Joe Scarborough, of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” is an example of an increasingly common situation in politics and the media. He is a political commentator who himself has become political news. After months promoting then-candidate Donald Trump in the primaries, scoring almost daily phone-ins from the billionaire, Scarborough soured on Trump (about the time Trump started to gain and keep traction in the polls).
Now, Scarborough has announced his departure from the GOP that nominated and elected President Trump.
Political historians will one day view Donald Trump as a historical anomaly. But the wreckage visited of this man will break the Republican Party into pieces — and lead to the election of independent thinkers no longer tethered to the tired dogmas of the polarized past. When that day mercifully arrives, the two-party duopoly that has strangled American politics for almost two centuries will finally come to an end. And Washington just may begin to work again.
Not to honk my own horn, or claim that I’ve always been right, but in this particular case, I saw the bus coming long before its wheels claimed Scarborough. Back in 2015, I wrote a number of pieces (here, here, here, here, here, here, and here) warning the GOP, and the nation, to take Trump seriously, and that he will destroy the GOP.
Trump speaks for a base that feels abandoned by the Republican Party, and the rise of this new Know-Nothing group should signal the GOP in the same way it preceded the death of the Whigs in 1853.
I concluded, with a candidate list somewhere around a football team roster:
The GOP needs to grow up, man up, and deal with the issues without kowtowing to liberal Zeitgeist and political correctness (no matter how mild). This means some candidates will have to graciously bow out of the race to make room for those who can run successfully against the Know-Nothings.
Either that, or the Republicans may go the way of the Whigs.
It would appear Scarborough, a former GOP Congressman, agrees.
But let me suggest that wanderers in the wilderness accomplish very little alone. If we are to Stand Athwart History and yell “Stop!” we must first recognize that place we can call “home,” where friendly faces and common interests meet.
Even underground partisans need to have a home. And that’s exactly what those who have left the GOP are. Back in May, I burned my GOP delegate card, a symbolic act of “I’m done with you.” And now I edit The New Americana, a site that’s unapologetically and intrinsically connected to The Federalist Party.
Joe Scarborough represents a growing feeling in the GOP’s conservative base that the party is no longer a viable representative for them.
Let me invite Joe, along with the many who agree with him, to check out The Federalist Party. Its foundation is Life, Freedom and Smaller Government. If you agree with those principles, and reject Washington’s preening, power politics, you might join with serious people of like mind. Because everyone needs a home, even wilderness conservatives.
If you like what you see here, support The New Americana.
