GOP Out Of Touch

Watching the Republicans stumble through the last few weeks gives one pause to wonder how one of the major political parties in our country could be so out of touch with the majority of the electorate. The party has become so paralyzed by the far right leanings of its base that it has forfeited any reasonable sense of compromise. There is no escaping the inconvertible fact that the party is incapable of governing.

The train wreck surrounding Indiana’s Religious Reform Law is a case in point. At a time when the LGBT community has a higher approval rating than most minorities you have to wonder what was going through the minds of the Indiana State legislature to bring such a bill to the floor. Don’t these people watch cable news? So eager were Republicans to appeal to their evangelical base that they could not wait to get in front of the cameras and tell the world what a great day it was for religious freedom. Nationally, all but two of the presumptive presidential candidates weighed in with a full throated support of the law.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the party. So eager to appease the evangelicals, Republicans took for granted the faction that pays their bills. Long known as the party of Wall Street, the banks and corporate America, Republicans had neglected “the one that brung em”…the business community. Hell hath no fury like a corporation in danger of losing its customers. The business community responded with a vengeance. Apple, Wal-Mart, Eli Lilly, Anthem, the NCAA and a host of other corporate giants rose up in opposition to the law. Watching Republicans scramble to un-ring the bell would have been funny were it not so sad. Jeb Bush was before the law before he was against it.

The result was a “fix” from the legislature that amended the law. It also sent a very clear message that religious freedom may be important to the Party but it pales when pitted against commerce and campaign contributions. And by reversing a law that should never have been enacted in the first place, Republicans managed to alienate the very evangelical community they were trying to appease.

Over the past six months the Republican Party has managed to offend the business community, evangelicals, the LBGT community, Latinos, and blacks. Among all of these groups are women, a demographic that Republicans are desperate to win. Add in patriots and independents who are deeply offended by the GOPs very public efforts to undermine and embarrass the president regarding his negotiations with Iran...

Note to Republicans! This is not a winning strategy. The country is rapidly changing and you are living in an alternate universe. You have a choice. You can either alter your strategy to connect to the changing times…

…or you can continue to lose the popular vote as you have in five of the last six national elections.