It’s Time to Unsubscribe to Culture Wars

It seems the Republican party has forgotten how to govern. During the 2016 presidential campaign, the GOP realized its ticket to winning the White House was by sowing division and stoking anger among the electorate by embracing culture wars. Once securing a win, the Republican party doubled down on culture wars to distract people from their inability to govern.

Culture wars deliver “symbolic victories for some groups of voters rather than others.” Recently, Dr. Seuss and Mr. Potato Head have found themselves unlikely heroes in the Republicans burgeoning culture war.

America remains in the grips of a pandemic while simultaneously slogging through a vaccine rollout. When Congress was supposed to be working to pass a stimulus bill to help the millions of Americans suffering, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy used his floor time to read Green Eggs and Ham to highlight the decision of Dr. Seuss enterprises to remove some titles (though notably NOT Green Eggs and Ham) from publication. The stunt was the GOP’s malaise in microcosm: histrionics in lieu of governing.

This is only a recent example of the GOP using culture wars to detract from the larger issues at hand. After eight years of playing obstructionists during Obama’s presidency, Republicans beat the drum on repealing and replacing Obamacare, smaller government, and…