The California GOP is "Unsalvageable", "We have to decimate it and start over" - Polidicks

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/11/17/rip-california-gop-republicans-lash-out-after-midterm-election-debacle-1000481 LOS ANGELES — In the wake of a near-political annihilation in California that has left even longtime conservative stronghold Orange County bereft of a single Republican in the House of Representatives, a growing chorus of GOP loyalists here say there’s only one hope for reviving the flatlining party: Blow it up and start again from scratch. That harsh assessment comes as Republicans survey the damage from the devastation of a “blue tsunami” in California which wiped out five GOP-held House seats — with more still threatened — while handing every statewide seat and a supermajority to the Democrats in both houses of the state legislature this week. The latest blow came Thursday, when Democrat Katie Porter, an UC Irvine professor, defeated Republican Rep. Mimi Walters in a district which represents the beating political heart of Orange County. “I believe that the party has to die before it can be rebuilt. And by die — I mean, completely decimated. And I think Tuesday night was a big step,’’ says veteran California GOP political consultant Mike Madrid. “There is no message. There is no messenger. There is no money. And there is no infrastructure.” Republicans like Madrid also mourned another low point this week: the defeat of Southern California Assemblyman Dante Acosta, marking the demise of the last GOP Latino legislator — in a state where Latinos comprise the fastest-growing electorate. “The California Republican Party isn’t salvageable at this time. The Grand Old Party is dead,” wrote former state GOP Assembly leader Kristin Olsen, who startled fellow Republicans with a brutally frank op-ed this week saying Republicans must acknowledge their “serious problem” in California, particularly the effects of toxicity of President Trump. Madrid argues that many California Republican leaders remain in complete denial of the fact that their continued support of Trump presidency has sealed the fate of the GOP — and last week’s midterm elections revealed the true extent of the GOP’s rot in California, where the state party has now shrunken to third party status. Madrid cites the recent gubernatorial contest in which Republican nominee John Cox, who described himself repeatedly as a “Jack Kemp” Republican, pushed for Trump policies that are abhorrent to many Californians. “It is completely unfathomable...for a Republican nominee to run on building a wall,’’ said Madrid, a nationally recognized expert on Latino voting trends who noted that the party has spent 20 years trying to extricate itself from the damage done by Prop. 187, the anti-illegal immigration ballot measure that eviscerated Latino support in the state. “And everyone acts like it’s normal...Cox was running on that, in California. Are you out of your mind?”

Or just leave it decimated

If there's only Democrats all the conservatives will just move there.

Plenty of parts in California are purple so it's highly possible for red to sweep over parts of California in the next 10 to 15 years as having a blue district now doesn't mean the opposition went away.

Ya its easy to say the democrats have done in california what the gop has done in say texas but the reality of it is that california has independent redistricting and pretty lax voter ID laws, the gop just does not have a platform to run on in california.I hope this would drive home the importance of climate change and environmentalism to the gop, or any number of other issues where they're so far out of touch with their coveted suburban voters but this will just end up with either crazier republicans like Nunes or weaksauce guys like flake who just waste a seat prattling on about how they hate their party but how the other party is somehow worse.

The California GOP needs to be dealt with along with some the south-eastern GOP branches. They take cancer to a whole new level. Take this from someone who has been a Libertarian/Republican most of his life: The GOP needs to adopt a Libertarian or Constitution approach or the entire party will fall. God, Guns, and Country will only get us so far in this current age.

Decimate... So kill 10% of them as a punishment?

Not exactly unique to Cali.

It might be a good idea for California to get its own "conservative" party. Single-party rule is bad, even within a state, but clearly the national Republican party isn't suited to Californian conservatives. I expect such a party would formally ally itself with the GOP in national politics - caucus with them in Congress, endorse their presidential candidates - but maintain its own platform and vote against the GOP when their platforms conflict. Sort of like the Libertarian party, but more regional. That would a) give better representation within California, b) provide a check on Democrats within California to keep them from stagnating, and c) act as a moderating force on the national GOP, who have gotten rather extremist over the past decade or two.

It's not like Republicans have never been elected office in California. Remember Arnold Schwarzenegger? The problem is, right now the Republican party has gone way off the fucking deep end and desperately needs to be reformed if they ever want to stand a chance in places like California again. This is why it's so important for Trump's era of Republican politicians to fail. Outlaw Gerrymandering, outlaw voter suppression, and make Republicans fight on a fair ground, and maybe the party might crawl out of the hole of corruption and perversion of politics that they've found themselves in.

That's being extremely optimistic. They have no infrastructure, no way to out raise their opponents, and a distinct lack of talent on their bench. This is just the end result of a process that has been going on since the mid 90s. The California GOP were the first to make use of hardline anti immigration rhetoric and legislation to drive their voters, and they're reaping the results after refusing to readjust or realign when they need to.

this has become a pet peeve of mine every time someone uses the term "decimate" and it's all thanks to a friend of mine with the same pet peeve, who would berate me for using the word for its dramatic sound

Best part is, the Cali GOP only has itself to blame as to why they are effectively dead. Thank you Arnold for passing a law to make Cali a jungle primary.

Pretty much. Straight-up banning the MAGA crowd from running on their ticket is the first step for the GOP's recovery. And if it has results in Cali then maybe it would work elsewhere nowhere else in the nation would follow suit because the GOP is completely insane

This is arguably the case in the Northeast, where "independents" like Bernie are successful. They aren't formally a "party" but they kind of act like it. I don't think a non-Democrat liberal party could succeed in California under the current electoral system. Even with jungle primaries, FPTP has too strong an equilibrium at two dominant parties. The only way this could happen is if CA Democrats swung farther to the right, completely destroying the CA Republicans but leaving lots of dissatisfied CA liberals open to a new party. Which isn't entirely impossible but seems pretty unlikely to me. If they switched to STV or PR or some other voting system, all bets are off.

If the CA-GOP were smart they'd drop the bigotry, nationalism, and anti-intellectualism. That mostly leaves fiscal and some social issues, but they could certainly build a base off that in California.

It's hard to do that while bigotry, nationalism and anti-intellectualism is basically the entire platform of the national GOP. Even if local candidates reject it, they'll still be associated with it just because they use the Republican name.

I've been saying this since the beginning. And its also not going to happen

The funny thing is they could do that and lose no votes from the loonies because they would be too scared to vote for Democrats

Gee, it's almost like people don't want to support horribly discriminatory politicians who blatantly lie and try to subvert our decmoractic process. Whoever could have possibly seen that coming?? The GOP as a whole needs to be recreated from scratch because what it's become is a total joke, and not a funny one either. (The Democratic party could do with a refresh too. Cast out the corporate retards, they can create their own party if they want.)