All politics are identity politics. Republicans have long mocked this notion, treating the very concept of “identity politics” as a left-wing fixation. In reality, the GOP’s success is entirely due to the cheapest form of identity politics: For decades, but especially now, they have worked to distract voters from the party’s ruinous policies with appeals to their identity as white, provincial and, most importantly, Christian. This campaign has been enormously successful. White evangelicals have been the backbone of the GOP for decades not because they love tax cuts for the rich and environmental degradation, but because they have been told, repeatedly, that Democrats are demonic and there is no such thing as a liberal Christian.
This is why there’s a growing panic in the Republican ranks over the campaign of James Talarico, the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate in Texas, and it’s not just fear that he could beat Ken Paxton, the state’s Republican attorney general. Win or lose, Talarico — a seminary student-turned-politician — embodies an existential threat to the right’s long-standing myth that to be Christian must necessarily mean voting Republican.
What I really hate in our politics is when you have loads of situations like this in virtually every election cycle, and lots of basic, low-info assholes will proclaim bOtHsIdeStHeSaMe in close elections like this.
For extra irritant points, they think they are soooper dooper insightful and Above It All ™ if they say it’s a choice between a Giant Douche or a Turd Sandwich. These are the kind of apes that will smugly not vote, and then proudly point out that nothing changes for the better when the normal human being is not put into office. As if letting Republicans win proves this thesis they think they came up with themselves…
I have a feeling some of these assholes are either too stupid or cowardly to actually pick a side, and don’t want to look dumb, so take a stupid copout. I’m sure at least a few are Republicans that are savvy enough to know that Republicans are not exactly liked in mixed company, and so pull the bothsiderest card when politics come up, then still vote Republican.