General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWhy We Are Leaving the G.O.P.
By Susan Bevan and Susan Cullman
Ms. Bevan and Ms. Cullman are leaders of Republican Majority for Choice.
June 24, 2018
We are about to bury the rights of over 100 million American women under a heap of platitudes, protested Mary Dent Crisp, the co-chairwoman of the Republican National Committee. Her colleagues assured her that the platform was nonbinding and that reproductive health services were not in danger.
But she was prescient. As pro-choice Republicans, we refuse to support a party that has rightly earned the labels anti-woman and anti-common sense. Our organization, the Republican Majority for Choice, the organization founded by Ms. Crisp in 1988, is shutting its doors. The big tent has collapsed for good.
It is no wonder that women are voting with their feet. According to a recent analysis by the Pew Research Center, 56 percent of women identify as or lean toward Democrats. The gap is even wider among college graduates and minority voters. The party should take note that 70 percent of millennial women have either registered as Democrats or lean Democratic.
It has become taboo within the party to even say pro-choice. Most of our supporters gave up on the party as it moved to the extremes not just on abortion but also on other social and fiscal issues.
This Republican Party is no family of ours. And so we say goodbye.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/24/opinion/abortion-rights-republican-party-women.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-right-region®ion=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region
manor321
(3,344 posts)It took them until now to figure this out? There must be something wrong with them.
maxrandb
(15,401 posts)workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)Are the real kool-aid drinking Trump cultists.
KY_EnviroGuy
(14,501 posts)an authoritarian mentality coupled with a morbid fear of being wrong.
Just guessing, but I would bet these women still support massive tax cuts and the butchering of our government.....
brush
(53,978 posts)of white women voters voted for trump.
Action speaks louder than words, ladies.
Show up at the polls and vote Democratic.
KY_EnviroGuy
(14,501 posts)make a big dent in that 53%.
And, when health care costs start to skyrocket and more women's clinics close, woe be unto his orange butt........
brush
(53,978 posts)secondwind
(16,903 posts)struggle4progress
(118,379 posts)one resigned in disgrace after his dirty tricks were exposed;
the next suffered from Alzheimer's, officiated over what was (until then) the most corrupt administration in US history, and ran an illegal war from the White House basement;
the one after that was a covert operative, who pardoned those involved in the illegal war to protect himself;
the next, his son, was installed in office after justices his father appointed stopped the vote count in Florida so that he could inherit the Oval Office despite losing the popular vote;
and now we have this guy!
GOP doesn't have a very good record for the last 50 years
jayschool2013
(2,319 posts)The stumblebum who stumbled into office and immediately pardoned the bum who preceded him.
volstork
(5,403 posts)of the "worst" pile. His pardon of nixon allowed nixon's subterranean cronies to resurface 30 years later: cheney, rumsfeld, wolfowitz, etc. It also set a precedent for not prosecuting crimes against the Republic, which continued through bush I, bush II, and even Obama.
struggle4progress
(118,379 posts)jayschool2013
(2,319 posts)A tumor on a tumor. LOL
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)...as we have failed to punish them, they have become ever more emboldened.
bdamomma
(63,974 posts)not how to govern, just butcher away at programs and our institutions. They feel "entitlement" let's see how long that lasts.
Civic Justice
(870 posts)Reading can provide information to help people understand what they see. (please be patient enough to invest in reading, its how we as a society were groomed to learn) We can give our thanks unto our public schools for the gift of education, by using it "read" that we can become better informed. We owe it to ourselves and our American society, as well as the offspring's who's future is at stake.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100210779687
pazzyanne
(6,560 posts)They are the learn from experience and denial Americans who won't admit things aren't going well until they are on the street without social programs to support them because they voted those programs out. Then it will be too late.
TY
KG
(28,753 posts)Afromania
(2,771 posts)A better question is where have you been the last 18, or an even better question the last 2. What's happening now has always been the endgame. Anybody paying any attention could see it. Nice n all that they have decided to buy some smoke detectors today but the house is completely on fire and the embers are threatening the houses next to us. I wonder how much a privatized fire department will charge us to put this out.
Pacifist Patriot
(24,654 posts)I know several women involved in this organization. None voted for Trump.
They are, for lack of a better term, Eisenhower Republicans. They truly felt they could work from the inside to correct the insane trajectory. This is an admission of defeat for all their efforts over the last few decades.
Afromania
(2,771 posts)The gop didnt need saving, the country did, from them. From the people they sided with right up to and past the jumping off point for sane people. This isnt about party but what is right and proper and right and proper hasn't been on the gop blueprint for longer than I have been alive. So talking this talk now is disingenuous at best and a move toa synical atteempt at cover butts at the worst. You say they don't vote for trump; that was the easy part but did they actively move against him and the GOP that permitted him to continue unabated? Did they vote for Hillary?
Pacifist Patriot
(24,654 posts)full well they were tilting at windmills. But you can't tell that to someone inside until it's too late.
I know several of these women did vote for Hillary and one abstained from voting at all. I don't know about the others. One Hillary voter in this group knocked doors for Clinton with me.
I don't think any of us can say for certain what was in someone else's head or heart. I just know it was a very frustrating and painful time for these women. I'm not asking for pity for them, I've argued with them vehemently over the years. But to assume they did nothing but wring their hands is wrong. These women in my local area fought hard to get moderate pro-choice Republicans through the primaries to keep tea party nut jobs out of the general election. They had some success there and a couple of failures. Their successes have made a difference in preventing a bat shit insane voting block on the county commission.
When your area is so red it's pretty much a foregone conclusion the election will go to a Republican, getting a moderate through the primary can make all the difference in the world.
Afromania
(2,771 posts)It job one to dismantle the country and demonize me while they were doing it. You're going to excuse me if I'm of no mind to say good job on just figuring this all out because its clear that the GOP had their necks dotted for cutting the entire time you were arguing with them. Perhaps if they just walked away from republican ism it would have spurred others on to do so. You tell me I don't know what's in their hearts, well I don't need to know because the refusal to listen to you while they tilted at republican windmills is telling me I need to know, republican or nothing. A moderate republican is still a republican and last time I checked they more or less walk in complete lock step with the crazies that made the mess we are in.
Raven123
(4,937 posts)Vogon_Glory
(9,137 posts)Then around 1990 I wised up. I started voting Democratic.
hatrack
(59,606 posts)Good work, ladies!
BTW, how many members does Republican Majority for Choice have left? 200? 300?
workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)http://www.logcabin.org/
klook
(12,174 posts)Fortunately the Dixiecrats are a thing of the past, except for maybe the stray throwback here and there.
Democrats For Racism would make about as much sense as Log Cabin Republicans.
workinclasszero
(28,270 posts)Kinda like Latinos and Hispanics for Dotard Trump.
https://www.facebook.com/LatinosandHispanicsforDonaldTrump/ What.the.actual.fuck!?
llmart
(15,569 posts)Yes, I understand the "where have you been the past 30 years" sentiment, but I would rather see these women openly state they are leaving the Republican party then have them continue to live a lie.
If the Democrats are going to be the "big tent" party, then we also have to welcome ex-Republicans.
I still maintain that if our republic is to be saved, it will be the women who will do it.
CrispyQ
(36,567 posts)A career republican is running as a democrat for Al Franken's old seat. Is that big tent enough? Maybe we can encourage more disgruntled GOP members to run as dems & take our party even further to the right. Accepting the likes of Richard Painter, Steve Schmidt, Nicole Wallace*, etc., into the party just because they are anti-Trump seems like a mistake. Let them form their own new conservative party, instead of trying to hijack the only other major party with the infrastructure to win elections. People whined about Bernie Sanders running as a dem but are okay with Richard Painter. WTF? At least Bernie caucuses with the dems.
* Schmidt & Wallace have not announced their intent to join the Democratic Party or run as dems, but there is an open acceptance of them & other republicans, into the party simply because they are speaking out against Trump right now.
Liberalagogo
(1,770 posts)sarge43
(28,946 posts)Liberal In Texas
(13,615 posts)They'll just call themselves Independents and still vote for repubs.
But maybe they won't vote for the "p grabber" next time.
BumRushDaShow
(130,043 posts)There really needs to be more serious soul-searching.
NewJeffCT
(56,829 posts)voted for Romney in 2012.
In 2016, college educated white women voted Democratic for the first time ever.
It's trending in the right direction - if Trump drops below 50% with white women in general, it won't be good for Republicans.
Cryptoad
(8,254 posts)just a binary choice,,,, Trumpsters and anti-Trumpsters!!!!!!
catbyte
(34,546 posts)nation after the 2010 election clusterfuck? That was 7 years ago. I guess it's better late than never, but come on.
lark
(23,199 posts)Geeze, are they slow learners or were just so wed to their party they couldn't, wouldn't see the truth?
DonCoquixote
(13,616 posts)And frankly, I know that some would say "see, we are winning them to our side!" Sorry, but these folks willl gladly get on the GOP train once a Mike pence or Paul Ryan or Rubio comes along and says "See, we changed!"
Dawson Leery
(19,348 posts)They should have left when Newt took over.
phylny
(8,394 posts)He voted for Obama twice, and he's my watch buddy for Rachel at 9 pm. I don't rub it in his face - he mourns for the "fiscally conservative" party that he joined, but he sees the big picture now.