Seeing as this will be my final column before everyone goes to the polls on Tuesday, I figured that I’d reflect on the election as a whole, particularly the rise of Mr. Donald J. Trump.
In the wake of Mitt Romney’s 2012 loss, the Republican elites released an “autopsy” of Romney’s loss that also laid out their plans for future elections.
In the report, they commented on Romney’s inability to win any minority demographic, saying, “We need to campaign among Hispanic, black, Asian and gay Americans, and demonstrate we care about them, too. We must recruit more candidates who come from minority communities. But it is not just tone that counts. Policy always matters.”
And — as I’m sure we’re all too aware of at this point — in an ironic twist of fate, Trump rose out of his cesspool of garbage, reality television and crazy conspiracy theories, saying, “You called for me?”
One narrative I’ve observed in this election is that of the GOP establishment being taken captive by Trump, like he sprung up out of nowhere and took everyone by surprise. In reality, though, Trump is an inevitable product of their own making.
From their coordinated attack on President Obama’s legitimacy as a U.S. citizen to their utter unwillingness to accept any of his actions as within the constitutional allowances of his office, the GOP has spent the past eight years planting mistrust, hatred and bigotry in their most stalwart constituents. And now, they’re reaping what they’ve sown.
Regardless of the results on Election Day, the GOP will lose. If Trump wins, they are automatically on the wrong side of history in endorsing Trump. If he loses, it’s another four years that they’re without a person in the White House.
But back to my original point: Trump is not the only manifestation of everything antithetical to the 2012 Extreme Platform Makeover: GOP Edition. The rest of the party’s leaders are, too.
Why? Well, it’s inherently contradictory for Republicans to attempt to appeal to minorities while retaining their current policies.
There’s nothing Hispanic-friendly in their coded rhetoric that in reality serves as a call for mass deportation. There’s nothing black-friendly in their unwillingness to admit that police brutality is a real issue and to see the legitimacy in the Black Lives Matter movement. There’s nothing LGBT-friendly in the right-wing hysteria that erupted over the transgender bathroom rights debate.
The fact of the matter is that the real cause of the GOP’s disarray and confusion is the inability of the stereotypical Republican — white, Christian middle-class — to reconcile his or her belief in America as a WASP-controlled country with what it is becoming today: a true melting pot of different races, ethnicities, religions and sexualities.
Trump is more of a symptom of the GOP’s current identity crisis than he is a cause of it. He’s not the virus but instead the really, really hideous — and orange — rash that’s alerted us to what lies underneath.
So what’s a GOP party chairperson to do?
Regardless of the election results, the GOP must make some fundamental changes to its platform if it doesn’t want to disintegrate as a party. The demographics of the U.S. are changing; by 2045, whites will make up less than 50 percent of the population.
If the GOP wants to remain relevant, it must wholeheartedly embrace the diversity of the U.S. That means it has to drop its most conservative social beliefs, like its stances on Roe v. Wade and gay marriage. It needs to start seeing some of the institutional problems that have led to mass incarceration and police brutality.
It must focus more on economic issues and less on social ones. Even I — an admittedly diehard liberal — can begrudgingly see the merits in a few of their economic stances.
In doing so, maybe — just maybe — the Republican Party will be able to retain a shred of its dignity.
