The impostors : how Republicans quit governing and seized American politics / Steve Benen.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 323-374).

"We're Not Great at the Whole Governing Thing": Meet the Post-Policy Party -- "Manipulate the Numbers and Game the System": Economic Policy -- "Even If It Worked, I Would Oppose It": Health Care -- "Extending a Middle Finger to the World": Climate Change and Energy Policy -- "A Series of Hasty Unplanned, Unexamined Decisions": Foreign Policy -- "The Cruelty Is the Point": The Collapse of Immigration Policy -- "We Stand by the Numbers": The Federal Budget -- Life and Death in the Culture Wars: Gun Control, Civil Rights, Reproductive Rights -- "Governing by Near-Death Experience": Government Shutdowns and Debt-Ceiling Crises -- "It's Like These Guys Take Pride in Being Ignorant": The Eternal Campaign -- Bridging the "Wonk Gap": The Road Ahead.

In this thoroughly researched book, Benen, blogger and award-winning producer of the Rachel Maddow Show, makes a solid case that in recent years, Republicans have repeatedly upended their once-cherished beliefs in order to focus on more power-oriented political and ideological goals. The author clearly demonstrates how Republicans have consistently reversed positions in order to score points against the Democrats, whether on trade, taxes, guns, immigration, or deficits. Regarding deficits, "since Watergate. every Democratic president has left office with a deficit smaller than when he started, and every Republican president has left office with a deficit larger than when he arrived." Furthermore, even when Republicans agreed with Democrats, at least in principle, as in the case of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, their votes often failed to reflect bipartisanship. Despite 130 congressional hearings over multiple committees, Republicans--who had once supported many of the Affordable Care Act's tenets--claimed Obama had "rammed through" the ACA. A particularly ironic example of willful contrariness was the Ebola crisis of 2014, during which Republicans either accused Obama of being "too hands off" or of being alarmist. Donald Trump. who had yet to declare his candidacy, even called for his resignation. The author ably lays out the many disturbing trends in the Republican political arena, making a convincing case for his argument that the GOP has "quit governing" and now merely focuses on attaining and wielding power or simply negating any progress made by Democrats. A cleareyed argument that "strategy and governing [have] been replaced by instincts and partisan id."