The GOP Rebranding: A Status Report

With much fanfare after the 2012 debacle, the Republican party wandered into the wilderness to lick their wounds and contemplated what had gone wrong.

The result of that uncharacteristic contemplation was an effort led by RNC Chairman Reince Priebus (double points on Scrabble for that name!) to rebrand the GOP. A new and improved, lemon-scented party. Or more succinctly put by LA Gov. Bobby Jindal who kept saying to anyone who would listen to him that the Republican Party must quit being the stupid party that nominates unelectable and lunatic candidates: you know, witches, Rapist Babies are God’s will and women’s bodies have a way of shutting that whole thing down, Second amendment remedies to lost elections, etc.

So we must ask, how is that re-branding going Reince? Let’s look at some recent developments:

In Florida, we were invited to some southern hospitality at a fundraiser for GOP Congressman Steve Southerland. I mean, only men were invited:

“Good men sitting around discussing & solving political & social problems over fine food & drink date back to the 12th Century with King Arthur’s Round Table. You are invited to join such an occasion with your U.S. Congressman & a small group of concerned men. Tell the Misses not to wait up because the after dinner whiskey and cigars will be smooth & the issues to discuss are many.”

Don’t want the womenfolk to look haggard in the morning, now do we? The menfolk will solve all the problems like it was Mad Men’s 1950s.

Let’s move north and listen to Thom Tillis, the candidate running for North Carolina Senate mansplain math to a banker and budget chairperson, the incumbent Sen. Kay Hagan:

Nice that he calls her Kay. Kinda cute, isn’t he?

But here’s his rebranding moment: Tillis also has recently joined Cory Gardner and they have flip-flopped on their opposition to birth control, fooling absolutely no one.

As long as we are in the neighborhood, let’s see what inspiring words Rep. Robert Pittenger has to say about freedom:

“You need to respect the autonomy of somebody running their business,” he said. “It’s like smoking bans. Do you ban smoking or do people have the right to private property? I think people have the right to private property. In public spaces, absolutely, we can have smoking bans. But we don’t want to micromanage people’s lives and businesses. If you have a business, do you want the government to come in and tell you you need to hire somebody? Why should government be there to impose on the freedoms we enjoy?”

Well, it’s not exactly equating being gay to cancer, and I suppose Freedom! to fire gay people is pretty fundamental to a fundamentalist.

By: Tengrain

Fully caffeinated with twice the sugar, unabashedly liberal. Award-winning Americans United blogger, blogs at Mock Paper Scissors, and sometimes at Crooks and Liars.

You can follow @Tengrain on Twitter, or you might see him enjoying coffee somewhere in Seattle at any given moment of the day.