Herschel Walker is the proper experiment in how low the GOP will sink

If Herschel Walker’s campaign can be boiled down to one thing, it’s that everything is associated with ugliness, a dark cloud. According to Joe Scarborough, this makes the campaign a perfect laboratory for experimenting with how low MAGAs will sink.

Limiting the assessment of Herschel Walker’s candidacy simply to his past business failures would reveal a patchy background of fraud and mismanagement allegations. In a normal race, that would be a significant hurdle, probably insurmountable. Walker mowed straight down to the very significant business failures and downfalls of the past, only to deal with allegations of domestic violence that went well beyond a “one-off disaster day.” It was a recurring pattern that Walker also seems a little comfortable relating to mental health. But it’s his overt, face-to-face religiosity juxtaposed with the actual record that may be definitive. Walker likes to claim that he is “saved” and is therefore forgiven for everything he has done. Fine. But up until three days ago, he carried around a big lie about his true views on abortion, to the point that Walker was called out by his son for his destructiveness. Redeemed in his faith is very different than redeemed from society enough to deserve a seat in the US Senate.

Ugly. And Scarborough says it’s that ugliness that makes it the perfect test of MAGA’s willingness to go as far as it takes to “own the liberties.”

“All of this comes before we even get to the fact that Republicans understand he’s not qualified to be a senator. He doesn’t know the problems. He cannot talk about any subject in a way that is persuasive, that makes any sense. This is almost the perfect lab experiment in how deeply Republican voters are willing to go to quote, “own the liberties.” It is not worth.”

Oh yeah. There it is. He knows nothing about the government or the problems facing the Senate. This is hardly limited to Walker, of course, but the same can be said of Sen. Tubberville or would-be Senator Mehmet Oz – admittedly Walker takes the misunderstanding to another level. You can’t say that about Walker’s opponent, the Ebenezeer Baptist pastor who doesn’t force his faith on anyone, is one of the true intellectuals in the Senate, and a caring, unapologetic individual.

But Scarborough’s unique observation deserves attention. Yesterday Magee Haberman told Nicolle Wallace why Trump loved the Walker campaign so much:

“It’s the lowering of the bar and the erosion of the bar. Trump wants to show that nothing matters. Showing that there are no more red lines always makes him happy.”

It is the gateway to autocracy. The more Trumps MAGAs scrap the rules, the less the rules matter. The old rules would have wiped out Walker before the primary. But the old rules set some standards, enlightenment that there was something sacred to protect. This new environment, Scarborough says, is a litmus test of whether there is any substance to elections or whether it is now simply a matter of being loyal to a movement.

It’s a subtle observation that’s worth noting in the last month of the campaign. Do the MAGAs still have limits? Or do they rely on a personality cult and autocratic tendencies? We’ll find out. Keep in mind that Walker isn’t just up against “anybody”. He’s running into a star. The race hangs in the balance. Test, in fact.

@JasonMiciak believes a day without learning is a day not lived. He is a political writer, columnist, author and lawyer. He is a Canadian-born dual citizen who spent his teens and college days in the Pacific Northwest and has since lived in seven states. Today he enjoys life as a single father to a young girl and writes on the beaches of the Gulf Coast. He loves making his flower pots, cooking and is currently studying philosophy of science, religion and non-mathematical principles behind quantum mechanics and cosmology. Please do not hesitate to contact us for lectures or other concerns.