Enlighten me please. What do GOP elites stand to gain from stoking vaccine avoidance?

[NCcoast]

What is the end game? I saw a David Frum tweet here earlier today suggesting the GOP overlords wanted to prevent herd immunity. Why, to what end? What do they gain at the cost of killing many of their own? Granted they are sociopaths, and it is only their mob base they are sacrificing, but even the horde may at some point realize their leaders have so little regard for their lives that they willing to sacrifice them for a political strategy of some sort. But what do they have to gain that makes it worth exposing their sociopathy so blatantly?

The David Frum tweet is here.

[everyonematters]

1. Thom Hartman has suggested that they want the economy to crash

so that they can blame it on Biden. I'm not sure; I just think it is something that took on a momentum of it's own. The Dems were pushing it so they repelled against it.

[Cosmocat]

7. That's it - there is no master plan to this they just know one thing - FEED THE BEAST

It works for them because the chaos keeps the zombie base perpetually tweaked out and more so every day dulls everyone else to the relentless crazy - it is to the point where even the most insane shit, like fighting everything needed to deal with the pandemic like their lives depend on it, seems normal.

Those who have not just fully drank their own kool aid know the process, it is all about keeping their frankenstein (the average American "conservative&quot in a state of irrational compliance.

[mitch96]

8. "That's it - there is no master plan". I think the master plan is to Own the "libs" and feed

the corporate handlers... follow the money and actions.. McTurtle said it best.. My job is to BLOCK everything Biden wants to put in place for the American People... Like he tried to do with Obama... Not legislate or negotiate.. Own the libs...YMMV

m

[peggysue2]

22. Think Hartmann is on the nose

The first reason is to sow more division among Americans. The chaos theory works (or at least they think it's working) for those invested in power/money/influence and desperately want that power base back in their fold. Dragging their feet on the vaccination program will (from their viewpoint) make Biden's economic recovery slow, sluggish, disappointing. They have no problem killing off Americans, preferably Democratic Americans, but even their own supporters if it produces wins in 2022 and 2024.

However, Biden's infrastructure and American jobs program which looks likely to get through reconciliation will have a massive, transformational effect on the country's economy and Americans' welfare and well-being. Add that to the Child Tax Credit already being distributed and I believe that the train is on the track and will run these suckers down.

At some point in time, sooner rather than later, Red America should be waking up to the fact that their GOP 'leaders' don't give a shit about them or their families, have lied to them from the start and are quite willing to let them and their kids die. The fact that younger patients are ending up in hospitals with the delta variant may turn the tide. You might be ridiculously arrogant and defiant yourself, but it's pretty hard to watch a child gasping for breath or ending up on a vent because you didn't see the need of vaccination.

The Republican elite class and their mouthpieces aren't simply crazed ideologues. They've really taken the path to the Dark Side.

[enough]

2. Anything that stokes suspicion of government works for them. They want government out of their way.

[brooklynite]

3. Avoiding a Primary or challenge from the right...

…and rallying RW voters to their side in the General Election.

[Scrivener7]

4. I saw an explanation linked here that made sense to me. It was a Krugman

twitter feed, I think, but I can't find it so I'll try to imperfectly summarize it.

It's a version of the "no true Scotsman" problem.

Republicans don't really stand for any policy positions or governing actions, so the only way they can distinguish themselves from each other is to "out conservative" each other. The most conservative gets the most votes.

So they keep going farther and farther right, farther and farther into conspiracy craziness, to prove that they are the "true conservative." And in doing that, they kind of dare people to follow them to prove that they, too, are the REAL conservatives.

One quote I remember is along the lines of "Any old RHINO can support fiscal responsibility" but only a TRUE conservative can espouse the various absolutely insane crap that they are spreading these days.

[Septua]

15. That about sizes it up

There's no end game or beginning game...just the same old distraction, diversion, dissension tactics. Make Biden/Dems look bad at any costs. It's been going on since Trump decided to run for President.

[jmbar2]

21. the only explanation that makes sense

[Apollo Zeus]

5. They are capitalizing on the backlash

People hate being told what to do and have generally very low trust in government. So they are positioning themselves as being for "freedom and small government."

Polls showed that less than 50% of American intended to be vaccinated so the GOP got in front of that majority position.

Many of the things needed to be done and still need to be done are VERY unpopular so they are positioning the GOP to gain from that unpopularity.

[ProudMNDemocrat]

6. Besides killing their own voters?

They sure as hell will not be owning the Libs, that is for sure. They were smart enough to get vaccinated and follow protocols.

Karma has been busy.

[Major Nikon]

20. Make no mistake in their delusional minds they are owning the libs

It doesn't matter if it makes any sense. It doesn't matter if they are killing themselves wholesale. It doesn't matter what the risk or cost is. What matters to them more than anything else is owning the libs and that's the only reason for it.

I have a lot of wingnut co-workers that one day will brag how they are never going to get vaccinated and the next day will express how someone they know has died from the disease and how fearful they are of it. I always take the opportunity to remind them how I am glad I don't have to worry about it anymore since my whole family is vaccinated.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. Success for Biden hurts their electoral prospects. They want any government program to fail

before 2022, since that increases their chances of winning the midterm elections, because swing voters are not that rational - they vote against the sitting president if they don't think things have gone well, without examining why (eg sabotage by the Republicans in Congress, or by Fox News propaganda). If they get majorities in either house in 2022, then they may push for something they can call 'bipartisan', but which is basically right wing, if they think Democrats are by then desperate to pass something to show "government works", and to tack to the center in the hope, however small, of attracting back some of the swing voters for 2024.

The number of Republican voters who actually die won't be a high percentage of their base, and they think the swing votes will outweigh them. They don't care that a lost vote through death is far more serious than a lost vote through Democratic success.

[luv2fly]

10. To make everything under Biden's time in office go to shit

That's the end game, and they don't even pretend otherwise. "Patriots" MY ASS.

[Liberal In Texas]

11. The worse they can make things going into an election, the more chance

that voters will vote for the party not in power. That's their theory.

Add voter suppression and lawsuits in RW courts and you have the formula for getting power back and keeping it.

[FakeNoose]

12. It's puzzling that Big Pharma is so pro-GOP

... especially the makers of the Covid vaccines - Pfizer, Moderna and J&J - must be royally pissed. Their big donations to the Repukes have not paid off.

[Xoan]

13. Not so fast ...

From Pfizer to Moderna: who's making billions from Covid-19 vaccines?

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/mar/06/from-pfizer-to-moderna-whos-making-billions-from-covid-vaccines

[viva la]

14. Trump won't turn on them this week.

That's in their heads. They have to anti-vax to let him pretend Covid isn't so bad?

[lame54]

16. Full nation vaccination would be a Biden win - can't have that

[inwiththenew]

17. Another lockdown would be disastorous politically

The economy still is out of whack from the last one. Another one will screw it up even more and probably for longer.

Plus it makes Biden look like he's incapable of getting the country past this and back to normal.

[ananda]

18. Culling members of the herd who are not like them?

I suppose they don't think of these people as customers
maybe.

[Chainfire]

19. The end game is that they have an emotional issue to bind the faithful.

Republicans have to keep fresh issues before their 30% of their lunatic following. Denying vaccinations is a badge of honor of the party faithful. When that issues begins to lose steam, there will be another. The problem is that each new issue has to be crazier than the previous one. In the struggle to keep and grow power, there is no place that the Republican leadership will not tread. The top Republican leadership does not want, and can not survive, a Representative Democracy, so they are chipping away at the edges.

It is all about an insatiable lust for power, the control of the many by the few.