One of the problems with figuring out what is wrong with the Republican Party is that our names for the various factions are all wrong. Kristen Soltis Anderson’s wonderful article about the Republican Party’s post-Trump divisions includes this line about “those who believe Republicans lost by being too conservative and failing to build a broad coalition.” She means the who think that the Republican Party should have adopted the policy recommendations of the RNC’s “autopsy.” There is just one problem: the alleged supporters of moderation and openness are actually extremists who are tearing their party apart in pursuit of unpopular policies.

Let’s start with the supposed moderation. The Republican National Committee’s autopsy is no moderate document. It has nothing to say of Mitt Romney’s (and the Republican Party’s) support for a politically toxic combination of high-earner tax reductions and entitlement cuts. It has nothing to say about learning from Bush’s disastrous Iraq policy. The only alleged moderation and openness is in calling for “comprehensive immigration reform.” This is a Washington euphemism for a combination of upfront legalization of the existing population of unauthorized immigrants, plus expansion of future immigration.

Now let’s discuss the broad openness of the Republican moderates. As Byron York pointed out, the comprehensive immigration reform favored by the alleged moderates would have vastly increased future immigration. The moderate, constructive immigration reform would have especially increased low-skill immigration.

Unfortunately for the self-proclaimed Republican pragmatists, only 7 percent of Republicans, 17 percent of independents and 20 percent of Democrats favor increasing immigration. The people who can’t shut up about the need for a broader party have united around a policy position that repels people across the political spectrum.

It is worse than that. To the extent Americans favor future immigration, they favor a policy based around skills and English proficiency. This is another issue where Democrats and Republicans agree. One can hardly imagine a less popular proposal than increasing future immigration for people with a high school degree or less – and yet that is what the self-proclaimed Republican realists want.

We can’t think clearly because our labels have nothing to do with reality. The Republican establishment is populated with extremist, politically suicidal fanatics, but the Republican politicians can’t see it because they don’t measure moderation by public opinion. They measure moderation by the social status of the people holding the opinion. Republican officeholders, lobbyists, and consultants overwhelmingly hold one set of opinions on immigration (pro-amnesty, pro-increasing immigration, contemptuous of immigration enforcement.) That opinion is shared by the mass of the party’s donors, and the business trade associations. It is shared by the mainstream media. That becomes the universe for Republican politicians. The vast majority of Americans who don’t share those opinions only exists as a vague, despicable, fringe minority.

That is how you get Scott Walker being unable to recognize that his pro-open borders principles, and his dismissal of immigration enforcement were not universally shared. That is how you get Speaker Paul Ryan working to expand a low-skill guest worker program even as the Trump revolt was tearing his party to shreds. That is how you get Republican senators who are planning to repeat the exact mistakes that led to the Trump revolt. These establishment Republicans bear more than a little resemblance to the British journalistic and political elites who reacted with horror and disbelief at the public’s vote in favor of Brexit.

The Republican Party’s establishment lunacy is a bigger worry that Trump. Trump is loathsome, but he is just one guy and he is basically self-interested. He would sell out his new supporters the moment it became convenient. The establishment Republicans are true believers and the Jeb Bushes, Marco Rubio’s, and Paul Ryans aren’t going anywhere. They will keep pushing and pushing until they rip the party apart – and then they will blame the Republican voters for not caring enough about the opinions of the American people.