Tag: Republican Party

RNC Chair complains about internet bias on Fox News after Republicans killed net neutrality

The following article by Josh Israel was posted on the ThinkProgress website July 27, 2018:

Ronna Romney McDaniel needs to go back and read her party’s platform.

RNC Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel on Fox & Ffriends. Credit: Fox News Screenshot

The chair of the Republican National Committee complained on Friday morning that conservatives are being censored by Silicon Valley, citing the debunked conspiracy theory that Twitter and other net platforms are intentionally targeting voices on the right. But even if the problem were real, her party has done everything in its power to make that sort of Internet censorship possible.

Back in the Obama years, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) enforced a 2015 regulatory policy called “net neutrality,” aimed at protecting an open Internet.  Under those rules, service providers were prohibited from throttling or blocking Internet sites. “We cannot allow Internet service providers (ISPs) to restrict the best access or to pick winners and losers in the online marketplace for services and ideas,” then-President Barack Obama explained as his administration implemented the protections.

McDaniel’s party was outraged. In their 2016 Republican National Committee platform, they vowed to repeal the protections and to allow companies to censor content as they saw fit. In an Orwellian “Protecting Internet Freedom” section of the platform, they wrote “The survival of the internet as we know it is at risk. Its gravest peril originates in the White House, the current occupant of which has launched a campaign, both at home and internationally, to subjugate it to agents of government. The President ordered the chair of the supposedly independent Federal Communications Commission to impose upon the internet rules devised in the 1930s for the telephone monopoly.”

View the complete article here.

Maria Butina, Russian gun-rights advocate who sought to build ties with NRA, charged with acting as a covert Russian agent

The following article by Rosalind S. Helderman, Tom Jackman and Devlin Barrett was posted on the Washington Post website July 16,2018:

Maria Butina, 29, founded a Russian group called the Right to Bear Arms. On July 16 she was charged with conspiracy to act as an agent of Russia. (Patrick Martin/The Washington Post)

A Russian woman with ties to a senior Russian government official was charged in Washington on Monday with conspiracy to act as an agent of the Russian Federation, including by building ties to the leadership of the National Rifle Association and other conservative politicalorganizations.

Maria Butina, 29, who recently received a graduate degree from American University, was arrested Sunday in the District and made her first appearance in U.S. District Court before Magistrate Judge Deborah A. Robinson, where she was ordered held without bond.

Butina is accused of trying to cultivate relationships with American politicians to establish “back channel” lines of communication and seeking to infiltrate U.S. political groups, including an unnamed “gun rights organization,” to advance Russia’s agenda. Descriptions in court papers match published reports about Butina’s interactions with the NRA.

View the complete article on the Washington Post website here.

President Trump Is What Happens After Republicans Spend Decades Rebranding Knowledge as Elitism and Ignorance as Bliss

The following commentary by Michael Tomasky was posted on the Daily Beast website June 8, 2018:

‘I don’t think I have to prepare very much’ for the upcoming meeting with Kim Jong Un, Trump says. Here’s how we ended up with president who’s all gut, no knowledge.

Thursday morning, after hearing that Donald Trump got huffy with Justin Trudeau over Canada “burning down” the White House in the War of 1812, I sent out a tweet noting that in fact we, the United States, invaded Canada during that war; we even burned down government buildings in Toronto (then called York). As usual, what Trump said to Trudeau was not only not the truth, but turned reality inside out and ran it through the pulverizer. Continue reading “President Trump Is What Happens After Republicans Spend Decades Rebranding Knowledge as Elitism and Ignorance as Bliss”

GOP tax message hits a snag

The following article by Naomi Jagoda and Niv Elis was posted on the Hill website March 30, 2018:

Credit: Alex Edelman/picture-alliance/dpa/AP

More than three months after the passage of the GOP’s tax-cut law, new surveys suggest that many people don’t think they are getting bigger paychecks, which could cut into support for Republicans in this fall’s midterm elections.

A CNBC poll this week stated that just 32 percent of working adults reported having more take-home pay due to the new law, a problem for Republicans hoping to run on the measure and the health of the economy in November.

The GOP has made the tax-cut law the centerpiece of its campaign message, arguing that Republican control of Congress and the White House led to legislation that is putting more money in people’s pockets and stimulating an economy with low unemployment. Continue reading “GOP tax message hits a snag”

The End of the GOP

The following article by Kenneth T. Walsh was posted on the U.S. News and World Report website February 16, 2018:

The Republican Party as Americans have known it is vanishing under President Trump.

WEEK AFTER DRAMATIC week, it’s becoming increasingly clear that, under President Donald Trump, the Republican Party as Americans came to know it for 40 years is vanishing.

Trump is redefining conservatism in his own erratic image, and most Republican members of Congress are going along with him even though the long-time pillars of their belief system are crumbling. Trump is not a true conservative. He is taking some pages from the right’s agenda but abandoning others, and GOP stalwarts are in a stew over it. Yet there is no Republican rebellion and precious little pushback. Continue reading “The End of the GOP”

The GOP has a major millennial issue, new poll shows

The following article by Stacey Leasca was posted on the mic.com website January 30, 2018:

Olivier Douliery/Pool/EPA

The Republican Party could be in serious trouble when it comes to attracting younger voters, according to a new in-depth NBC News/GenForward survey.

The survey of “racially and ethnically diverse young adults” found that not only do 63% of millennials think the country under the Trump administration is on the wrong track, but they also believe Republicans don’t care about them or issues they see as relevant. Continue reading “The GOP has a major millennial issue, new poll shows”

Another continuing resolution won’t solve the real problem within the Republican Party

The following article by William B. Heller, Associate Professor of Political Science, Binghamton University, State University of New York, and Olga Shvetsova, Professor of Political Science and Economics, Binghamton University, State University of New York, was posted on the Conversation website January 23, 2018:

Senate Republicans, led by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, right, have been working through the snags with their tax bill. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

Republicans can’t agree on a budget.

That lack of agreement has made it necessary for Congress to pass a series of continuing resolutions to keep the government open.

There’s no budget agreement because factions within the GOP hold contradictory policy positions on almost every issue. James Madison, an author of the Federalist Papers might have framed the problem this way: The party draws on votes from – and is accountable to – diverse groups of citizens with conflicting interests. That conflict within the Republicans’ voting base means that any policy they propose would hurt at least some of the members’ key constituents. Continue reading “Another continuing resolution won’t solve the real problem within the Republican Party”

Flake on hot mic: GOP ‘toast’ if we become the party of Trump, Moore B

The following article by John Bowden was posted on the Hill website November 18, 2017:

Republican Sen. Jeff Flake (Ariz.) was caught on a hot mic Saturday warning that the Republican Party will be “toast” if it becomes the party of President Trump and Roy Moore.

At a tax-reform event in Arizona on Saturday, Flake was caught on a live microphone by ABC affiliate KNXV bashing the president in a conversation with Mesa Mayor John Giles, a friend of Flake’s.

“If we become the party of Roy Moore and Donald Trump, we are toast,” Flake is overheard saying. Continue reading “Flake on hot mic: GOP ‘toast’ if we become the party of Trump, Moore B”

Trump is slowly rupturing the Republican Party, suggests yet another new poll

The following article by Aaron Blake was posted on the Washington Post website September 13, 2017:

President Trump’s decision to back Democrats’ plans for raising the debt ceiling and permanently removing Congress’s debt ceiling requirement is frustrating Republicans, and especially conservatives. (Jenny Starrs/The Washington Post)

President Trump’s ability to fracture and even destroy the Republican Party has been chewed over plenty in recent days, as he — for the moment, at least — flirts with working with Democrats. The New York Times’s Peter Baker wrote that Trump is, “in many ways, the first independent to hold the presidency” since the Civil War. I’ve looked at what might happen if Trump actually ditched the GOP. Continue reading “Trump is slowly rupturing the Republican Party, suggests yet another new poll”