Like Shakespeare's play, The Tempest, the storm that is the 2016 election will thankfully be over and Republicans will emerge from their place of refuge to assess the damage to their brand. The survivors of this political storm will stand on the shore of their island and look out on the shipwreck that was once the Grand Old Party. As the sky clears, the survivors will come to realize that the man responsible for sinking the Republican ship is still here; Donald Trump will not go away.
In reality, Trump is executing a scorched-earth campaign, but it is important to note that such a campaign is a strategy, not a surrender. Trump is cultivating the seeds of a new political faction sustained by the idea that the election was rigged and Trump was stabbed in the back by disloyal Republicans and the media. Many on both sides of the aisle recognize the potential danger to our union posed by an attempt to delegitimize the democratic process. At the very least, the outcome of Trump's strategy could be a permanent change in the outlines of our two-party system.
Trump has declared that he has never sought forgiveness from anyone, not even God, and his fragile temperament pushes him to extract vengeance on those that reject him. For this reason, Trump will continue to be a constant presence on the political scene and will use his gift for self-promotion to make himself and not Congressional Republicans the voice of opposition to President Hillary Clinton.
Many GOP insiders are concerned that Trump's political movement might become the future blueprint for the Republican Party. If Trump is able to recruit candidates in his image to run in primaries nationwide his movement could evolve into his own version of the party.
Trump and his tactics are most similar to a dictator; he dreams of ruling our nation, but he will settle for securing dictatorial power over the Republican Party. Trump has already mobilized the outline of a new Nationalist Republican Party. The new GOP will be composed of mostly working-class whites, from the South and West, along with some rural areas in the North. They will oppose both legal and illegal immigration, based upon ethnic and religious prejudice or economic competition. Tomorrow's Republicans will bring a resurgence of economic protectionism, including high tariffs and trade wars, similar to the economic policies of President Warren Harding that existed in America between World War I and the Great Depression.
If today's traditional Republicans claim this scenario could not happen, then ask, what has changed within the Republican Party since the primaries? During the primaries, Trump was able to disseminate all 17 GOP candidates without even a coherent plan of his own. After the 2016 presidential election, there is no one within the Republican Party strong enough to wrestle dominance from Trump. Paul Ryan will continue to face strong opposition in Congress from the ranks of his own party, in part for his rejection of Trump. "Little" Marco Rubio has already withered under the relentless personal attacks of Trump, and Ted Cruz has proven weak and unwilling to stand his ground. The sad reality is, the GOP will be Trump's party, a Nationalist American Workers Party.
