Big Tents Get Messy.

The Republican Party represents a minority of Americans. The party is mostly white and Christian and somewhat reactionary. It’s largely homogenous.

The Democratic Party includes: Everyone else.

1/ https://twitter.com/BabiesFree/status/1325589395676651520
Democratic Party includes

💠Latino communities in California
💠Southern African American communities
💠Urban intellectuals
💠Big, diverse cities
💠Democratic socialists from Queens
💠Asian communities in California
💠LGBTQ
💠 Pro-union working-class Whites
Etc. Etc. Etc.
2/
When we say, “The GOP demographics are aging and shrinking, and the Democratic base is expanding” Democrats cheer. It means we can win elections.

It also means that we are a huge, diverse heterogeneous group.

2/
The Democratic Party includes minority communities that might lean somewhat conservative but are unwelcome in the Republican Party.

The GOP actively discourages diversity. When you have a homogenous group, it's easier to get along.

3/
Autocracy discourages diversity. Fascism arises by declaring war on “others,” the “enemies” in our midsts (usually people of different religious or ethnic groups.)

The GOP challenge is that their party represents only a minority of Americans, and a minority of views.

5/
As the GOP becomes a full-on White nationalist reactionary party, I suspect that we're in for a party shift.

We may no longer divide into "liberal" and "conservative."

We may divide into people who want democracy and people who don't.

Lots of people don't.

6/
Democracy is hard work. It's messy. It requires compromise.

"My way or the highway" isn't democracy; it's autocracy.

Some people don't like democracy because they don't want to share power (and compromise) with people they don't like.

7/
Some people think they want democracy but they don't. They want things their way.

When my son was in preschool he came home one day and told me that in school that day, he learned to "take turns." He said, "I don't LIKE to take turns. I want all the turns."

8/
Highly functioning societies often go against human nature. (Did anyone else read Civilization and its Discontents in college?)

There are things that cannot be compromised. But for a functioning democracy, the list of things that cannot be compromised must be small.

9/
I'll also add that my son grew up to be a nice young man :)

If the GOP continues to become more autocratic, we will have to outnumber them.

This means accepting into our tent anyone who wants rule of law / democracy.

11/ https://twitter.com/cloudydays1971/status/1325594916697874433
This means accepting into our tent people whose policy ideas we don't like. The alternative is for the non-authoritarians to splinter and lose to autocracy.

In other words, purity tests will not work.

I suspect the GOP will continue to become more autocratic.

11/
The Mitt Romneys will continue trying to thread the needle, appealing to the base while trying to be reasonable, but all those white supremacists and Breitbart readers are not going to close up shop and learn to love democracy.

Remember that trolls have gotten savvier.

12/
Trolls may pose as Democrats, call themselves Democrats, and then call other Democrats names to make trouble.

Some liberals may not like big tents.

Some people don't really like Democrats but they're stuck with us because the alternative is Trump-style autocracy.

13/
This used to be true for a brief period between about 1920 and whenever the GOP finished morphing from a conservative party into a reactionary / regressive party.

14/ https://twitter.com/Not_a_RussiaBot/status/1325597749069279232
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