{"id":4480,"date":"2012-02-02T16:53:00","date_gmt":"2012-02-02T22:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/?p=4480"},"modified":"2012-02-01T16:54:09","modified_gmt":"2012-02-01T22:54:09","slug":"establishment-republicans-have-only-themselves-to-blame-the-gop-is-brain-dead-richard-cohen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/election\/establishment-republicans-have-only-themselves-to-blame-the-gop-is-brain-dead-richard-cohen\/","title":{"rendered":"Establishment Republicans have only themselves to blame: “The GOP is brain-dead.” — Richard Cohen"},"content":{"rendered":"

Establishment Republicans have only themselves to blame – The Washington Post<\/a> By Richard Cohen<\/a>, Published: January 30<\/p>\n

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The Republican establishment acts as if this season\u2019s goon squad of presidential candidates has come out of nowhere, an act of God \u2014 a tsunami that hit the party and receded, leaving nothing but nitwits standing. In column after column, conservative commentators lament the present condition, but not their past acquiescence as their party turned hostile to thought, reason and the two most important words in the English language: <\/font>It depends.<\/font> \u2026<\/i><\/p>\n

This rampant anti-intellectualism<\/a> is worrisome. The world is a complex place, but to deal with it, the GOP presented a parade of hopefuls who proposed nostrums or, in the case of Michele Bachmann, peddled false rumors about vaccinations<\/a>. When this started I cannot say \u2014 the late Richard Hofstadter won the Pulitzer Prize for his \u201cAnti-intellectualism in American Life<\/a>\u201d in 1964 \u2014 but the embrace of Sarah Palin<\/a> by the GOP establishment has got to be noted. The lady has the gift of demagoguery and the required anti-elitism, but she knows next to nothing about almost anything \u2014 and revels in her ignorance. \u2026<\/p>\n

Subtlety is banished. Yahoos stride the stage. \u2026<\/p>\n

The Republican Party has veered so far from reality that Gingrich is lambasting Romney as a \u201cMassachusetts moderate<\/a>\u201d \u2014 moderation being, as it was with the clueless Barry Goldwater, an epithet. Romney, who has all but collapsed his rib cage to conform to conservative dogma, must be perplexed. Others have prudently stayed out of the race.<\/p>\n

The Republican establishment that has now risen up to smite the bratty Gingrich has only itself to blame. For too long it has been mute in the face of a belligerent anti-intellectualism, pretending that knowledge and experience do not matter and that Washington is a condition and not a mere city. The endorsement of Gingrich by Cain was not a bulletin. It was a feeble blip on a scope. The GOP is brain-dead.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Establishment Republicans have only themselves to blame – The Washington Post<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Establishment Republicans have only themselves to blame – The Washington Post By Richard Cohen, Published: January 30 The Republican establishment acts as if this season\u2019s goon squad of presidential candidates has come out of nowhere, an act of God \u2014 a tsunami that hit the party and receded, leaving nothing but nitwits standing. In column … Continue reading Establishment Republicans have only themselves to blame: “The GOP is brain-dead.” — Richard Cohen<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4480\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}