Whenever I meet a Republican capable of reasoning — and they’ve become rarer than plutonium in the 21st century — I try to ask four questions that I remember by the acronym CWAG:

1. Do you think climate change is real?
2. Do you think weed should should be legalized?
3. Do you think abortion should be a woman’s choice?
4. Do you think gay marriage is lawful?

In California, at least, I have never received a ”No” answer to any of those questions, which then leads me to a fifth:

What makes you think you’re Republican?

THAT question is the only that occasionally produces a pause. Because, to the last, those four questions warrant a firm “No!” from the GOP’s national policy platform. And while a handful of Republican lawmakers stray toward liberalism in the House, no Senator takes the political risk of port bow ideology.

Which may leave Republicans with an ugly option: the truth. And the truth is this about Republicans:

It’s all about race.

There was a time when the Grand Old Party could point to issues where it differed with the donkeys: fiscal frugality; military preparedness; the social safety net. No need to bring up that whole Civil War unpleasantness.

Then Bill Clinton claimed the centrist political ground, and Republicans lost whatever was left of their collective wit. They offered increasingly dim simpletons, from George W. to Sara Palin to, of course, Agent Orange.

And there appears to be no slowdown. They are so desperate to hold onto power in Georgia that they have offered an illiterate, religious athlete as senator, a painfully obvious plea for voters of color. Or at least forgiveness from them for the political lawn jockey they brandish on their lawn to claim the neighborhood is integrated.

Still, let’s give the devil his due: The Georgia race is neck and neck. The GOP may establish a blockade in the mid-terms. Ron DeSantis may be the next president. Many, many Americans claim to be Republican.

But gone are principled stands, save perhaps for the right to own a submachine gun and unvaccinated body. And even those are looking like antiquated notions of a backward tribe. Aside from fear that the camera will capture their souls, what is the plan of action for conservatives?

Of course, there isn’t one. Conservatism literally fights the law that governs the universe, entropy. Entropy (known as the Second Law of Thermodynamics) dictates that change in our world is inevitable: apples rot; life evolves into new forms; transformation is assured. There’s no un-creaming a cup of coffee.

Conservatism, by its very definition, resists change. Likewise, liberalism embraces it. Do the math (another burr for consevatives).

It leaves the political right with some bleak options, because the world has become technological and corporate enough to see how untenable ”No!” is as an answer to every question. Eventually, negativity becomes a sign of who you are, positively.

Or in the GOP’s case, what: minority-fearing, cash-clutching, gun-bearing terror.

Enough with your ”Blue Lives Matter,” “masking is child abuse,” ”let parents decide,” “Fauci’s lying” bullshit. That’s not policy. That’s political panic, and you’ve been shilling it for 2-1/2 centuries.

You remember, back when you were willing to admit the truth behind your reasoning.

It was with much fanfare and self back-pattery that the Senate eked out an inflation and climate change bill. To which I say cheers and kudos!

Now go kill yourself.

Not literally, of course. We know the difference between literally and figuratively, unlike, say, an Alex Jones. He may soon learn the cost of truth.

But, in a way, the two are oddly linked: They both illuminate the Baby Boomer Generation, at its most cooperative and unruly.

Read: Baby Boomers haven’t done shit.

You were given the world and went to the moon, torching the Earth on your way up.

It breaks my heart to say that. Some of my favorite people are Boomers — and I don’t mean as defined by Wikipedia’s very questionable timeline; even those born between the mid-50’s and 1964 want out, opting for the term Generation Jones.

Like them, I see Boomers as the inheritors of those who put in the work. That would include work from a decorated, wounded World War II vet uncle Guy, whose first name and glass eye I inherited. What have I done with the privilege of First World residency?

Not much, but seismically more than those slightly older than me. One war lost, another tied, the rest staged as strawman torchery. Corporate Darwinism took over as the apex predator under Boomer supervision, and Rock & Roll died on their watch: Name a rock genre after grunge.

It’s hard to think of what Boomers gave this nation besides the moon shot and some politics worth overturning. Boomers didn’t even usher in the next historically significant age: The Technology Era. That was created by Generations X and Y, fittingly, and Boomers still try to halt the progress of that movement. Note that not one Republican senator voted for climate change legislation.

Time to get off stage and let The Parkland Generation take it from here. You had our say. And that soul? It was purchased in foreclosure when the housing bubble popped — perhaps Boomers’ true enduring legacy.

So, we want to emphasize: We did mean to kill yourself, literally.

But please, do actually fuck off.