Read It Was All a Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald Trump for Free Online Page B

the sadness I feel is difficult to express. No one wanted this moral test, but most of my tribe have failed it. When and if my old friends read these words, some will be angry with me and feel betrayed. They will call me hypocritical for happily taking the rewards of the tribe—money, access to power, something that hints at influence—then choosing to betray my fellow members. For this charge I have no answer. They are right. I did. I ate the queen’s bread and fought the queen’s wars. While they worked through the tedious process of government, trying to make a difference on the edges, I left that hard work to others and spent my non-campaign time roaming the globe chasing snow, in pursuit of athletic challenges with no meaning. They would argue they did the hard work and I was over-rewarded for playing a bit part in our political drama.
    That’s all true. But as much as they may try to blame me, I am confident I have asked myself the same and much tougher questions with the hollow realization I had no good answers. I can’t change any of that. But as imperfect a messenger as I may be, what my tribe has encouraged, blessed, and promoted should not be forgotten or forgiven. Even if Donald Trump loses in 2020, the Republican Party has legitimized bigotry and hate as an organizing principle for a major political party in a country with a unique role in the world. While it is true that many of the institutions, particularly the judiciary, have survived this stress test of Trump anti-Americanism, it is despite the Republican Party, not with its encouragement and blessing. A few years ago it was possible to read a professional hate website like Breitbart and sort of chuckle that this was the odd corner of the political universe where the weirdos and freaks hung out to share grievances. Now that can be said of the national Republican Party. From the party of Lincoln, Republicans have become the party that endorsed Roy Moore and cheered when the man they would choose for president called Mexicans “rapists.” The White House welcomes and empowers those on the right who peddle conspiracy theories and religious and racial bigotry on the internet. Strange, angry freaks like Sebastian Gorka and Stephen Miller are celebrated, not shunned. Across the country almost every state party is now dominated by the angry and aggrieved who seem to believe the purpose of our politics is to make America at last safe for white people.
    These are the new segregationists, who have convinced themselves they are fighting a just war to defend the values of “our way of life.” They are unified by a shared vision of America not as a just force to help equalize the worst impulses of society but rather as a heavy mace they can use to club the future into submission. They will and do lie and swear they are trying to “save America,” but what dark force in politics has not argued some noble purpose to justify its betrayals of decency? In today’s Republican Party, a George W. Bush would be crushed by a Sean Hannity, whose growing body and seemingly enlarging head respond to lies like Pinocchio’s nose. The Trump Republican Party has abandoned any pretense of kindness or compassion as a desirable human quality. All his life Donald Trump has seen these as weaknesses, not virtues worthy of aspiration. Now so it is with the Republican Party.
    So how does this change? Only through defeat and desperation. Any appeal to country over party has long been proven as ineffective as a Texas governor organizing days of prayer for rain. What must be understood is that these Republicans like what they are championing. They like being the voice of white America. It is impossible to move them by any appeal to patriotism because they see themselves as putting patriotism first when they fight for their misguided vision of America. The party will only change when its desire to revel in its worst instincts is challenged by its fear of losing power. There will be a