What makes you Identify with the Party you do?

[Joe Republic]

I used to be an insufferable Wulfric, until eventually I realized:

The Republican Party as it is now and has been for a couple decades is completely and utterly insane. Like, every once in awhile I have to step back and remind myself how crazy it is that this is a party where Ben Carson can be a leading candidate in a primary. Where someone like Sarah Palin can get millions of votes for Vice President. Where thinking Moses is basically an honorary founding father is completely normal, believing we should allow guns in bars is sane public policy, and one of the party's most prominent Senators can waltz onto the Senate floor with a snowball as proof that global warming is a hoax.

I can't think of literally any issue in American politics right now where the Republicans offer a sane and reasonable alternative. Their positions on womens rights are terrible. On gay rights they're terrible. On police brutality, they're terrible. On healthcare, the environment, drugs, taxes, welfare, campaign finance, torture, trade, guns, wages, uniformly terrible, if not downright childish and occasionally evil. When it comes to foreign affairs they routinely expose themselves as cocksure incompetents who don't even maintain coherent positions, across the board. It also goes without saying that I grew up during the time of a President (Bush) that probably deserves some sort of medal for handling just about anything he ever tried tackling awfully. In fact, I may as well just repost an old quote of mine instead of retreading the same ground:

6. George W. Bush.
*Bush deserves the last spot on here for being the most directly damaging Presidents on this list, as well as having the unbelievable skill of being able to f**k up damn near everything he attempted or did.

9/11? He ignored all reports and threats of terrorism before it happened. Bin Laden? Couldn't get him. (Thanks Obama!) Tax cuts? Were so wasteful and unstimulative that he did them twice. Medicare Part D is one of the most incredible stories of legislative clusterf**kery that you could ever read, and was a total mess to boot. The PATRIOT Act. No Child Left Behind? Plenty, actually. Afghanistan? Mismanaged. Iraq? A lie from the very beginning. All told, his middle eastern excursions will cost us trillions of dollars that we could've used for anything else. His first veto? Killing a stem cell research bill.

Illegal wiretapping. Torture. Rendition. Sold his plan to privatize Social Security to the public so hilariously badly that it was abandoned within weeks. Completely lied about his promise to reinstate the Assault Weapons Ban. Riddled mining and oil drilling regulations with loopholes for his industry friends and raised a middle finger to every environmental cause he came across. Neutered FEMA due to a lack of any interest in qualified governing, and New Orleans paid the price. Wanted to appoint Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, for Christ's sake. Vetoed a children's health insurance program expansion bill that was fully paid for. Ruined America's image abroad and made us the laughing stock of the first world. This is just the stuff off the top of my head.

In addition to all of that, his term ended with the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression, the damage of which will be felt for generations. Everyone who acts like we can't treat Bush like a terrible President because he's too recent and we're biased? Screw you. George W. Bush is one of the worst Presidents in the history of the United States. End of story.

What makes all of that worse is that, in the ensuing years of such complete and utter demonstrable failure a party traditionally retreats into the minority for a few cycles, moderating and maturing, emerging as an alternative after the governing party grows stale and tired. The exact opposite happened here, for some bizarre reason. They've only become more bats**t.

Over the last year, for unrelated reasons, I've grown to despise hackish thinking in general. I don't like partisans. I generally think you should try to listen to everyone, regardless of who they are, regardless of background, regardless of other crazy s**t they've done, to try and come to a greater understanding. But there really is nothing, anything at all that I can think of, that is well-reasoned and has a basis in reality from the Republican Party that I can support. And this is so astonishing to me that every once in awhile I feel like I'm being too unfair, that there must be something that they have over the Democrats, or just have a decent idea about in general, because for that to not be the case in any way whatsoever is so logically unlikely. But they really are that incompetent, from top to bottom, at this point in time.