Republicans Want Reform
The Trump-Haley battle is part of a war for the soul of the Republican Party

Originally published Jan 31 2024 by the Lexington Herald-Leader
There is currently a conflict for the soul of the Republican party. The combatants are two Republican factions who have disagreed for several decades. On one side there is the Establishment faction (sometimes called “neoconservatives” or “moderates”) which believes in foreign military intervention, tax cuts, fiscal responsibility, strong support for Israel, and a cozy relationship between the government and business. On the other side there is the Reformist faction (sometimes called “paleoconservatives” or “grassroots”) which believes in isolationism, immigration restriction, cares about culture war issues, and wants to fight corruption.
Establishment Republicans believe that the American government/media/university system is basically good, that America’s military should spread this system around the world, and that we just need to balance the budget and cut taxes in order to cure most of what ails America.
Reformists believe that America faces deep problems, that the American government and mainstream media are riddled with corruption, and that the Republican party establishment has been part of the problem for at least the last six decades. Reformists would say that Establishment Republicans are naive, and ignorant as to the extent of corruption within the American government and media. Establishment Republicans would say that Reformists are a rabble of weirdos, idealistic dreamers and conspiracy theorists.
Since Donald Trump came down his golden escalator and announced his candidacy in 2015, the Reformist faction has chosen Trump to be their avatar. Trump succeeded where his Reformist predecessor Pat Buchanan failed, beat 10 Establishment candidates in the primary, and then shocked the world by proving that he was not, in fact, too extreme to win the general election. Establishment Republicans hate Trump. They view him as a gauche, unprofessional upstart and rabble-rouser who isn’t even a real conservative. Since the grassroots Reformist faction was not prepared to staff an administration, the Establishment faction staffed the Trump White House with their own people and they were able to shift the administration away from the rhetoric that Trump had used during the campaign and toward Establishment priorities such as tax cuts and support for Israel.
In short, since Nov. 9, 2016, the Republican Establishment has treated Trump and the Trump movement as an embarrassing fluke; one which will eventually go away so that the GOP can resume pre-2016 business as usual.
In the 2024 primary, the Establishment faction has put its full weight behind Nikki Haley. But Haley is not only disliked by the Reformist faction, she is viscerally hated. They see her (fairly or unfairly) as “Hillary Clinton with an R next to her name.” A warmonger who wants to violate the First Amendment. A political opportunist who kowtows to the left’s framing of cultural issues. An example is illustrative: While she was governor of South Carolina, Haley approved $120m in special benefits to Boeing to get them to invest in the state. After she left office, she was hired on the board of Boeing, a position that pays $300,000 per year. Establishment Republicans think this kind of trading of favors is just how politics works. Reformists think it is tantamount to a bribe.
The fact that the Establishment faction made Haley their champion in this primary shows either that the Establishment faction has no intention of offering a compromise to the Reformists, or that they understand the Reformists so poorly, they wouldn’t know how to offer a compromise.
Trump’s victories over Haley in the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries suggest that Republican voters are willing to choose a candidate who is less electable in November for the sake of getting a Reformist candidate rather than an Establishment one. The question of the next few years is whether the Establishment is ready to treat the Reformists as serious political actors, i.e. whether the Establishment will be willing to come to the table of compromise.
Trump is a reformer like you and I are NBA All-Stars. And those who believe in this self-serving clown, and would-be authoritarian, can't reform anything, let alone be taken seriously. SEE: the current R House. And MTG, Gaetz, Chip Roy & all the others who sold their souls to lick a huckster's boots.