REVENGE OF THE LIBERAL REPUBLICRATS

Much is being said about this US election and the folks coming to power. The only thing worth noting that I can spot, and something mostly ignored from what I can tell, is that many key Republicans and even lower level appointees are actually lifelong Democrats. Even their key supporters and consultants are not Conservatives but, by almost any metric, actually Liberals. Though I've seen and heard of some party flipping over the years, here and there, I don't think there has ever been such a wholesome takeover of one party by the membership of another.

I mean, from the president himself to RFK jr to Tulsi Gabbard and even Elon Musk. Those are the big names this term. Where are the conventional conservatives?

In Rubio they chose a Cuban American, who was born to non-citizens, for the role of Secretary of State. And who's heading the FBI? The child of Indian immigrants who were chased out of Uganda by the dictator, granted asylum in Canada, and who eventually alighted in the US. Patel became a lawyer and spent his early career as a public defender, fighting of behalf of drug smugglers, money launderers, and murderers before working in counterterrorism. Scott Bassinet, the new pick for Treasury Secretary, was a partner with Soros Fund Management throughout the 1990s, eventually headed their London office, and became a fundraiser and donor to Al Gore, Hilary Clinton, and Barack Obama in the 2000s. He is now the highest-ranking openly LGBTQ person in American history. Lori Chavez-DeRemer, former mayor of Happy Valley, Oregon, and new pick for Secretary of Labor is extremely pro-union. She previously cosponsored the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act, to expand the power of public sector unions, and backed the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, which saw her win support from the Teamsters. She also cosponsored legislation to reform federal cannabis laws. And on and on it goes.

Like, what is even happening? Does any of that look like anything you understood the Republican party to be about? Isn't this who the Dems tell us they are? At this point, to my eye at least, the Conservatives seem more liberal than the Liberals. I mean, could the party be more firmly the anti-war, free speech, gay rights, pro-labour, pro-immigrant party folks on the left hoped and imagined the Democrats could be in the '80s and '90s?

Just as astonishingly, I've neither seen nor heard anything about any of these folks' backgrounds or identities even once. I had to dig these details up on my own. Now is there any doubt that if these folks were Democrats we'd be reading all about their sexuality and status as the children of immigrants and just be hit over the head with it at every turn? And how strange is it to remember this feeling of not being required to care above all else who one sleeps with or where their relatives were born?