There Is No Such Thing as a 'Biden Republican'

Many cultures have a foundational myth.

The Greeks had the Titanomachy, the Romans had the tale of Romulus and Remus, the Egyptians had Ra and Osiris. Even our own country’s creation has been mythologized to a certain extend.

To wit, George Washington probably did not chop down that cherry tree.

But what we have to remember about myths is that they are just that — myths.

They’re tall tales growing out of great cultural upheavals to help people make sense of things.

At best, myths should not be taken literally.

At worst, they are often promulgated by some in power to advance their causes.

Bearing that in mind, there is a new cultural and political myth being propagated by the corrupted soap operas AKA the American media; namely, the so-called "Biden Republicans."

In a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Rahm Emanuel, Barack Obama’s former aide and yes man, argued that it’s possible for Democrats to make huge gains with moderate Republicans who oppose Donald Trump. He goes on to compare this not-at-all-plausible phenomenon with the "Reagan Democrats" who helped propel President Ronald Reagan into the Oval Office in 1980.

There are quite a few problems with this theory.

First off, Trump still has a 90% approval rating among Republican voters, so I’m not sure who this large group of disaffected Republicans are. Maybe Emanuel means the tiny "Never Trump" movement, made up of third-rate and jaded consultants — who have mostly lost campaigns — who’ve become shills for Democrats and paid contributors with the media to talk about how much they hate Trump and vilify people who voted for him.

They’ve even gone to the trouble of forming the not-very-effective "Lincoln Project," which actively campaigns for Democrats and can’t even create its own social media content.

In fact, the 2020 electoral landscape is vastly different from the situation in 1980 that drove many Democrats to vote for Ronald Reagan.

In 1980, there were many, many culturally conservative Democrats.

So much so, that Reagan, in his speech accepting the nomination at the Republican convention in Detroit in July of 1980 made an open appeal to Democrats to join his "community of shared values."

In 1980, Reagan, even as accepting the nomination of the GOP, had actually been a Democrat longer — 30 years — than he’d been a Republican, 18 years.

Unlike Trump, who even now still retains huge support within his own party, Democrats (and the rest of the country) were fed up with Jimmy Carter by 1980.

In June of 1979, Carter had a 70% disapproval rating nationally, according to a New York Times/CBS poll.

Only 23% of Democrats wanted Carter to be their nominee in the 1980 election.

One doesn’t need to look far to see why; under Jimmy Carter’s abysmal leadership, inflation skyrocketed, gas was short, national morale was low, and hostile countries like Iran and the Soviet Union were running circles around the U.S. Many Democrats in 1980 felt abandoned by their former hero Carter.

Until recently, Trump had a strong economy to run on, and it’s only because of COVID-19 that we now face a recession.

That aside, Trump has not faced issues comparable to those Carter failed to address.

If he had, maybe more Republicans would be willing to hold their nose and vote for Biden the way many Democrats voted for Reagan.

But I doubt Biden will even come close to winning a third of Republicans in some states like "The Gipper" did with Democrats in 1980.

Overall, Reagan took some 27% of the Democratic vote in 1980 and 26 percent in 1984.

The other great fallacy in the "Biden Republican" argument is Biden’s choice of Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., as his running mate.

As I wrote recently in Newsmax, Biden picking Harris was a poor decision for a number of reasons, but one of them is the fact that Harris is the farthest thing from a unifier a party ticket could have.

Now — the centrist Democrat must be considered an endangered species.

Another factors in Reagan’s appeal to Democrats was his choice to run with George H.W. Bush. Aside from his long, long resume Bush was liberal for a Republican and assuaged the fears of many Democrats who worried about the more conservative Reagan.

But this was a minor point.

The Reagan Democrat was created by Democrats who were supportive of the Gipper.

Indeed, it may have been Peter Goldman, a respected journalist for Newsweek who first coined the phrase "Reagan Democrat" in the throes of the 1980 campaign.

A Democratic pollster, Stan Greenberg, found that in Macomb County, Michigan, 63% of Democrats had voted for John Kennedy in 1960 but by 1984, 66% supported Reagan. These voters just outside of Detroit were unionized, blue collar auto workers.

Contrarily, Harris is a leftist firebrand who makes the "progressive" Obama presidency look like mere junior varsity liberalism with her promises to abolish private healthcare, confiscate guns, and institute the ludicrous Green New Deal and only the most zealous Never Trumper would seriously support her. Self-respecting Republicans, even moderates, should be terrified of Harris.

The rise of the "Reagan Democrat" signaled an important change in American electoral behavior. It showed that, with the right messaging and coalition building, a strong candidate could draw moderates away from the opposition party.

Someone like Ronald Reagan, who has since gone down in history as one of our most successful and popular presidents.

Biden has neither; his messaging is tailored to the worst elements of the liberal base, codified further by his running mate.

Look at these facts and the historical context, and that’s all you need to see that the "Biden Republican" is just another media folk tale fueled by wishful thinking and TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrom.)

There is no such thing as a 'Biden Republican.'

Craig Shirley is a Ronald Reagan biographer and presidential historian. His books include, “Reagan’s Revolution, The Untold Story of the Campaign That Started it All,” “Rendezvous with Destiny, Ronald Reagan and the Campaign that Changed America,” "Reagan Rising: The Decisive Years," and “ Last Act: The Final Years and Emerging Legacy of Ronald Reagan." He is also the author of the New York Times bestseller, “December, 1941” and his new 2019 book, “Mary Ball Washington,” a definitive biography of George Washington’s mother. Shirley lectures frequently at the Reagan Library and the Reagan Ranch. He has been named the First Reagan Scholar at Eureka College, Ronald Reagan’s alma mater and will teach a class this fall at the University of Virginia on Reagan. He appears regularly on Newsmax TV, Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN. Read Craig Shirley's Reports — More Here.