In the first Republican debate all the candidates were asked if they would rule out an independent presidential bid, and Donald Trump was roundly decried for refusing to do so. In hindsight, perhaps the better question would have been “If a batshit insane dude captures the nomination, will you endorse the Democrat candidate?” Because it is looking increasingly likely that a batshit insane dude is gonna steal the Republican candidacy, and if he wins the whole world is in a dark place.

It’s very clear now that a significant proportion of the Republican “base” are sympathetic to a campaign that is, essentially, fascist. Some “moderate” left-wingers are trying to claim that Trump is not fascist, and are splitting hairs over whether he is really a narcissist or just “leading America down a fascist path” but I think it’s clear from his latest little announcement that the F-word is no longer hyperbole. Lots of Republicans have gone ballistic over his plan to prevent all Muslims from entering the USA but some of the front-runners have been careful to avoid criticizing him directly, and it’s not clear whether the objection from some of those Republicans is based on respect for “American values” or fear that such a strategy would prevent them from winning an election. It’s certainly clear that for a significant proportion of Republican primary voters the much-vaunted Republican ideals of freedom of religion, freedom of speech and freedom of association are running a distant second to any political strategies based on racial discimination and nebulous notions of “strength,” mingled in with a healthy dose of imperialism.

This is, of course, the consequence of a long period of Republican craziness, that has mixed racist dog-whistling with openly racist attacks on Mexican migrants and overseas Muslims, along with muscular support for torture and the police state and racism and violence towards internal enemies. This is the environment in which Elliott Rodgers, Robert Dear and Dylan Rooff enacted their openly racist or misogynist militarist plans, and the environment in which some sizable minority of Republican voters have shifted towards an openly fascist platform. For all his bluster and popularity, Trump is a latecomer to this scene of frenetic hatred and partisan divisions: he is a well known birther, but his birtherism is hardly unique or especially well-represented, and when he says there is “something wrong” with the president he is drawing on a deep vein of discontent that is obviously built on racist origins. Although we can hope, there’s no reason to think his latest utterances are going to sink his campaign or discourage his followers.

I think some of the Republican elders must be starting to think that they have woken a slumbering giant here, and worrying that when it starts stomping about it isn’t going to be particularly careful about where it puts its feet. Certainly the Bushes are worried about it, and given how reviled they are by the base I think it’s safe to say they didn’t have much part in the creation of this monster. But a lot of them are up to their necks in it. Cruz, Huckabee and some of those doyens of hate radio, the Limbaughs and Hewitts, need to face the fact that they built this beast, and they’re now caught in its storm. But others, like Christie and Kasich, for all that they’re oily operatives that anyone with any sense wouldn’t go near in this political universe, I think they realize that this beast is going to devour its own party first, before it bursts out of the chest of American democracy and starts eating everything in sight. They want to stop it.

I think they may find that they can’t stop it without interfering in the nominating process. I think Trump is going to win some states, and if they’re lucky he won’t get a clear majority, but there’s a chance he will, and then they face a choice: refuse to nominate him and have him run third party, essentially splitting the vote; or let him be the candidate and watch him either win and destroy the country (unlikely) or lose massively and hand the Democrats a massive majority. In that case I think it’s likely that Trump’s candidacy will spoil the House and Senate elections, and the Republicans risk losing control of all three branches of government. I don’t think the Republicans understand just how toxic this primary is going to be for them, and my fundamental faith in humanity tells me that the longer Trump is in charge, the worse the general election will be for them in every house.

The basic problem here for the doyens of the Republican party is that they have a crazy-wing, and they need to destroy it. Take Cruz as an example. Trump’s antics have made Cruz look almost reasonable, but he’s actually a complete fruit loop. Yesterday he held hearings in the Senate committee on science, of which he is somehow the chair, which all the serious Republicans didn’t attend because they hate him, and which were basically a joke. Steyn was in attendance as an expert on climate change, but didn’t get a chance to speak because Cruz was outnumbered by minority Democrat members, because the other Republicans didn’t want to be there. So instead of having a chance to discuss a Republican approach to climate change based on free markets and innovation, they had some grandstanding about how it isn’t real, and Steyn got some free publicity for his doomed attempt to defend himself from libel charges that will absolutely destroy him. This isn’t how serious people behave, it isn’t how policy is made, and it isn’t a serious base for a political party. Senior Republicans know this, but they don’t know what to do about it.

Trump offers these Republicans a chance to take their party back from the religious nutjobs and Tea Party lunatics. But first they need to find a way to destroy those lunatics, and what better way than to show that they are a tiny minority of the electorate. I think at the very least the senior figures in the Republican party need to make it clear that they won’t support Trump and that if he wins the primary they will campaign against him in the general. They should lay down the line on policy and make clear why they don’t support him. I think, further, that they should endorse the democrat candidate as a strategy for saying enough is enough, and when Trump gets sweet fuck all of the general vote they can start rebuilding – an 8 year process with a real political movement at the end of it. Once Trump lays waste to their party the elders can come forward with a plan to rebuild it based on coherent strategies on ISIS, global warming and healthcare, strategies that may not be what my reader(s) or I want but are generally consistent with vaguely intelligent notions of how to get shit done.

The alternative is that Trump gets selected, leading figures in the party like Cruz refuse to distance themselves, and the Republicans get smashed at every level in the elections, losing complete control of the government. That may seem overly apocalyptic, but bear this in mind: Even though people say he lost the Democrats the senate in the mid-terms, he actually did exceptionally well for a president in his second mid-term. Mid-term elections in the second term typically go really badly for the incumbent and Obama did a lot less badly than the historical average. The Democrats are more popular than they look, and if Trump wins the primary there is every chance of a bloodbath. If the Republican leadership want to take back their party, now is their chance, but they need to show leadership and moral backbone, something in precious short supply in the Republican party. If they don’t act to crush him in the general, the Republican party is going to be toast for a long time to come. Or worse still, America will become a fascist state.

It’s time for the Republicans to show they love their country and not their donors.