My experience with both parties (and centrists) is that there are some (more rare) people who have solid reasons for their positions, and that so very much of the rest is chaff and regurgitation.

And yes, Lemmy is not reality. But there is a decent fraction of Republicans who aren't morons, but Republicans are, by and large (with some notable exceptions), terrible at taking something they grasp intuitively, reasoning it out, and communicating that in a way that Democrats will understand.

I can get how people view this as being moronic. But the underlying intuitions are solid, and not prioritizing analytical thought over intuition allows them to hold to those intuitions well. Unfortunately, their entire party was hacked by mongers of Straussian philosophy. Strauss did a lot of "read between the lines and see the dark shit I'm actually saying", and honestly, both parties suck at handling that, but the Republicans are way more susceptible, because they depend on viable leadership. The Republican leadership is basically a Straussian cult at this point. So despite the underlying intuitions that drive the Republican party being pretty solid, they are not really capable of dealing with a hacked leadership. Disinfo from their leadership fucks them.

In any case, while Democrats have their own issues that I believe to be just as fundamental, I can't fault you for thinking Republicans are morons (though I strongly disagree).