In recent years, American political history has never seen anything like how Tea Partiers and some other Republican Party conservatives targeted RINOS (really defined as those who weren’t conservative or conservative enough) to go after them in primaries and effectively purge them from the Party. This has led to the virtual extinction of the GOP’s once strong moderate Republican wing. In the new Trumpublican Party it now appears the target is going to be prominent Republicans who won’t come out and endorse all-but-certain nominee Donald Trump. The immediate high-profile target: House Speaker Paul Ryan, who said he can’t endorse Trump until Trump changes some things about the tone and content of his campaign.
The campaign against Ryan is now happening on several fronts: former Alaska Gov. and political celebrity Sarah Palin has announced Ryan’s political career “is over” and that she’ll work to help defeat him in a primary, his primary challenger has jumped on the issue and Trump is now suggesting he may get Ryan removed as chairman of the Republican convention.
But consider this just the opening salvo in the Trump faction’s consolidation of its hostile take-over of what was once called the Party of Lincoln. Lincoln would likely have this reaction today and could be heard rolling over in his grave.
SARAH PALIN: It’s no surprise that Palin — the living, breathing embodiment of Arizona Sen. John McCain’s and his advisers’ recklessly atrocious and dangerous judgment displayed by picking her to run as his Veep in 2000 — would jump into the fray and call for Ryan’s defeat. McCain, once considered a principled maverick who over the years proved to be someone with more caves than Fred Flintstone (the latest is he’s edging towards endorsing Trump), helped unleash Palin as a political celebrity who immediately after the 2000 election became a Tea Partier working to defeat the very kinds of moderate Republicans and thoughtful conservatives who had been McCain’s allies. Palin is similar to Trump in her knowledge-free political rhetoric, based in resentments and sound bytes.
Sarah Palin will work to defeat House Speaker Paul Ryan by backing his primary opponent in Wisconsin, the former Alaska governor told CNN’s Jake Tapper.
Palin said in an interview that airs Sunday on “State of the Union” that her decision was sparked by Ryan’s bombshell announcement to Tapper last week that he wasn’t yet ready to support Donald Trump, the Republican presumptive nominee. Palin endorsed Trump back in January.
“I think Paul Ryan is soon to be ‘Cantored,’ as in Eric Cantor,” Palin said, referring to the former Republican House majority leader who was ousted in a shocking upset in 2014 when challenger Dave Brat ran to his right in a Virginia primary.
“His political career is over but for a miracle because he has so disrespected the will of the people, and as the leader of the GOP, the convention, certainly he is to remain neutral, and for him to already come out and say who he will not support is not a wise decision of his,” Palin continued.
Ryan’s announcement highlighted a deepening rift in the party over Trump, as several party elders have vowed to skip the GOP convention in July and not vote for the real estate magnate, while others say they’ll back Trump out of party loyalty and a desire to block Hillary Clinton from reaching the White House.
Palin speculated that Ryan’s announcement was driven out by a desire to seek the White House in 2020.
“If the GOP were to win now, that wouldn’t bode well for his chances in 2020, and that’s what he’s shooting for,” Palin said.
DONALD TRUMP: Trump is dangling removing him as convention chair. It isn’t usual for political parties to remove convention chairs because a chair might not favor someone who looks as if he has the nomination sewed up. But, then, Trump has blown up many of the “givens” about our politics, the language used in campaign, the need for specificity, and the use of dog whistles to scapegoat communities (he uses an air horn).
Donald J. Trump said he would not rule out an effort to remove Representative Paul D. Ryan as chairman of the Republican National Convention if he did not endorse Mr. Trump’s candidacy.
Mr. Trump stopped short of calling for Mr. Ryan, the speaker of the House, to step down from his convention role. But in an interview that aired Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Mr. Trump said there could be consequences in the event that Mr. Ryan continued withholding his support.
“I will give you a very solid answer, if that happens, about one minute after that happens, O.K.?” Mr. Trump said. “There’s no reason to give it right now, but I’ll be very quick with the answer.”
Mr. Trump has shown little interest over the last few days in placating his critics inside the party, including Mr. Ryan. Mr. Ryan, a representative from Wisconsin, said on Thursday that he was not ready to endorse Mr. Trump, citing reservations about his political style and policy agenda. The two men are scheduled to meet privately in Washington next week.
But on “Meet the Press,” Mr. Trump struck a dismissive tone toward Mr. Ryan and responded with outright hostility to other Republican critics who have refused to back his campaign.
Jeb Bush, he said, was “not honorable” for breaking his promise to endorse the party’s nominee. Mitt Romney, he said, was “ungrateful” for the help Mr. Trump gave him in the 2012 election. Mr. Trump referred to Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina senator who said Friday he would never vote for Mr. Trump, as “this lightweight.”
Of Mr. Ryan, he said: “I’d like to have his support. But if he doesn’t want to support me, that’s fine, and we have to go about it.”
Ryan will meet with Trump on Thursday. If right after the meeting he endorses Trump, he’ll likely be seen as one more Profiles in Cowardice Republican who is caving to pressure and trying to cover all bases for future ambitions. If Ryan suddenly comes out for Trump, it will signify the waving of the white flag by Republicans, and an official end to the era of Ronald Reagan conservatives in the new Trumpublican Party.
Unless afterwards Trump suddenly changes his campaign style and content.
Four words on that:
Don’t.
Hold.
Your.
Breath.
photo credit: Paul Ryan via photopin (license)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.