What Happened to the Republican Party?
The GOP is now the party of extremism
The Republican National Convention is being held this week. You may have seen it in the news. If there was ever a graphic display of the differences between what the two parties represent, it is how they have portrayed themselves at their individual conventions. At the DNC, the Democrats displayed themselves as candidates still trying to win Americans’ trust. At the RNC, we have seen nothing but spectacle and outright dishonesty, with speakers appealing to base instincts of hate and extremism.
The RNC has been a blatant production of propaganda, casting aside all pretense of reality. It has been a shameless and morally rudderless adherence to the cult of personality that is Donald Trump. The speeches from speakers have reiterated widely debunked falsehoods spread in social media memes, and narratives created by the Trump Administration. They have mythologized recent conservative heroes such as Nick Sandmann and the McCloskey gun couple. Speakers at the convention are those who have themselves advocated for extremist views, with histories of antisemitism, racism, sexism, classism, and propagating conspiracy theories such as QAnon. They’re not even pretending to have a platform to run on any more.
As dangerous and disturbing as all of this is, it makes one wonder how it got to this point in…
