I my entire voting life I have never felt a place in the Republican party. My vision of government is radically different from that of party on virtually every issue, including but not limited to foreign policy on the national level, fiscal and social policy throughout government. That is not to say that there are a couple times I voted for a Republican for a local or state office because they were in-fact the best candidate. But the role of the both parties is an important part of how our government works for all Americans. Debate creates better ideas as compromise leads to a stronger and more successful government. But for at least the last three decades one party has created an alternative universe of what more recently has been called alternative facts.
One cannot fully trace back the origin of when the Republicans started to live in a fantasy world. Maybe the rise of right wing radio that at first bent the truth to fit policy desires. Maybe when a flawed Democratic Governor won the White House and there was a rich vein of gold to exploit so throwing in some pyrite would go unnoticed. I don't know. But by the time President Obama was elected the blurring of right wing punditry lies and the elected officials became virtually the same and thus people who would normally be shunned in the halls of power, Jim Hoft, Jerome Corsi, and Alex Jones were quoted and supported by those running for or had been elected to office. Then the Tea Party came along and they helped elevated candidates who did not know how government worked. Repeated slogans over ideas and voted against anything the Democrats were for. Both small town and national voices across the radio, TV and internet were promoting nonsense not even close to facts and more and more reality became a thing debated on cable news. Then came Trump.
Donald Trump was a known charlatan and buffoon among his peers and neighbors in New York City. A cartoon character of a businessman whose TV show drew viewers for its absurd storylines and later celebrity contestants. His transformation to cartoon was complete but he had ambition to be bigger. So to get more publicity he set off on a quest to prove the lie that President Obama was born in Kenya. He even spoke of all the evidence he had collected in Hawaii and that "you won't believe it". Smart people didn't believe him, but enough did that it became a get way to get more and more followers to his show and social media. He was given air time on cable channels and there was a grown swell for him to run for President. He did, and while at first wasn't embraced by the GOP, they had for so long created an electorate that thought much like Trump. That misinformed opinion was equal in value to someone speaking facts. That the media were the enemy of good Americans and that believed what he was saying because well, that part is unclear.
Trump got elected and every fear of his supporters was realized when critics came together from both inside and outside of the Republican establishment and the Democrats began several investigations into his campaign and choices for cabinet. So the ground was ready for what came next. Q!
The QAnon conspiracy developed in the well fertilized ground created by the GOP over a long period of time. Distrust of government, elected officials, the FBI, were all messages that were loud and clear from at least the 80s. Trump elevated those ideas to 11 when he was running. The hatred he showed for Hillary Clinton fed the first big lie about Seth Rich, a murdered staffer for then nominee Clinton. Killed in a botched robbery the story was he was murdered by the DNC because he leaked the emails that Wikileaks obtained. That he was going to testify. This was promoted by the mainstream and lunatic fringe of the right wing world including prominent cable pundits and elected officials. Like the birther conspiracy about Obama, this was easily dismissed with rational thought, but it was a horse many would ride to the point the family wanted to take legal action. But this was now a standard in right wing circle. So when Trump got elected he was able to basically take it anywhere he wanted. He immediately started his Presidency by having his staff lie to the American people about crowd size and within a few days of taking office created the phrase alternative facts. So when Q came along with crazy stories of pedophilia and child sacrifice, a secret government program to root out the deep state and arrest many leading political and media figures who were seen as opposed to Trump, and talk of an almost religious style awakening in the country many people believed it and knew their guy in the Oval Office had their backs. President Trump played footsie with Q as he had done with others like White Nationalists and Militia groups. Until he lost the election, and then his rhetoric got more directive. Calling for some kind of intervention between the election and the new President taking office. We all have seen the results of Q and the nonsense. The attack on Comet Pizza thought to be a center for pedophilia. A violent stand off at Hoover Dam looking for where some secret base was. Attacks on the media and celebrities both online and direct threats. The culmination was the attack on the Capitol that included calls for death to leading Democrats and Vice-President Pence. All because the religious leader of Q lost the election and told them it was stolen and it was up to them to make it right.
It would be tragic if this were all that it was, Trump had long sense disassociated himself from reality so him being the central figure of this conspiracy is not on brand. But we are finding that the GOP has embraced the worst of the Q which recently included calling for the death of members of Congress including the speaker. At least two members of Congress elected in November are unapologetic adherence to QAnon and their history of crazy talk including calling Sandy Hook and Parkland School Shootings false flags. The focus is the newly elected member of the House of Representatives Margery Taylor Greene who is deeply rooted in the Q conspiracy. More and more videos of her saying things that go way beyond the pale, including harassing teenagers after a school shooting including telling them she carries a gun. The GOP doesn't seem to care just how toxic she is. In fact the House leadership put her on the Education Committee. Even more so it is hard to find a member of the party that would call her out. When asked on ThisWeek on ABC, "Marjorie Taylor Greene has voiced support for executing Nancy Pelosi. Is she fit to serve?" Governor Asa Hutchinson answered "I'm not gonna answer that question as to whether she's fit to serve, because she believes in something that everybody else does not accept."
The Republican party is calling for Democrats and the President to act in the spirit of unity as they approach the date of the former President's impeachment trial for his part in the attack on the Capitol. But they embracing the very people that fed the hysteria and lies that led to the most violent of the insurrectionists. The party needs to purge itself of this terrible break from reality that has grown into a function of the party. It is difficult to take the party seriously when they say things like Gov. Hutchinson said. And we shouldn't.
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