A Blood Bath in the Republican Party?

[SirJosephPorter]

The divide between moderates and conservatives in the Republican Party is worrying more and more Republican politicians. Recently two of them expressed their concern at the developments (which resulted in Republicans losing a very safe New York Congressional seat).

First there was Gingrich. According to Gingrich, if the divide continues, if there is a third party challenge to Republican candidates in several senate and House seats, that will ensure that Pelosi will remain ‘Speaker for Life’.

Newt Gingrich warns of 'destructive' GOP primaries - Jonathan Martin - POLITICO.com

Whatever the faults of Gingrich (and there are many), he is not afraid to speak his mind.

“If we get into a cycle where there are tea parties and there are conservative third-party candidates, we will make [Nancy] Pelosi speaker for life,” Gingrich told POLITICO in an interview Thursday, calling the practice “totally destructive.”

Then there was David Frum, the speechwriter for Bush (he was reportedly responsible for the ‘Axis of Evil’ comment by Bush). He also had harsh words to say about conservatives and their penchant for supporting the third party candidates again moderate Republicans.

“A few days ago, I was talking to a roomful of young conservatives about the crisis. All agreed in denouncing both the bank bailouts done under TARP and the stimulus. I asked: OK fine, what was the alternative?

There was a short pause, and then somebody laughed: "I guess it's lucky that we weren't in power."

That's not much of a motto for a would-be national governing coalition. If all we conservatives have to offer is oppositionism, then opposition is the job we'll be assigned to fill.”

Republicans heading for a bloodbath in Florida - CNN.com

It will be interesting to see how this one plays out. If moderates and conservatives cannot come to some sort of agreement, Republican may well shoot themselves in the foot come 2010.

 

[gopher]

Too early a call for that. Even though the Dems won in November 2008 it was mostly by small margins in many areas. True, they won by a landslide in the presidency. But such a margin was not visible in many other cases. And you saw how easily the GOP won those governorships though they lost quite a few municipal elections.

The GOP still has a lot of money in its pockets which can readily be used to buy a few votes anywhere across the land. They can readily cook the books on the markets in order to make the Obama agenda look bad and win a few more votes that way. Therefore, I see no basis for ringing that death knell just yet.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

It is clear that GOP will make gains in 2010, Gopher, historical trends support that. If they don’t make any gains in a mid term election, they may as well give up politics.

The question is how widespread those gains will be. If the economy is still struggling by Nov 2010, they stand to make big gains (maybe even gain control of House and Senate). But the infighting may very well make a difference in a few tight races; they may lose a few they should have won (like the 23rd district in New York). And that may quite possibly make the difference between gaining control of the House/Senate and not gaining it.

The infighting may have significant political ramifications (as even the Republican leaders are beginning to realize).

 

[gopher]

To this point, every poll taken has shown that the majority of Americans blame Bush for the sad economy.

Therefore, the economy is not likely to be a factor in the next election.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

I think health care will be the overriding issue in the next election (unless something else unexpectedly crops up). If Democrats pass health care reform, they have good chance of keeping Senate and House. If they don’t, they are toast.

I also think that Democrats are much less likely to lose Senate and House in 2012 than they are in 2010. Mid term elections are always easy for the party in opposition. Not so the presidential elections.