Ever Wonder How the GOP Manages To Hold on to So Much Power?

Image from source, Rolling Stone

If you're going to use tricks and schemes to cling to as much power as you possibly can, it's best to have a good cover story. And when it comes to the GOP keeping a majority in the US Congress, they've had several good ones as cover for things like Voter ID and other changes to voter laws. They've used redistricting in ways that both sides do, and in extra, law-bending ways. And though their party is shrinking, due to demographics (and the general dickishness and batshittery of the Tea Party) they still manage to hold the US House of Representatives by a wide margin.

Like I said, they have good cover stories. But they're not perfect. Sometimes they slip and admit what they're up to. And sometimes, good reporting can piece it all together. The excerpted piece below, from Rolling Stone is a must-read, even if you're a conservative who hasn't been paying attention.

[Excerpt]

How Republicans Rig the Game
 
As the nation recovers from the Republican shutdown of government, the question Americans should be asking is not "Why did the GOP do that to us?" but "Why were they even relevant in the first place?" So dramatically have the demographic and electoral tides in this country turned against the Republican Party that, in a representative democracy worthy of the designation, the Grand Old Party should be watching from the sidelines and licking its wounds. Not only did Barack Obama win a second term in an electoral landslide in 2012, but he is also just the fourth president in a century to have won two elections with more than 50 percent of the popular vote. What's more, the party controls 55 seats in the Senate, and Democratic candidates for the House received well over a million more votes than their Republican counterparts in the election last year. And yet, John Boehner still wields the gavel in the House and Republican resistance remains a defining force in the Senate, frustrating Obama's ambitious agenda. . .

Read more at: Rolling Stone