It is now determined that the Democrats have retained control of the Senate and probably safe to conclude that the Republicans will have a small majority in the House of Representatives.
It was quite a feat for the Republicans to maintain its minority in the Senate and a gain only a fragile majority in the House. Record high inflation; record high crime; economy in a recession (changing the definition doesn’t change the fact); record low approval rating for the President; record high “wrong track” opinion; (possibly) record low preference for the party in power in the “generic ballot”; five million illegal alien entries in two years: unusually high levels of administrative incompetence; a thoroughly discredited federally-driven public health care agenda; a senile (and not very bright to begin with) President; an unusually corrupt President.
For the Republican party to pull it off was astonishing.
There are plenty of Republican apologists and pundits who proffer an abundance of excuses. Some of them have validity, such as the low number of Democratic Senate seats up for election; media bias; social media censorship; Justice Department in general and FBI in particular partisan politicization.
However, it should be totally obvious that the electoral disaster for the Republican Party was driven by two factors: the Republican Establishment, and the Republican Anti-Establishment.
As an example of the former, Mitch McConnel outdid himself refusing to support Republican candidates he perceived to be potentially unsupportive of Mitch McConnel. The most egregious example was support of Lisa Murkowski against the candidate supported by the Alaska Republican Party. There were plenty of other examples.
The Chief intraparty opponent of the Republican Establishment is Donald Trump. Whether one loves or hates him, supports or opposes his policies, enjoys or abhors his nose-tweaking of his opponents, is offended or amused by his name-calling, the fact is that he cannot and will not be again elected President of the United States. Right or wrong, fair or unfair, it is not going to happen.
For Republicans the question of the moment is whether Ron DeSantis is truly anti-establishment. If he is, there is a slim chance he can make a difference, IF he can procure the nomination of the Republican Party.
I have said for many years, because it has been demonstrably true for many years, that whether the government is in the hands of the Republicans or the Democrats affects only the terminal velocity of the USA at the time it crashes and burns forever, recognizable as its former self only from its charred and scattered remains.
The Republican and Democrat Establishments, pretend opponents in choreographed, pretend battle, must both be destroyed.
