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Comment by kmeisthax | Hacker News Reader

I thought the whole shitshow in 2016 with Obama accidentally spying on the Trump campaign would have, at the very least, lit a fire under the GOP's feet to reign in the government's surveillance apparatus.

Who am I kidding? They don't want the boot off their face, they want it on their foot.

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Why would they do that?. The swamp part of the GOP and the swamp part of the DNC are within a hairs breath of being the same establishment. They just market different things to different customers. They're like a megacorp selling all natural bullshit under one brand and rot your organs energy drinks under another brand. The Bernies and the AOCs and the MTGs and other "out there" politicians they let make noise are just market research so the swamp people know what positions they may need to adopt in the future to keep their products marketable to the masses.

The GOP has classically been stronger by leading from behind. That is, playing victims. They often garner more strong support this way. DNC just is ineffective when in power (they win when they have popular candidates because higher turnout but reps are more consistent voters). There's an old Simpsons joke here. Both sides do talk about government overreach and happily expand the military industrial complex and expansion of spying on US citizens (US is not alone or particularly unique here albeit the most powerful). There are outliers on both sides, mind you, but there is a common trend (that leads to conspiracy thinking). Some might call this Bread and Circus or Divide and Rule, but I think we can all recognize that there are political games being played.

Partially reiterating a sibling comment, but the GOP hates Trump. All of the Trumpy elements of the current House just refused to confirm the speaker in return for holding a new "Church" committee, so I'd say that faction of the Congressional GOP is as suspicious of our spy agencies as it ever has been.

https://theintercept.com/2023/01/05/mccarthy-speaker-republi...

"accidentally"

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