What will the Republican Party be like post-Trump?

[Max_S]

@HurricaneDitka

I doubt he’ll ever achieve a Reagan-like level of fame among Republicans, but if he wins again in 2020, I suspect Republicans will be more willing to follow a model that twice assembled a winning coalition. I see that as being more protectionist and less globalist than the Republicans have been in the past.

What’s going to happen to the pipe dream of fiscal conservatism? So far I don’t have any indication that the current Republican party cares about balancing the budget, not that either party has ever actually practiced fiscal responsibility. But it seems that even the talking point of fiscal responsibility has been pushed to the wayside. Sure, there was a tax cut - for many - but spending went up, not down.

~Max

[Kent_Clark]

@kunilou

I just want to say that no one on this board has responded to the wager I proposed in Post 56. Don’t we have any compulsive gamblers here?

I’m not looking to shame anyone publicly. If anyone wants to contact me by PM to discuss the details before they make a wager, I won’t mention it here. I also won’t mention any names here unless you agree to it.

@HurricaneDitka

Perhaps your wager is a bit too unlikely to come to pass for anyone to think it’s worth bothering with. If you had to guess, what are the odds that Condoleeza Rice even runs for president in 2024? 1%? More? Less?

@RTFirefly

Per that post:
First of all, there’s the ‘if.’ We’re talking about a bet that’s almost certain not to materialize.

And second, she’s the sort of potential GOP candidate that certain classes of pundit always like, but never get much of a following when they run. (And as much as I hate to say it, we Dopers have way more in common with pundits than we do with the average GOP voter.) If Condi were to run in 2024, she’d be lucky to get any delegates at all, and would most likely drop out well before Iowa.

@Max_S

Yeah dude, I’m not taking that bet.

~Max

First of all, I agree she will almost certainly never run. Second, I agree with RTFirefly. But I think if the Republicans have to pick up the pieces in 2024, Condi Rice is the one prospective candidate I see who could instantly eliminate the knee-jerk reaction independent voters would have against voting for any Republican candidate.

Yeah, it’s all a big what-if. But my offer stays on the table and anyone who wants to take the bet can back out right up until the day before the first Republican delegate event (primary, caucus, convention, meeting of superdelegates, etc.)

[Budget_Player_Cadet]

@Max_S

What’s going to happen to the pipe dream of fiscal conservatism? So far I don’t have any indication that the current Republican party cares about balancing the budget, not that either party has ever actually practiced fiscal responsibility. But it seems that even the talking point of fiscal responsibility has been pushed to the wayside. Sure, there was a tax cut - for many - but spending went up, not down.

~Max

Fiscal responsibility, as a talking point, is still serving exactly the same purpose it always served.

House Republicans released a proposal Tuesday that would balance the budget in nine years — but only by making large cuts to entitlement programs, including Medicare, that President Trump vowed not to touch.

The House Budget Committee is aiming to pass the blueprint this week, but that may be as far as it goes this midterm election year. It is not clear that GOP leaders will put the document on the House floor for a vote, and even if it were to pass the House, the budget would have little impact on actual spending levels.

Nonetheless the budget serves as an expression of Republicans’ priorities at a time of rapidly rising deficits and debt. Although the nation’s growing indebtedness has been exacerbated by the GOP’s own policy decisions — including the new tax law, which most analyses say will add at least $1 trillion to the debt — Republicans on the Budget Committee said they felt a responsibility to put the nation on a sounder fiscal trajectory.

It has always been an excuse to slash social safety net programs. Republicans never care about “fiscal responsibility” when they’re in power. They never think, “how will this affect the budget” when they pass another huge tax cut or drive us into another unnecessary imperalistic war. But in the aftermath, they’re perfectly happy to point to the massive deficits they racked up and scream about how debt is enslaving our children and that we have to do something - and that something is always cutting government services that overwhelmingly benefit the poor and working class.

I’d say “It’s just slightly more shameless than before,” but that might not be true, it was always pretty damn shameless. There’s a reason Clinton balanced the budget, then Cheney said “deficits don’t matter”. The party that actually cares about the national debt as more than a cudgel to beat their political opponents with is the democratic party. So this isn’t changing.

[Bryan_Ekers]

So Republicans are tax cheats, huh? (scribble scribble scribble) Good to know. Thanks, Ditka.
I expect the Republicans post-Trump will continue to try to undermine regulatory agencies and appoint like-minded judges. Trump is their current vehicle - they’ll hitch to another by and by. Basically, the U.S. will continue to lag behind the other liberal democracies.

[The_Peyote_Coyote]

But here’s the scary part. Trump is currently a drag on his party. But that largely comes down to him being grossly incompetent, stupid, self-destructive, obviously corrupt, et cetera et cetera et cetera. What if, in 2024, the person who runs shares Trump’s authoritarian tendencies, but, just to name one obvious example, isn’t so stupidly self-destructive that he’d fire the head of the FBI that’s currently investigating him for ties to Russia, then admit on national television that he fired the head of the FBI because of his handling of an investigation into him. Imagine if, instead of a scandal-prone man who cheated on his pregnant wife with a porn star then paid said porn star to keep quiet, we had just… someone who wasn’t that.

We’re fucked.

I agree with you Budget Player Cadet. That’s my biggest concern. I don’t think the next 20 to 40 years are going to be good ones for the US even if the Democrats win the 2020 election.

[Max_S]

@Budget_Player_Cadet

Republicans never care about “fiscal responsibility” when they’re in power. They never think, “how will this affect the budget” when they pass another huge tax cut or drive us into another unnecessary imperalistic war. But in the aftermath, they’re perfectly happy to point to the massive deficits they racked up and scream about how debt is enslaving our children and that we have to do something - and that something is always cutting government services that overwhelmingly benefit the poor and working class.

Yes, but I wish we would stop being such hypocrites and actually think about the fiscal implications.

~Max

[Red_Wiggler]

@The_Peyote_Coyote

I agree with you Budget Player Cadet. That’s my biggest concern. I don’t think the next 20 to 40 years are going to be good ones for the US even if the Democrats win the 2020 election.

I think the makeup of the Senate in the years to come – narrowly Republican and with states containing about 35% of the nation’s population dominating – will be the real drag on the country’s progress. Mitch McConnell, and Tom Cotton after him, won’t give a shit about obstructing every bit of modernization the Dems in the House and, hopefully, White House, propose. And we’ll fall further behind the rest of the developed world as a result.

But we’ll have a giant military that will make everyone else fear us and our increasing slide away from democracy, so there’s that.