No, there isn’t a GOP civil war

[DonViejo]

It's the establishment, Fox News, Heritage, Rush and the Koch Bros, versus a few moderates. That's a mercy killing

BY KIM MESSICK

It’s commonplace these days to suggest that a “civil war” has broken out in the Republican Party. The casus belli seems to consist mainly of two things: Mitt Romney’s loss to Barack Obama in last year’s presidential election, and the failure of Republicans over the last two electoral cycles to regain control of the United States Senate. It isn’t surprising, perhaps, that many Democrats attribute these events to the Republican Party’s increasingly shrill right-wing rejectionism, but apparently some Republicans believe the same thing.

About two months after Romney’s loss, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, channeling John Stuart Mill, admonished Republicans to stop being “the stupid party.” Karl Rove, whose bona fides as a political moderate had been fairly well hidden, announced that he would form a super-PAC dedicated to the proposition that only electable — that is, mainstream — candidates could emerge from Republican senatorial primaries. (No second amendment solutions, witches, or divinely ordained rapes need apply.) And John Huntsman, erstwhile Governor of Utah, Ambassador to China, and 2012 Republican Presidential candidate, went so far as to endorse the formation of a third party. “Someone’s going to step up at some point and say we’ve had enough of this,” he intoned. A third party might not win, but “[it] can certainly influence the debate.”

These assertions (and others like them) provoked the inevitable pushback from the party’s right-wing firebrands, and the civil war was joined. We are now asked to believe that a great struggle rages within the GOP, a close-run contest to determine its future direction and electoral destiny. A party divided between Cruz and Christie cannot stand.

A version of this narrative was recently provided by Pat Brady, the former chairman of the Illinois Republican Party. Appearing on the June 1 broadcast of MSNBC’s “Up With Steve Kornacki,” Brady agreed with his host’s claim that “the Republican base” was a problem for his party. He conjured a vision of “establishment people” girding their loins — or whatever it is moderate Republicans gird — in order to wrest control of the nominating process from that same problematic base. Control having been won, The Establishment would proceed to anoint “good candidates” such as Governor Christie and (inexplicably, at least for me) Scott Walker, the union-busting, Koch brothers-genuflecting governor of Wisconsin.

Full article
http://www.salon.com/2013/06/08/no_there_isnt_a_gop_civil_war/

[freshwest]

1. Nah. Just getting free airtime. Moderates = Democratic = Obama. Same enemy, same tune.

[WovenGems]

2. Karl Rove

A bona fide moderate???

How far right has the party shifted to make him a moderate?

[cheyanne]

3. Teapartiers are an exptremeist group not republicans.

As an extremist group they are based on ideological purity; the republican party is just their host victim.

Lifecycle of extremist group:

a. Harness social discontent and/or religious fundamentalism to simplistic conspiracy theory usually based on justifiable fears. ONce the theory is accepted by members, they are caught in a bubble that delegitimizes any criticism.

b. Offer people a chance to work for change in larger society, attracting more adherents.

c. As society rejects their proposals, the group will reject more moderate members in name of ideological purity. And members will leave as they grow disillusioned with group's progress.

d. The group will dwindle in power and importance.


I think that the republican party will survive.

[AlinPA]

8. The republican party = tea baggers. They are the same thing. They are all extremists.

[wandy]

4. The Teapublican civil war does not bother me........

It's the full blown battle that has broken out on this side I am concerned with.
If the Teapublicans wish to eat their own, so much the better.
I will help them if I am able.

So why do I feel that Karl Rove is laughing his ass off right about now.

[blkmusclmachine]

5. .

.

[davidpdx]

6. Our party isn't looking much better

The next 3 1/2 years are fucked. The Faux scandals are going to tie up Congress. People bitch and moan about this and that not getting done and yet we can't get enough progressives elected to actually do something.

[DearAbby]

7. They are desperate little monkeys...

if they were really serious, they would be timing these scandals for the greater effect. Instead they are flinging shit against the wall and hoping something sticks. We just have to hang together long enough to be the only party standing..

[Initech]

9. The Fox Opinion Channel is by far the worst thing to happen to our political discourse.

They are funded and owned by evil billionaires, and they only exist to spread toxic Ayn Rand / Koch / Heritage Foundation garbage as "news". Until we can kick the Fox bots out of office (Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Paul Ryan, etc, etc) we can kiss civil discourse good bye. They'll just keep trotting every negative thing they can about Obama out as if it were an actual scandal. Think this is the end? You haven't seen anything yet.

[Mr.Bill]

10. Boy, are they going to be surprised

when they find out Obama isn't running in 2016.

[davidpdx]

12. I don't think it matters to them

After the election they knew there was a strong chance the Democrats would win an unprecedented 3rd time for the first time in a half century. Since they lost badly last year, I think their only other strategy is impeachment. They are repeating the same exact cycle they did with Clinton (though it will be more difficult getting anything remotely solid).

[davidpdx]

11. I agree with you on that

And I agree that this isn't the end either. I've said in a couple of other posts I firmly believe something else will be brought up before July 4th. Now maybe I'm putting my butt on the line with the date given that's only three weeks away. But I just have this gut feeling about it.


If I'm wrong I'm going to return my crystal ball for a refund.

[Initech]

13. What's to stop them? It's definitely not our media.

[NCLefty]

14. The end of the article probably has it correct:

"One can’t help but sympathize with their entirely natural wish that their party awaken from its fever dream, but if they really think that process is underway now they’re the ones who are dreaming. What’s much more likely is that the Right’s grip on the Republican Party will not relax until it nominates one of its own for president, a candidacy that will almost certainly engender an electoral holocaust of Goldwateresque proportions. Only then will the moderates in the party have enough leverage to insist on a genuine program of self-criticism, a program that must precede any successful effort to reclaim their party. The Right may not have its 1988 moment until 2016, but — sooner or later — it’s coming."

The Tealiban will be with us until they finally get a chance to fly and wind up getting too close to the sun :p