White House spokesman Josh Earnest nails it regarding the disgusting, racist, anti-Muslim views held by so many in the Republican “base,” and pandered to by Republican presidential candidates (and others in that party). It would be great to see more Democrats doing the same, not to mention the media…
Is anybody really surprised that this happened at a Donald Trump rally? I don’t think anybody who’s been paying attention to Republican politics is at all surprised.
The reason for that is the people who hold these offensive views are part of Mr. Trump’s base. Mr. Trump himself would be the first to tell you that he’s got the biggest base of any Republican politician these days.
Now it is too bad that he wasn’t able to summon the same kind of patriotism that we saw from Senator McCain, who responded much more effectively and directly when one of his supporters at one of his campaign events about seven years ago raised the same kind of false claims.
Now what’s also unfortunate is that Mr. Trump isn’t the first Republican politician to countenance these kinds of views in order to win votes. In fact, that’s precisely what every Republican Presidential candidate is doing when they decline to denounce Mr. Trump’s cynical strategy because they are looking for those same votes.
Now, other Republicans have successfully used this strategy as well. You will recall that one Republican Congressman told the reporter that he was David Duke without the baggage. That Congressman was elected by a majority of his colleagues in the House of Representatives to the third highest-ranking position in the House. Those same members of Congress blocked immigration reform. Those same members of congress oppose reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act. Those same members of Congress couldn’t support a simple funding bill because they are eager to defend the Confederate flag.
So those are the priorities of today’s Republican Party. And they will continue to be until someone in the Republican Party decides to summon the courage to stand up and change it.
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