How Steve Bannon Will Turn The Republican Party Into The Trump Party

Richard Nixon started a process that has led the Republican Party to its death.  Lyndon Johnson passed a civil rights bill that allowed Nixon to turn the Dixiecrats in the South into Republicans.  Nixon also invented the "Moral Majority" to oppose the culture of liberalism that had developed in opposition to the Vietnam War.  The Republican Party under Nixon began its transition from the party of big business to the big business party that also opposed civil rights and defended traditional values against creeping liberalism.  That process was almost completed by Donald Trump.  He captured the political base that had been cultivated by the party since Richard Nixon.  This article describes how Steve Bannon plans to turn that base against what remains of the Republican establishment.  Neither Bannon or Trump share the traditional values of the Republican establishment.  Their game is to turn the Republican Party into a party under their control.  The weapon that they are using is the base of Trump supporters that Nixon brought into the party.  No Republican can win an election without their votes.  Trump and Bannon will use their control over 35% of the Republican base to complete the process started by Richard Nixon.  What remains of the Republican establishment has wilted under this pressure.  They hoped to use a Republican president to their advantage.  Bannon and Trump can do without them.  They will put their brand of Republicans into positions of leadership as they assume control over the Republican Party.  The only thing that can stop them is a revitalized Democratic Party that will prevent the destruction of the institutions that had been established by both political parties before the Republican Party became the Trump Party.