Another headline that takes a person's words out of context. The full quote:

issues, facts, policies—per say [sic]—don't matter as much as identity and wanting to beat the other guy. That's taken priority

-is much more revealing and less insulting to the American voter. Just as, in 2016, many Democrats (and they're not going to want to hear this again) didn't look at what Clinton's actual policies were; they simply didn't support her because they hated her for getting the nomination over Sanders. This is not simply a right-wing problem.

People have become so emotionally attached to the notion that it is a zero-sum game, and for me to win, you have to lose, that we've lost sight of the possibility of a win-win solution. There are some fundamentally decent people on both sides of the aisle, but it's the extremes who are the loudest and draw the most attention. Therefore we tend to paint everyone with a broad brush and demonize one another. And, admittedly, the Republican party has spent the past 40 years upping the ante and making politics into a blood sport. But there are still plenty of Republicans at all levels who are sick of this and who are ready to put the people before their party. We need to incentivize that behavior by rewarding it somehow. I'm prepared to vote for a good, middle of the road Republican as much as for a Democrat, as long as they will get things done.

Trump's base doesn't understand policy, they only understands dog whistles. Other Republicans who do, propagate Trump's lies because it may keep them in power to prolong the Republican agenda.

I could less give a shit what that war-for-profit loving war criminal has to say.