{"id":7657,"date":"2006-06-12T09:11:11","date_gmt":"2006-06-12T13:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=7657"},"modified":"2006-06-12T09:11:11","modified_gmt":"2006-06-12T13:11:11","slug":"you-always-want-to-polarize-somebody","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/you-always-want-to-polarize-somebody\/","title":{"rendered":"‘You always want to polarize somebody’"},"content":{"rendered":"

[tag]Allen Raymond[\/tag], a former [tag]RNC[\/tag] official and one of the few Republican officials to go to jail as a result of the New Hampshire [tag]phone-jamming[\/tag] [tag]scandal[\/tag]<\/a> of 2002, sat down this week with the Boston Globe for his first post-incarceration interview<\/a>. Apparently, he’s had time to reflect on what his party is all about.<\/p>\n

[Raymond] said the scheme reflects a broader [tag]culture[\/tag] in the [tag]Republican Party[\/tag] that is focused on dividing voters to win primaries and general elections. He said examples range from some recent efforts to use border-security concerns to foster anger toward immigrants to his own role arranging phone calls designed to polarize primary voters over abortion in a 2002 New Jersey Senate race.<\/p>\n

“A lot of people look at politics and see it as the guy who wins is the guy who unifies the most people,” he said. “I would disagree. I would say the candidate who wins is the candidate who [tag]polarize[\/tag]s the right bloc of [tag]voters[\/tag]. You always want to polarize somebody.”<\/p>\n

Raymond stressed that he was making no excuses for his role in the New Hampshire case; he pleaded guilty and told the judge he had done a “bad thing.” But he said he got caught up in an ultra-aggressive atmosphere in which he initially thought the decision to jam the phones “pushed the envelope” but was [tag]legal[\/tag]. He also said he had been reluctant to turn down a prominent official of the RNC, fearing that would cost him future opportunities from an organization that was becoming increasingly ruthless.<\/p>\n

“[tag]Republicans[\/tag] have treated campaigns and politics as a business, and now are treating public policy as a business, looking for the types of returns that you get in business, passing legislation that has huge ramifications for business,” he said. “It is very much being monetized, and the federal government is being monetized under Republican majorities.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As Digby put it<\/a>, “It’s amazing what happens to people when they run into trouble with the law, isn’t it? Talk about your moral clarity.”<\/p>\n

According to this former top GOP operative, today’s Republican Party believes in not only pushing the envelope in terms of what’s legal, but it’s also anxious to tear the electorate in half, and hopes the GOP is left with the bigger chunk. In terms of policy making, the distinction between cut-throat campaigning and governing is practically gone. It’s all part of the “broader culture in the Republican Party.”<\/p>\n

This should come as a surprise to, well, no one, but it’s always nice to have an experienced Republican insider admit it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[tag]Allen Raymond[\/tag], a former [tag]RNC[\/tag] official and one of the few Republican officials to go to jail as a result of the New Hampshire [tag]phone-jamming[\/tag] [tag]scandal[\/tag] of 2002, sat down this week with the Boston Globe for his first post-incarceration interview. Apparently, he’s had time to reflect on what his party is all about. [Raymond] […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7657\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}