by far the most activist part of the democratic coalition. The democratic party can ignore them at their peril in an effort to appeal to the 2-5% of the electorate who are republicans upset by Trump. [http://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/24/pew-deep-divisions-within-both-parties-244087](http://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/24/pew-deep-divisions-within-both-parties-244087) > [@](#): > > Solid Liberals (19 percent): This is the largest of all the groups. Among those politically engaged, they represent a quarter of the electorate — and nearly half of all politically engaged Democrats > > And their level of political activism in the months following Trump’s election sets Solid Liberals apart from all other groups in the political typology, left or right. Nearly half of Solid Liberals (49%) say they have contributed money to a political candidate or campaign in the past year; no more than a third in any other group (32% of Core Conservatives) say the same. And 39% of Solid Liberals report they have participated in a protest against Trump’s policies, which also is by far the highest share among the political typology groups. liberals went from 29% of democrats in 2000, to 39% in 2011 to 50% in 2017. I see no reason, especially in the age of Trump, to think that will change. Do me a favor **adaher** , and take the quiz. I’m wondering which group you are part of, because I’m assuming that group is the one that will defect from Trump. > **[Political Typology Quiz](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/quiz/political-typology/)** > > Take our quiz to find out which one of our nine political typology groups is your best match. I’d assume New Era Enterprisers. I’d have no problem with president Booker or Biden really. It isn’t like president Sanders would be able to accomplish anything, he’d just be a figurehead. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/27 "2017-10-25T04:03:08Z")
I actually got “Market Skeptic Republicans”, surprisingly enough. But that’s probaby inaccurate since I didn’t like many of the choices I was presented with. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/28 "2017-10-25T04:08:42Z")
I figured it’d be that group or the enterprisers. Either way, internet polls are never wrong. Among republicans 93% of core conservatives approve of Trump, 84% of country first conservatives. But only 66% and 63% of the other two groups of republicans approve of Trump. So those two groups are probably where the defections will come from seeing how not even one year in, about 1/3 of those two groups don’t approve of Trump. The 20% of voters who are core conservatives, of whom 93% approve of Trump, aren’t going to make up many defections. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/29 "2017-10-25T12:19:32Z")
If we were just talking about policy I’d actually prefer Trump to Obama or Bush at this point. The actual policies coming out of the administration are not too bad, although they suffer from being poorly thought out because of the guy at the top. My issue with Trump is his character, his sanity, his seeming loss of intelligence(senility?). The only thing I can say that he’s actually done right is where he’s reduced his own role, such as letting the military fight the war against ISIS and letting ICE enforce immigration laws. Executive interference in both cases was a problem during the last administration. Presidents should set broad policy consistent with the law, not interfere in how the experienced people on the ground carry out the mission. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/30 "2017-10-25T16:16:26Z")
Plus I don’t consider myself a “market skeptic”. I have become more aware of how big corporations stack the deck in their favor, but that’s not really a market issue, that’s a government issue. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/31 "2017-10-25T17:40:26Z")
I could see some corporate neo-liberal Republican types switching teams in next year’s mid-terms or at least not actively supporting Bannon’s GOP if we continue down the current path toward protectionism. Most Wall Street Repubs are still reluctantly supporting the GOP because they want even more tax breaks and less regulation, but they might see protectionism as too disruptive. The problem is, that cuts off the money but not everyone’s money. Bannon has probably already factored this into his populist scheme. ---
**Author:** ![Algher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Algher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algher)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/32 "2017-10-25T18:42:21Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > I actually got “Market Skeptic Republicans”, surprisingly enough. But that’s probaby inaccurate since I didn’t like many of the choices I was presented with. I ended up New Era Enterprisers - force fit since I also did not like the binary choices at times (though I know why they are used). ---
**Author:** ![doorhinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a5b964/32.png) [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/33 "2017-10-25T19:23:03Z")
\*Your best fit is… Core Conservatives along with 13% of the public. This overwhelmingly Republican group holds conservative attitudes across a wide range of issues, especially in their support for smaller government. Core Conservatives are deeply skeptical of the social safety net and favor lower tax rates on corporations and high-income individuals. While they are divided on whether immigrants do more to strengthen or burden the country, Core Conservatives offer far more positive views of immigrants than do Country First Conservatives. Core Conservatives are relatively upbeat about national conditions and a majority says that the United States “stands above” all other nations in the world.\* The possible options - -Bystanders -Core Conservatives -Country First Conservatives -Market Skeptic Republicans -New Era Enterprisers -Devout and Diverse -Disaffected Democrats -Opportunity Democrats -Solid Liberals Given the possible options, and considering the limited questions, I guess Core Conservatives sounds about right. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/34 "2017-10-25T20:13:56Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > I could see some corporate neo-liberal Republican types switching teams in next year’s mid-terms or at least not actively supporting Bannon’s GOP if we continue down the current path toward protectionism. Most Wall Street Repubs are still reluctantly supporting the GOP because they want even more tax breaks and less regulation, but they might see protectionism as too disruptive. The problem is, that cuts off the money but not everyone’s money. Bannon has probably already factored this into his populist scheme. On foreign policy and business regulation the Democrats might actually be the better party for many conservatives now. Most neocons on social media are anti-Trump in a big way. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2017, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/35 "2017-10-25T20:44:52Z")
[Bannon’s war exposes GOP donor divisions](https://apnews.com/abd8f462d1f9482f90f5a7b809141ac6/Bannon's-war-exposes-GOP-donor-divisions) is the AP’s latest story about this. > [@](#): > > Deep-pocketed supporters of Trump’s agenda are divided over how best to spend their dollars to advance the Trump agenda. Once a whispered concern, the division was out front this week as donors who support President Donald Trump huddled deep in the Texas desert to discuss their strategy. > > It’s not that they all oppose the president’s former adviser’s more-radical version of conservatism, though some of them do. Like him, they’re frustrated and angry that the current Republican majorities in Congress have so far failed to rid the nation of “Obamacare,” overhaul the U.S. tax system, build a border wall and more. > > But they fear he’ll depose incumbent Republicans in favor of weaker challengers who will then lose to Democrats. > [@](#): > > Bannon, who left his job as the president’s chief strategist in August, was not invited. He maintains relationships with some America First officials, but he has been focused instead on assembling his own coalition of donors in recent weeks to promote what he recently called “a season of war on the GOP establishment.” > [@](#): > > In fact, Bannon has said he plans to seek Republican challengers for virtually every Republican senator seeking re-election next year, chiefly for the purpose of electing candidates who would remove Mitch McConnell of Kentucky from the post of Senate majority leader. > > Bannon has even put reliable Trump agenda supporters, such as Sens. Deb Fischer of Nebraska and John Barrasso of Wyoming, on notice that they aren’t free from close scrutiny. > [@](#): > > Yet roughly a year before the next election, the battle for 2018 campaign cash has only just begun. And the pro-Republican forces start out as divided as ever. > > In last month’s special Senate election in Alabama, Bannon worked against the wishes of the GOP establishment, Trump himself and the pro-Trump super PAC to back ex-state Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore, who ultimately won the GOP runoff. Bannon is also promoting anti-establishment candidates in Nevada, Arizona, Mississippi, Wisconsin and New York, and the list is expected to grow. > > The pro-Trump America First, by contrast, is more tightly focused on backing candidates Trump supports and those who back his agenda. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/36 "2017-10-26T10:31:18Z")
> [@doorhinge](#): > > \*Your best fit is… > Core Conservatives > > along with 13% of the public. > > … > Given the possible options, and considering the limited questions, I guess Core Conservatives sounds about right. This is about as surprising as my finding out that I’m a Solid Liberal. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/37 "2017-10-26T12:01:48Z")
So you’re saying “liberal” is your middle name? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/38 "2017-10-26T16:32:00Z")
“What’s your first name, Baldrick.” “Not sure. Might be Sodoff.” “Sod off?” "When I went to play in the gutter, I’d say to the other snipes, ‘Hello, I’m Baldrick’ and they’d say ‘Yes, we know, Baldrick. Sod off, Baldrick.’ " - Blackadder _Dish and Dishonesty._ ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/39 "2017-10-30T18:42:09Z")
I rated as solid liberal. But many of the binary questions bothered me. For example, I don’t really think that “most” corporations make too much. But the giant monopoly or near monopoly corporations certainly do. I am in favor of free markets; it’s just that hardly any businessmen are, unless they are trying to break in to a market. Once in, they quickly change. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2017, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437/40 "2017-10-31T09:01:07Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > … But many of the binary questions bothered me… I was also extremely disappointed in the quality of the questions and the fact that only Yes/No answers were allowed. Didn’t the previous Pew survey allow one to select from _two_ sliding scales? One scale for Stength of agreement and another for Importance of the issue? In the past I had respect for Pew Research. I’m afraid their stark binary questions may be a valid reflection of how America has transmogrified politically. There’s no nuance anymore: We either want taxes to be Zero or 100%. We either want totally open borders, or an impenetrable Wall. We either want to kill babies, or to kill their mothers. :eek: [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bannons-war-the-fight-for-the-gop/799437.md?page=3)