Texas: GOP Rejects Democracy, Embraces Theocracy

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Dean Obeidallah, a typical contributor to CNN, describes the Texas GOP’s defiant rejection of democracy. In an before write-up, I pointed out that the state convention booed Senator Jon Cornyn for daring to negotiate a bipartisan gun regulate offer (which did not contain any of President Biden’s calls for). That was the mildest of their actions.

He writes:

CNN) &#8211 Disturbing movie from the Texas Republican Conference this weekend reveals conference-goers mocking GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw &#8212 a Navy SEAL veteran who misplaced his right eye to a bomb in Afghanistan &#8212 with the phrase &#8220eye patch McCain.&#8221

Fox Information&#8217 Tucker Carlson coined the derisive nickname right after the Texas lawmaker dared to convey aid for beleaguered Ukraine subsequent Russia&#8217s barbaric attack on it.

But evidently even much more heinous in the eyes of some attendees is that Crenshaw turned down previous President Donald Trump&#8217s claims that the 2020 election was stolen. 1 person wearing a crimson &#8220Make The united states Great All over again&#8221 hat can be observed yelling in an online movie, &#8220Dan Crenshaw is a traitor!&#8221 and &#8220He wants to be hung for treason!&#8221

As despicable as the behavior towards Crenshaw was, even a lot more alarming ended up the steps taken by the Texas GOP and the convention&#8217s 5,000-moreover delegates.

The accumulating rejected the end result of a democratic election, supported bigotry towards the LGBTQ local community and imposed significantly-suitable religious beliefs on other individuals by searching for to have them enshrined into legislation. And that wasn&#8217t 50 percent of it.

In point, the convention showed us just one matter: Texas Republicans are no extended hiding their extremism. Alternatively, they are openly embracing it.

Even prior to the opening gavel, they gave us a glimpse of the party&#8217s extremism in the Lone Star State by banning the Log Cabin Republicans from setting up a booth at the conference.

Texas Republican Social gathering Chairman Matt Rinaldi solid the deciding vote on the go to bar the group that has advocated for LGBTQ Republicans for many years. &#8220I believe it&#8217s inappropriate offered the state of our country correct now for us to play sexual id politics,&#8221 Rinaldi informed the Fort Truly worth Star-Telegram.

At the time it formally bought underway, the convention took a amount of appalling and un-American steps. To start with, delegates accepted a evaluate declaring that President Joe Biden &#8220was not legitimately elected.&#8221 In shorter, the Texas GOP &#8212 like Trump himself &#8212 is embracing a lie for the reason that it&#8217s unsatisfied with the election results. Put far more bluntly, the Texas GOP voted to reject American democracy.

Republican delegates also booed John Cornyn, the senior US senator from Texas, at the convention Friday because of the Republican lawmaker&#8217s function foremost negotiations to attain a Senate deal on a bill to stem gun violence. Those legislative efforts adhere to previous month&#8217s horrific taking pictures that claimed the life of 19 schoolchildren and two academics in Uvalde, Texas.

The platform accepted at the convention termed for repealing or nullifying gun legislation already in area, these kinds of as the Gun Handle Act of 1968, which prevents felons and other risky people today from staying able to acquire a gun lawfully. Evidently, the Texas GOP believes that even perilous people should really have a constitutionally shielded right to acquire a gun.

The Texas GOP system also embraced ramping up anti-abortion rhetoric in public colleges. For instance, the platform states that &#8220Texas college students really should master about the Humanity of the Preborn Little one, which includes … that lifetime starts at fertilization.&#8221 It even seeks to pressure college students to check out &#8220a live ultrasound&#8221 and for large-schoolers to read an anti-abortion booklet that critics say &#8220contains scientifically unsupported promises and shames women of all ages trying to find abortion care,&#8221 according to The Texas Tribune.

It sounds like the curriculum that you may obtain in a theocratic authorities such as the Taliban &#8212 not 1 in the United States funded by taxpayer dollars. But the GOP in massive swaths of this state is no for a longer time hesitant to help rules to impose its religious beliefs &#8212 as we see with steps some Republicans champion that would absolutely ban abortion. The GOP convention&#8217s document in addition urges officials &#8220not to infringe on Texas school students&#8217 and staffs&#8217 rights to pray and engage in religious speech.&#8221

The Texas GOP system also does its very best to demonize people in the transgender neighborhood. It describes transgender people today as struggling from &#8220a authentic and incredibly unusual psychological well being ailment.&#8221 And it sees sexual reassignment surgical treatment as a variety of professional medical malpractice.

The system requires aim at gay Us residents as perfectly with the statement that homosexuality is &#8220an abnormal way of life decision.&#8221 Instructively, the Texas GOP system did not contain this kind of language in 2018 and 2020.

This system presents us a glimpse into the views of the Republican foundation on key issues that in change will tension GOP elected officers in Texas &#8212 and maybe outside of the state &#8212 to adopt in the same way excessive positions or operate the risk of a principal challenge from an even a lot more excessive Republican.

What brought about this move to the far appropriate? Brandon Rottinghaus, a political scientist at the College of Houston, instructed The Texas Tribune about the state GOP&#8217s new intense system, &#8220Donald Trump radicalized the get together and accelerated the requires from the foundation.&#8221 He extra alarmingly, &#8220There basically aren&#8217t limitations now on what the base might talk to for.&#8221

I agree &#8212 in portion. I don&#8217t believe Trump radicalized the base &#8212 rather he only gave folks permission to be who they generally wanted to be.

But I concur with Rottinghaus that there are now no limitations for what the GOP foundation may request &#8212 be it rejecting election success it doesn&#8217t agree with to enacting additional laws based on severe spiritual beliefs. And that need to deeply alarm each individual American who wants to live in a democratic republic.

The convention also issued a phone to repeal the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which confirmed the right to vote for just about every citizen of voting age.

The only detail the Texas GOP neglected to do was go a resolution congratulating the shooter at Uvalde for working out his “God-presented right” to use his AR15 as he saw in shape.

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