The republican establishment made a deliberate, conscious decision to court the ‘racist white asshole’ vote that the democratic party establishment lost after a democratic president signed off on the Civil Rights Act The republican establishment embraced and promoted ‘prosperity theology’ to let the super-rich claim divine right to excuse the even increasing inequality that resulted from their policies, to put a ‘Christian’ stamp on their most un-christ-like behavior and economic philosophy, and to encourage their base to seal their right-leaning political affiliations behind an unthinking unreasoning shell of faith that would allow neither self criticism nor compromise. The republican party establishment specifically rejected, and encouraged its voters to reject, rationality and science when those things proved to be at odds to the profit interests of their corporate sponsors or the fundamentalist dogma of their prosperity theology spokesmen. And now, the Republican establishment is shocked to find their voting base utterly overrun with unthinking racist assholes who cannot be reasoned with, desperate to hand the reigns of power over to a super-rich megalomaniac.