We Are, In Fact, Heading Back

 I have long argued that the Republican Party is no longer a "conservative" party but a reactionary one. It is not concerned with sustaining and defending the status quo, so much as turning back the clock to an imagined bygone era.

It seems, naturally, that Republicans are going to take another swipe at repealing or defunding the Affordable Care Act. I would guess that Collins and Murkowski are, once more, no votes in the Senate, but the faux populists like Hawley are unlikely to join them. John Curtis, the new Senator from Utah, was once a Democrat and the ACA could fit within the communal values of the LDS. Jim Justice, the new Senator from West Virginia, is also a former Democrat and has a state unusually dependent on the ACA. In the House, the margin is likely to be razor thin and three defections could sink the plans to kill it.

However, defunding Medicaid within the ACA is almost certainly on the table. Repealing the regulatory reforms of ACA seems unlikely, both because it can't get around the filibuster and because it helps middle class families like ours with things like keeping our sons on our insurance until they graduate college. Throwing the Poors off Medicaid to pay for tax cuts is exactly the sort of things that get Republicans tumescent. 

There are a host of things like this that are going to happen. Pete Hegseth, if confirmed, will toss transgendered service people out of the armed force. I can even see Dreamers deported, which could be a terrible loss to our country. The regulatory state will be gutted, environmental standards will be rolled back. 

It will be depressing.

Here's the thing, though. We will be going back in time years, maybe decades. If it immiserates people to the degree that I think it will, that will create a backlash. Elections are run at the state level and the House will change hands in 2026, maybe even the Senate if it gets bad enough. It happened last time.

Eventually, we will crawl back out of Trumpistan and can start reviving the reforms that he kills. Progress isn't linear, it can be reversed, but the reverses can be reversed, too.

ADDED: I don't know how far Republicans will go towards further restricting abortion, but the existing regimes in certain states will lead to both deaths and the flight of OB/GYNs from those states, leading to more deaths.