Where to start? There are plenty of lessons to be learned from this week’s slaughter of the Republican Party. Here goes:

1. It’s the economy, stupid.

How many times do we have to see this movie? The inflation caused by COVID-19 spending plus Biden-era policies has created real economic hardship for Americans. President Donald Trump promised to bring costs down. That hasn’t happened in ways most Americans can see.

2. The war in Iran was a millstone around Republicans’ necks.

The social media cognoscenti are debating whether the war in Iran was necessary. They’re missing the point. The Iran conflict has kept gas prices high, and that affects the cost of everything else: heating and cooling, transportation, groceries. When Americans elected Trump on an “America First” platform in 2024, they were serious. A lot of us have warned for months that high gas prices posed a real threat to the GOP going into the midterms. Maybe listen next time.

3. There need to be consequences for wrongdoers.

It isn’t just that no one from the Epstein files has been charged (and don’t kid yourself — Democrats won’t go after them either); Americans are tired of irate tweets and endless congressional hearings about misconduct by people like Jack Smith and Anthony Fauci. That they aren’t arrested and prosecuted sends a terrible message.

4. Being related to someone in political office isn’t a qualification.

Darline Graham — enough said.

5. Local politicians can no longer escape a national shellacking.

I’ll be interested to see the data from local elections across the country in the upcoming days and weeks, but here in St. Joseph County, Indiana, not a single Republican won a local election.

6. Disgruntled voters did not vote for Democrats; they voted against Republicans.

Blue tsunami notwithstanding, Democrats don’t have the mandate many of them no doubt think they do (as the success of many conservative ballot initiatives demonstrates). Most Americans don’t want sharia law, open borders, criminals on the streets, males in females’ sports, pornography in schools, overregulation of small business, DEI and mRNA mandates, and the crippling of the energy and automotive sectors.

7. Democrats tend to vote for anything with a “D” after its name.

Republican voters do not behave the same way. Just saying, “Vote for us, we aren’t the other guys” isn’t good enough, especially when the electorate feels that campaign promises have been broken.

8. Republican infighting must stop.

I’ve never seen anything like it — so many factions, so many egos, so much hysterical bickering: the “woke Right,” Nick Fuentes and the Groypers, the Never Trumpers, the MAGA-forever devotees, Tucker Carlson and the rest of the gone-off-the-deep-end podcast contingent, the bitter ex-MAGA politicians, the pro-Israels, the anti-Israels. It’s dizzying, destructive and dumb. Republicans can’t seem to find a unified message. But maybe that’s because ...

9. The old political alignments are history.

Democrats used to be a pro-America party of farmers, military, small business and the working class; they defended the constitutional rights of “the little guy” from government intrusion. No longer. Now, the Democratic Party is the party of big business, globalism and Ivy League-educated socialists who’ve been indoctrinated to believe America is an oppressor, capitalism is evil, and the solutions to all our problems are policies that confiscate wealth (money, property, savings, jobs, housing) from ordinary Americans and transfer it to the third world by any means possible (unfettered immigration with generous welfare, government-facilitated fraud, a richly funded U.S. Agency for International Development and other NGOs). Republicans have become the party of workers, service members and veterans, the middle class, entrepreneurs and legal immigrants, defending individual liberties against government overreach by the Left. Old-timers in both the Democrat and Republican parties blame Trump for this realignment, which is one reason why they unite to thwart his agenda. But Trump is just a symptom, not the cause, and the old system isn’t coming back.

10. Democrats aren’t afraid to do exactly what they say they’ll do. Republicans will find any excuse not to.

This week’s losses can be laid directly at the feet of Trump and congressional Republicans, Senate Majority Leader John Thune in particular. Voters sent Republicans to Congress to pass the SAVE Act and cut wasteful spending, among other legislative priorities. Although the House did make some effort, hundreds of bills passed by the House (including the SAVE Act, multiple times) never moved forward in the Senate. And yet ...

11. John Thune wants to be minority leader.

Apparently, his campaign slogan will be, “I’m consummately qualified to be minority leader because I led Republicans into the minority.” He, along with any Republican who supports him, should be primaried out. 

12. It’s all about academia.

The late Andrew Breitbart often said that politics is downstream of culture. And the culture in this country is shaped by two industries within which conservatives have precious little pull: entertainment and education. As someone who’s been in higher ed for 36 years, I can tell you that we will never change the political trajectory of this country unless and until we radically reform our institutions of higher education. Everything else is just bailing water on the Titanic.

13. A Democrat Congress will move fast and break things.

Some people on social media are saying Democrats will be so busy trying to impeach Trump that they won’t have time to pass the kinds of crippling legislation they’re infamous for. Au contraire — remember the three dozen executive orders former President Joe Biden signed his first week in office? They’ve been planning for months. We can look forward to Democrats nuking the filibuster, legalizing abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy, refunding USAID and giving amnesty and citizenship to the tens of millions of people here illegally. Just for starters.

14. What most Americans want is simple:

Cheaper gas and lower grocery prices, no new wars, affordable housing, decent schools, safe neighborhoods, punishment for crime, election integrity, the elimination of fraud and theft from taxpayers, and an immigration system that is enforced and fair, both for those who already live here and those who want the chance to. None of these is even remotely controversial, but for some reason, neither party can bring themselves to achieve them. Democrats will control Congress and more state governments come January. But unless they can produce what Americans want, they will face another disgruntled voter base in 2028 and beyond.

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