The Bitch vs. The Mitch
The nasty hair (or hairpiece) pulling is in full display now in the Republican Party. And it couldn’t happen to a nicer political organization. Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell declared that Trump was “morally and practically responsible” for the mob attack on the Capitol, and Trump predictably had to fire back: “Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack, and if Republican Senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again. He will never do what needs to be done, or what is right for our Country.”
Trump, of course, is right about McConnell being a “hack” — as his vote to again acquit the former president of impeachment charges, while calling on state prosecutors to lock him up, starkly demonstrated. When faced with grand, principled decisions, McConnell is a master at finding the weaselly, political escape hatch. Trump is also right to call out McConnell’s wife (and his former Transportation secretary) Elaine Chao for her big family stake in the Chinese shipping industry. When it comes to Washington corruption, McConnell is the wiliest old Swamp Fox around.
The GOP feud is already hurting McConnell, with the latest polls showing a nearly 30 percent drop in his favorability ratings back home in Kentucky (whose idiotic voters keep reelecting the Swamp Fox or Lizard King or whatever he is). But here’s the beauty part — Trump is also poison for the future of the Republican Party. His mad rants from Mar-a-Lago might hurt targets like McConnell, but his continued bullying domination of the party only keeps driving away college-educated and suburban voters from the GOP. There has been a growing stream of Republican voter defections since the January 6 mayhem, and the party meltdown will continue as long as the Donald still clings to the top of the GOP tower like a wounded and howling King Kong.
Joe Biden and the Democrats should continue to take full advantage of the Republicans’ uncivil war, barreling ahead with their ambitious rescue and rebuild plans with or without the support of the few sane members left in the opposition party. Trump — and McConnell — are the snarling twin faces of the Republican Party. And they, and their repulsive party, deserve each other.
