Pour one out for sunny, Reaganesque Republicanism.

The latest blow came this week, when Tim Scott, the second of two candidates with a future-focused, relentlessly positive message and a smiling disposition, dropped out of the GOP presidential primary. He was preceded to the exits by his fellow happy warrior Mike Pence. Both capitulated to an electorate more interested in candidates eager to violate Ronald Reagan’s Eleventh Commandment — thou shall not speak ill of any fellow Republican — shredding each other to make a point.

The last of their kind amid a field of slash-and-burn culture warriors and angry brawlers — candidates willing to call their political enemies “scum” and “vermin” — Pence and Scott had bet that there was a silent majority of Republican primary voters who wanted a return to an optimistic, whistle-while-you-work-the-base standard bearer.

  • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Reagan, and Pence, treated people like scum and vermin. LGBTQ, immigrants, drug addicts, poor people, atheists… Their happy positivity only applied to wealthy Christians and the military industrial complex.

      • thefartographer@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Their mouths said they hated me, but their eyes… Well, their eyes said they hated me, too, but I really appreciated how much effort they put into working together in an attempt to discredit my right to live.

    • Madison420@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Reagan was a Patsy, it’s very clear at this point he wasn’t running himself let alone the government.

    • irmoz@reddthat.com
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      1 year ago

      Yeah… no shit… it’s written right there, why act surprised?

      thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow republican