Dear People In Charge of the Republican Party,

Whoa.  You really dodged a bullet there.  Don’t be all like “I knew it would turn out that way.” Because everyone knows damn well you didn’t.  Even your guy was all up in the “its rigged” thing when the polls weren’t going your way.  [Not to say you had much say into what came out of his face, but that’s kinda what this is all about.]

So, here it is.  I have voted Democratic for my whole life – all fifty years of it so far. I am socially and fiscally liberal. I am Keynesian, Great Society thinker.  I know that’s not your cup of tea, but that said, I understand that part of what makes us great as a nation is our ability to dialogue.  Ever since America lost Tip O’Neil, [who I know in public wasn’t your favorite person, but in private you liked him just fine] we haven’t been able to do shit in this country.

Here is what I got to say to y'all right now while you're hiring high paid consultants to figure out what went right:  Don’t think you won.  The Democrats lost and you happened to be the other team playing the game.

I don’t mean to say that you didn’t put up a good fight.  What I mean to say is you’ve got to do better than that.  You’ve got to make sure that the ideals for which the Republican party stands:  Free trade, individual freedoms and opportunity are heard, loud and clear the next time we get to have a national debate – if that ever happens again.  Right now, you can’t make them out over the pussies being grabbed and the walls being built.

See, I know your party has been overrun.  Where are your John Danforth’s?  Where are your Nelson Rockefeller’s?  Where are your Dwight Eisenhower’s?  As a liberal, I don’t mind telling you where I think they are – these days we call them Democrats.  I have to tell you, America needs these people on both sides of the debate.  Without them holding down the middle, all we’re left with is yelling and Ted Cruz.  [Please tell me you secretly hoped he would not win.  Trump has his issues, but compared to Cruz, Trump is like manna from heaven.] 

With the exception of Obama [who twice lit up who you put up there and would have lit up whoever you put up there for as long as he damn well wanted to] the Democrats have managed to run every boring-ass corporate lawyer they could find.  They are off their game and disconnected with their base.  If you think a union shop worker from Detroit or Chicago has the first damn thing in common with John Kerry, you are out of your doggam mind.  Find someone who can add to the national debate without insulting the whole doggam world and you would have won 2:1 over Hillary! Not only that, you would not have to have relied on your weak-ass Trey Gowdy Bengazi e-mail bullshit.  [C’mon.  You knew that was seriously weak shit, right?  Go on.  You can tell me.] 

Romney didn't lose because of that video. He lost because he was completely unapproachable.  McCain: larger than life! Dole:  Was he actually alive the whole time?  Bush:  You got lucky on there.  Twice.  And you know it.

You won 2016 with Donald doggam Trump. You won with an orange manatee. A man who - in public - was condescending, rude and diagnosably antisocial, if not psychotic.  Hell, for all I could tell, that was part of his game plan!  That's who you freaking won with!  You go on and tell me you won and they didn’t lose it for you while you were standing there.  For pete’s sake, people were predicting the death of the republican party:  Death by Marco Rubio and Scott Walker.  [Seriously, you’re not serious about those two, are you?]  Remember that old joke about your stuffed-suit John Ashcroft losing his 2000 US Senate reelection race to a dead opponent?  This was close, man.  Hillary is chronically boring and has like 0% in common with about 99% of ‘Murica.  How embarrassing would that have been?

So, listen.  You've got 3 or so years to dig through your ranks to find someone with whom ‘Murica can relate.  [PS:  You thinkin’ Trump 2.0.  I’m thinking:  maybe, but what could it hurt to have a Plan B, just in case the Democrats accidentally pull someone out of their ass that ‘Murica can actually relate to?]  It’s a tale of two Clintons:  One word (deplorable) can sink one of them, whereas the other one basically admits to smoking pot and having sex in the back of a pickup truck and he blows into office…twice.  [OK, probably not the best choice of words there, but you get the point.  Relax.  It’s not actually that funny and we all know damn that the only reason you’re offended is because you didn’t get any of that.]  Someone with a conviction to actually stand for and a personality that doesn’t make little kids want to point at the TV’s and whisper to their mommies.

Calm your indignant selves down:  I'm not saying Trump won’t make a good president.  He can’t possibly be as “all that” as the candidate Trump.  I have hope that things will slow down a bit and something this side of normal will show up.  Some of his fiscal policies actually have a tinge of collectivism to them that even FDR might have thought were good ideas.  He’s got to work on the interpersonal skills a bit, though and he should just stay away from moral leadership for a while until those nudies of his wife stop circulating around Facebook.

He's just a little too...Don Corleone. A little too Hugh Heffner. A little too Lehman Brothers.  A little too Bernie Madoff. A little too Bill O’Reilly. You know what I mean?  You hear what I'm saying?

Maybe we could find someone a little less Don Corleone and a little more Elliott Ness.

Maybe we could find someone a little less Hugh Heffner and a little more Mister Rogers.

Maybe we could find someone a little less Lehman Brothers and a little more US Coast Guard.

Maybe we could find someone a little less Bernie Madoff and a little more Jackie Robinson.

Maybe we could find someone a little less Bill O’Reilly and a little more Walter Cronkite.

It's a big doggam party. If you look, you'll find him or her. You will. Trust me, you will.  But you have look like you’re thinking you’re going to find him or her – not like when you look for your keys even though you’re absolutely sure your wife took them.  Not that kind of looking.  Really, really looking.

And you have to be ready because when you find him or her, s/he is bound to have a few warts.  You can’t take risk and be unscarred.  That’s just true.   S/he won't pass every sniff test.  That is, assuming you have a sniff test, which is questionable recently.  Have some faith in your people and in your ability to find people in your party.

Good luck.  I’m rootin for ya.  Seriously.  We owe it to our country to be more effective than we are.  Thankfully, we haven’t set the bar too high, lately.