The Republican word of the day is ‘disarray’

January 16, 2008

The NYT’s Adam Nagourney captures the current state of the Republican landscape pretty well today.

Can anyone bring the Republicans together again?

The convincing victory by Mitt Romney in the Michigan primary on Tuesday means three very different states — with dissimilar electorates driven by distinctive sets of priorities — have embraced three separate candidates in search of someone who can lead the party into a tough election and beyond President Bush. […]

On the most tangible level, the vote on Tuesday was proof from the ballot box of what polls have shown: this is a party that is adrift, deeply divided and uninspired when it comes to its presidential candidates and unsure of how to counter an energized Democratic Party.

One need not look too hard to find similar descriptions elsewhere. I’ve seen some describe the state of the Republican race as “chaos.” Others call it a “free-for-all.” Others still are talking about unprecedented “disarray.”

Oddly enough, it might get worse.

[H]ere is what Rush Limbaugh said about McCain and Huckabee on his program today: “I’m here to tell you, if either of these two guys get the nomination, it’s going to destroy the Republican Party, it’s going to change it forever, be the end of it.” This week, Rush and his radio mimics have been on the rampage on the party’s modernizers, from Newt Gingrich on over.

This thing will only get uglier.

So, who’s likely to emerge from this train wreck?

We’ve been talking for weeks about the Republicans’ none-of-the-above problem, but now that voters are actually making their voices heard, the phenomenon has become even more pronounced.

McCain only seems to win when the Republican vote is diluted with independents. Huckabee’s support is limited to the party’s theocrats, and he’s disdained by everyone else. Giuliani is spinning his wheels, and doesn’t have any real support to speak of. Thompson’s off somewhere taking a nap. Ron Paul is routinely booed at Republican debates, that is, when he’s not excluded because Fox News and the GOP establishment hates him.

In this last-man-standing environment, Kevin Drum had the same thought I did.

Somehow, every time I go through this exercise, the only possible winner seems like Mitt Romney, even though his national support levels don’t look so hot. On the other hand, Romney not only won Michigan last night, but he beat everyone else, including Huckabee, among evangelicals. That seems promising for the Romney cause.

Agreed. I can give you 50 good reasons why Romney has absolutely no shot at the Republican nomination, and one good reason why the odds are in his favor: there’s no one else.

I try to avoid predictions, but I see one of four scenarios playing out:

* Republicans make their peace with McCain and he gets the nomination;

* Republicans decide they just can’t live with McCain as the party’s leader, but they split the anti-McCain vote four ways and he gets the nomination anyway;

* Republicans decide they just can’t live with McCain as the party’s leader, and they rally behind Romney;

* Republicans can’t decide anything, and head towards a brokered convention, much to the delight of reporters (who love the drama), political scientists (who love the history and deal-making), and Democrats (who love to see Republicans at each other’s throats).

I expected this cycle to be entertaining. I had no idea it would be this entertaining.

I occasionally listent to Republican’t debates and I always hear Ron Paul being cheered, especially after an attack by McCain or one of the others????

You know, we have discussions here about how great it is that Iowa and New Hampshire didn’t pick our nominee and how now the rest of the country (or some of it anyway) will get to play.

For the Republican’ts, it’s just disarray.

I’m not sure they believe in voter participation…

  • I have said since summer that this race is Romney’s, and I continue to stand by the prediction for three simple reasons: money, money and money.

    Ok, really: money, stereotypically presidential appearance, and an ability to shape-shift that lets voters project whatever position or stance they want on his candidacy.

    Huck wins Iowa, McCain wins NH and neither has the cash to really leverage that into a multi-state push. McCain had to settle for focusing on Michigan, Huck on SC. But Romney has the cash to play in both – and Florida, California and just about anywhere else. We joke about his bragging that he got “a silver medal” in Iowa and NH, but really he can keep taking “silver” for a longtime, slowly grinding the others down while he just writes himself another check.

    It may be hard to purely buy the Presidency in a general election, but the whole point of the Republican philosophy is that everything is for sale for the right price.

    This baby is Mitt’s. For he who has the gold votes the fools.

  • My quote of the day comes from Romney advisor, Barbara Comstock, talking to Contessa Brewer on MSNBC today. Comstock said Romney’s appeal is that he is “a candidate who can really cover the full spectrum.” I fully expected one of the two to start laughing. At least she didn’t say he was “too perfect” like Jack Welch did a couple days ago.

  • Can someone explain to me why the Wyoming caucuses, which Romney already won, apparently don’t count? There’s been virtually no media coverage or discussion of them, and everyone seems to be treating Michigan as Romney’s first win. Am I missing something?

  • James,

    Because Romney’s win in Wyoming means nothing (except lots of delegates, which does matter.) The reason it isn’t discussed is because it was a party establishment vote only, and the people that decided it were Romney staff members. In other words, it means absolutely nothing about his support in the general election.

    All you people can sit here and cheer that Romney might win the nomination, but mark my words. He will not win the general. So go ahead, and help him win the nomination. Talk abut how great that is. The party is STILL going to die an ugly and painful death.

    The shape-shift comment above is perfect. It WILL get Romney the nomination, and a democrat in the white house and a Republican party that is ruined.

  • I love how Limbaugh is pissing his shorts. He’s basically saying that approximately 2/3 of the Republican voters support the destruction of the GOP. I would add that if 2/3 of the Republicans and 100% of Democrats want the GOP to be extinct, then maybe they should just die already.

    Is there enough popcorn for this?

    More context for what he said:

    Big headline: If McCain or Huckabee Gets the Nomination, It Will Destroy GOP

    CALLER: People like her, I coined a term, a call them TV Republicans, and it doesn’t stand for television, it stands for tunnel vision, because they need to take the blinders off and see the bigger picture. If they sit out the general election, the Democrat wins it by default, whichever one of the Three Stooges wins it. Guess what? In the next four years, there’s going to be probably one, maybe two Supreme Court vacancies come up. Do they really want one of the three bozos over there appointing the next two Supreme Court justices? Is Clinton gonna appoint another Ginsburg, or is she going to do another Scalia? Is Obama going to appoint another Justice Thomas or is he going to do somebody like Breyer or Stevens? Do they really want a liberal appointing the next two Supreme Court justices? They need to take the blinders off, Rush. They need to look at the bigger vision and quit being Tunnel Vision Republicans.

    RUSH: I understand what you’re saying. I hate to tell you this, but she’s not alone. I’m here to tell you, if either of these two guys [Huckabee or McCain] get the nomination, it’s going to destroy the Republican Party, it’s going to change it forever, be the end of it. A lot of people aren’t going to vote. You watch.

    http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_011508/content/01125107.guest.html

    Ha ha. Wingnuts with tunnel vision? You don’t say.

  • Rush and others have had everything they wanted since Bush2000- and look at the havoc they have created. Wars and debt and loss of freedoms . Whoever would trust Rush for any type of advice- except maybe for pain medication – needs to go see a shrink and take some medications.

    His views are toxic for our country.

  • CB:

    Why don’t you try and put some percentage amounts next to the possibilites you list?

    Intrade shows McCain has about a 38% chance of winning?

    Do people here think he is more likely or less likely to win the nomination?

    If it were a horse race then McCain would bascially be the 3-2 favourite.

  • “All you people can sit here and cheer that Romney might win the nomination, but mark my words. He will not win the general. So go ahead, and help him win the nomination. Talk abut how great that is. The party is STILL going to die an ugly and painful death.

    The shape-shift comment above is perfect. It WILL get Romney the nomination, and a democrat in the white house and a Republican party that is ruined.”

    Uh, Scott m@6, that’s exactly what everybody on this blog HOPES will happen! This is a DEMOCRATIC board.

    We WANT to see a Democrat (Big D, not small d) in the White House next year.

  • This is bound to be good news for Republicans:
    Ex-lawmaker charged in terror conspiracy

    The former Republican congressman from Michigan, Mark Deli Siljander, was charged with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice for allegedly lying about lobbying senators on behalf of an Islamic charity that authorities said was secretly sending funds to terrorists.

  • Changing demographics in the U.S. have doomed the Republican Party for some time. When you look at the number of Democratic Congressmen who are running unopposed, it is easy to see that the Republican party has stopped being a national party and is a party that can only win in some places.

    The more important question is whether the Democratic Party gets to 60 seats in the Senate or has to wait until 2010. The Republicans destroyed their chance to remain relevant when they decided to do nothing of what they ran on in 2000. To the Republicans, earmarks and personal entitlement was more important than long term political success.

    In the long run, the U.S. will have to decide how it will function as a one party state and where the general elections are meaningless exercises of affirming who the Democratic Party has nominated.

    Look at Philadelphia. The new mayor was sworn this month after being elected in the Democratic Primary in May of 2007. Does America really want New Hampshire and Iowa deciding who will be the president 12 months before the inaugural?

  • Ultimate result would be the Huckster smiting his foes at the GOP Convention.

    That’d be after a sizable portion of the GOP superdelegates get busted going through the Minneapolis Airport by undercover cops.

  • What they fail to address…what Rush cannot say without having a heart attack…is that it doesn’t matter who the republican nominee is no republican will win the WH in this election. Not a snowball’s chance in hell.

    Everything they have done or tried to do has failed miserably and they have made such a mess that the next four years will be spent restoring some sanity to the WH. The republicans own recent history of failure and disgrace makes it impossible for them to have a candidate that is even viable in this election. Their party is incapable of admitting failure or reversing the course of disaster which prevents them from making any thing change for the better. If you cannot admit to making mistakes it is impossible for you to correct them. The GOP has allowed their own hypocrisy to destroy them. All they are able to do now is smear, blame, name call and throw self destructive temper tantrums. It was inevitable.

  • Rush limbaugh almost has an orgasm because “Fred’s finally come alive”…

    RUSH: …it was just shy of orgasmic — there was so much excitement and happiness, and people were also frustrated, where’s this been? Fred’s finally come alive. This is an annunciation of the conservative agenda that has not been present in their debates before, and everybody has known, a lot of people have known it’s there. It just hasn’t surfaced. So now, because of Fred’s stellar performance last night — I should say Senator Thompson’s stellar performance, guess what’s happening? It’s predictable. The Drive-Bys, media commentators… (blah blah blah)

    http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_011108/content/01125111.guest.html

    And you thought Rush only got off on drugs. Turns out he likes really old guys who appear to be dead, then “come alive”. I guess he’s really loving Dead Fred’s poll numbers. Watch them, Rush! Watch them come to life!!!

    bwahahahaha

  • The only one out there that has talked about policy in changing the direction America is headed is Ron Paul. He understands that all of our problems are interrelated.

    Our foreign policy is effecting the dollar, the devalue of the dollar is affecting the buying power of the middle and lower economic classes.

    He understand we need to reduce the waste of money that is created by Dept of Education, Homeland Security (Isn’t that the FBI, NSA, and CIA’s job anyway?), Federal Reserve and the IRS. He understands that we 123 billion dollars more than the rest of the world combine on national defense. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/spending.htm

    Take 10 minutes and ask yourself why am I voting for my candidate, do I know all his policies? Then take 10 minutes and read about Ron Paul and his policies and philosophy. If you want you could watch a snippet of his stances and philosophy here:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FG_HuFtP8w8

    Its your opinion no one can change your mind except yourself.

    Remember January 21st, stand up for freedom and change once again.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAWClI8zsH4

  • I think the Republican party destroyed itself when it went after “Reagan Democrats” to win elections.

    Eventually, the Reagan Democrats wondered “why do I keep voting these crooks into office?”.

    And now the Republican’ts have no majority left.

  • Re # 16,

    Now that’s just scary, having a Paulette commenting on a Progressive blog.

    It’ be great to have Ron Paul get the Repub nomination though, ’cause we could agree to end the War on Drugs.

    I suppose it would be a third party candidacy for “Law and Order”, which would mean Fred Thompson 😉 right?

  • Rush said: “I’m here to tell you, if either of these two guys get the nomination, it’s going to destroy the Republican Party, it’s going to change it forever, be the end of it.”

    Oh, Rush, you limpdicked, viagra-crazed drug addict, you, you pimple on the ass of America, how I hope you are right, you worthless piece of crap.

  • The Repugs have had great success when the populace was either irrationally scared of nameless brown people or “offended” by the Clinton’s lapses of so-called “morals.”

    But as soon as the curtain is pulled back and people notice that hey–you know–these guys actually can’t um, you know, govern too well–it’s over.

    Offending the fastest-growing minority group in the nation by telling them they’re illegitimate wasn’t so smart either, but you don’t want to lose the rednecks too, so the poor dears were caught in a double-bind.

  • The aide said that guys like me were “in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who “believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” … “That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

    “My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
    Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”

  • Limbaugh is still flogging the anti-McCain Kool-aid, huh?

    I wondered if that was the case. I knew that Limbaugh backed W heavily in 2000, and that his “McCain is a Secret Liberal” meme was, frankly, one of the chief reasons that I suspect that McCain didn’t end up with the nomination. Lots of “Dittoheads” were lapping up McCain’s supposed “liberalness” and “fake conservatism” on a semi-daily basis during the 2000 pre-election season.

    I still don’t know what McCain did to turn Limbaugh against him. I’m sure he must have made some anti-Limbaugh statement at some point to get the fat loudmouth so poisoned against him – possibly in an attempt to “Sistah Soldjah” Limbaugh for his moderate cred.

  • LOL on Racerx’s #15 comment And you thought Rush only got off on drugs. Turns out he likes really old guys who appear to be dead, then “come alive”. I guess he’s really loving Dead Fred’s poll numbers. Watch them, Rush! Watch them come to life!!!

    Rush touches heart and says, “I necro feel ya, brother.”

  • stevem has a point… and to take it one step further, you then might see Fred get McCain’s nod for VP to “reunite the party.” That would be one hot ticket! (That last sentence was solely a reference to the wives on that ticket.)

  • I see a different scenario than #9 and #20 above. McCain probably wins SC, which will be a blow to Huck and a merciful end to Fred. Florida, who knows? Mitt knows he can’t do well in SC, so if he’s smart he’ll throw some money at Florida. Huck’s doing well there, too, last I saw. McCain doesn’t have the money to do much, so he needs all the free media he can get. Then comes Super Tuesday.
    I haven’t seen any polls from SuTu states, or any info about who’s spending what in them. They all figured the race would be over before then, and even if they wanted to plan ahead and save some bucks early, they’ve been forced to spend it by now. Even Rudy’s low on cash. None of them can go all out in all the SuTu states (unless Mitt decides to write himself a monster check- a possibility?) It will all depend on their individual strategies. I figure even Rudy will be able to win a few states (NY, NJ, and CN are winner-take-all, aren’t they?) so we’ll be looking at delegate totals on 2/6. Given the $ situation, advantage Romney, but no majority. Repubs will have to cut deals to beat him, but they’ll do it long before the convention. Best guess, a McCain/Huck ticket, but I’m not betting any more than a nickel on it.

  • The Republicans really are in a pickle because they can’t run on the past seven years of Republican control, which has been a ride on the highway to hell, they can’t run on change since the past seven years have been about showing this nation the Republican Party’s true colors so they can’t repudiate that, their last winning strategy was scream “Vote for me or we’re all going to die” which Rudy has ridden into just about last place with, so all they can do is brag about who’s more “conservative. That’s pretty slim pickings especially since none of them are poster boys for that silly expression. Pass the popcorn …

  • I don’t know why the Repubs even bother trying to nominate someone the majority of them will like; to me, that seems like the lost cause. What they should do is what they do best: agree on whom they *dis*like the most. One whom they’d miss the least, when he perishes under the Dem bus in November. That’s who ought to get their nomination — the sacrificial lamb who’ll take one for the party. ’08 is not going to be “their year”, no matter whom they punt. So they might as well follow Oscar Wilde’s advice to “relax and enjoy it”.

  • Take six (well, seven—Hunter’s denser than a fence-post) misanthropic bugwits, put them in an hermetically-sealed steel box with no air-holes, and watch them duke it out for the last bit of oxygen. It’s enough to make me get the barbecue out—and it’s still freaking WINTER!!!

  • I do blame our own Current GOP President George W. Bush A lot Of these Republicans now Just can’t get their act together. I believe it will be a 3 to 4 way race in Republican We will never know exactly who has the most delagets, Until the Parties Convention If they can have one one without fighting each other. The ones who win are truely in the issues of this Country. Cause Now Even Corportations And High Excutives are losing money with this economy. Billions Are being lost each day cause the de valued US Dollar High Energy Prices and poor business ventures Like the Mortage Housing Market. Something got to be done for All people in this Country NOT just the WAR or Terrorism- Including Iraq John McCaine! We might as well say Hello GW bush ‘s Friend .We never get out of IRAQ And Our economy will Fail I ‘m democrat Too. I do not believe in rubber stamping the economy with band aid government Funding. I do believe The US People need help, but we all must help ourselves Ronald Reagan & Bill Clinton told us that. Justice must be served for all.I agree the Rich should or Must pay more taxes Yet I also agree When rich apy taxes they must fair for All including the Rich.

  • To #16

    That pricing statistic is also horribly misleading, since we’re essentially the only country in the world with active military operations on a large and continuous scale half the globe away, currently. We have to constantly pay money for logistical support (food, uniforms, shelter, etc.), ammunition, maintenance, increased pay levels, medical costs and everything else that goes into a conflict. This is also ignoring the tech basis for our military, the economies of scale involved with our large country (and the consequentially larger total budget), the inflation of costs and prices involved in shipping stuff overseas, and the problem of the $50 plunger (which has likely crept back into things, knowing Bush and crew).

    Ron Paul may understand that all our problems are interrelated, but he also fails to understand the realities of the modern world and that applying 18th century economic and political theory straight out of a textbook isn’t going to fly in the 21st century. His “ideas” about change will essentially hand our country over to foreign companies and interests on a silver platter with “Debt” stenciled into it.

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