Leaving the GOP and becoming a Democrat has been the best decision of my political life

It was 109 days ago I made the decision to join the Democratic Party. I left the GOP 13 months earlier when Donald Trump won the Republican nomination for President. As I wrote in my article, “44 years a Republican, 1 year an Independent, today I’m joining the Democratic Party,” leaving one’s political party is not an easy decision. You can read the article by clicking here.

How I viewed the Democrats before leaving the GOP.

A legitimate question is why it took a year for me to join the Democrats? I didn’t think of Democrats as evil people as so many in the GOP do. I worked in Washington, DC in politics for two and a half decades at very high levels. When you crossed the Beltway and entered the National Capital Area, much of the partisanship went away.

Let me rephrase that, it used to go away. Partisanship whose only purpose is to control the masses breached the wall that was the Washington Beltway during the Judge Bork hearings. Where Republican and Democrats had put the bickering aside to work together, the rancor of the Bork hearings took root. Hate, rancor, lack of cooperation, and politicizing everything right down to one’s neckties and scarves found fertile soil and has flourished.

The Democrats are not immune to the partisan rancor as anyone who reads social media knows. It is the GOP who has taken the partisan divide to dangerous levels. The GOP has reverted to naked tribalism. If you are not a part of the tribe, you are attacked. If you attack the tribe, they try to annihilate you.

I know this first-hand because I had been an author and distributor of GOP propaganda. Some of the stereotypes the GOP pushes successfully against the Democratic Party were first typed by the very fingers that are typing this article. I was a bot. I was not only a programmer, I was programmed. That is what made it so difficult to leave and join the enemy.

The Democratic Party

As a matter of conscience, I left the GOP. I enjoyed my year of not being in the partisan fray. I disliked Trump and spoke out about it. Democrats and Republicans widely read my articles and I became the target of the GOP hate machine. While being an Independent had its pluses, it had one very large minus. You will not be an agent for political change in America unless you belong to one of the two major Parties.

I’ve always been a person with ideas for change and I want them heard. That means I must belong to the Democratic Party. I joined, and it burned the bridges between me and the GOP. I’m not a stranger to the GOP hate machine. At one time, I was one of the attack dogs and I was good at it. I know the game, and the GOP does not intimidate me.

I attacked the tribe and of course, they turned their focus to me. This was not the first time the GOP had turned on me. In the past, they didn’t turn on me with the fury they have now because I was a good fundraiser and great campaigner. Just a little discipline and they knew I would be back in time for the next election. At least that was the way things operated prior to 2016.

I should have known I was on my way out of the Party. I didn’t support the war in Iraq, or Afghanistan and paid a heavy consequence for defying the party. I didn’t achieve pariah status for that stand but was spanked for my lack of loyalty.

I was opposed to the Patriot Act, waterboarding, torture, domestic spying, and holding people indefinitely without charges at Guantanamo. I also thought the Bush tax cut in the face of waging two wars was just stupid. History has proved me right on that one. In GOP land, there were questions raised that perhaps I had lost my mind, or had a stroke, or early onset of senility.

It was none of those things. It was my steadfast belief that the biggest threats to the USA are not al-Qaeda, ISIS, or the Russians. For me, the growing threat to our freedom, to our way of life, to liberty itself is the GOP.

The shocking lack of patriotism in the GOP

In my Reagan days, I was pro-military spending, pro-military, pro-intervention to stand for freedom and human dignity. To me, protecting and defending the Constitution of the United States and promoting democracy and human rights around the World was the mark of Patriotism. I thought being in the GOP was part of being a patriot. I was so wrong. There is a profound lack of patriotism in the GOP. Here are a few examples.

The GOP has disrespect for the Constitution of the USA. The GOP particularly despises the First Amendment. Which is more patriotic: defending a person’s right to protest under the First Amendment and listening to their concerns, or holding a piece of cloth in higher esteem than a human being?

The near-religious worship of the flag as though it has some meaning other than a symbol of the Nation is not patriotism. That is nationalism. That is also a GOP guiding principle.

Is it more patriotic to defend a person’s right to worship, or not worship as they see fit as articulated in the Constitution, or to single them out for scorn and discrimination for their religious beliefs?

The GOP gives countenance to those who wish to destroy America and make it a religious nation. They think that is religious freedom. The Taliban would agree with them. Imposing religious dogma as the Law of the Land is unconstitutional. It is un-American and not an act of patriotism.

The GOP has turned Patriotism into a haven for scoundrels. Somehow throwing the principles of freedom of worship, freedom to protest, and discriminating against Americans who don’t agree with the GOP has become acts of patriotism. The sign of totalitarian regimes is they strip the rights of those they don’t like.

In the GOP, villainizing those with whom they disagree is patriotic. You can see the process at work at this very moment in time with how the GOP is treating their own. Two new villains in the land of the GOP are Senators McConnell, and Senator Corker. Isn’t villainizing the opposition what the Democrats are supposed to do? They are so filled with hate they call the loyalty of their own who disagree with them into question. Again, that is nationalism and a demand for tribal members to be rigid in obeying a central figure or suffer scorn.

In the GOP, it is now Patriotic to give aid and comfort to our enemies, and not stand by those oppose those who are against America. How patriotic is it to ban a political opponent of Vladimir Putin, and try to stop an investigation into Russia’s involvement in our domestic political process?

In today’s GOP, it is ok to attack veterans, war heroes, and Gold Star families. How patriotic is that? What is even more disturbing is the attacks of heroes by a draft dodger are defended. In the GOP I loved and served, we didn’t support draft dodgers. Times have changed.

I’m glad I’ve come over. I would say to Senator Bob Corker (R-TN), come join me for your last 18 months and join me in holding our heads high as Democrats. There is no greater honor than standing against totalitarianism and that is what the Democratic Party has as its mission today.

By Bob Schneider