This is a fun topic! There are many pundits, on TV and print, that are trying to write off the GOP because of the rise of more radical Right wing politics, such as the Tea Party…….I have heard many, many people say that its time in the spotlight is waning……
A very smart analyst, Mark Halperin, see it all a little different……
Mark Halperin: “Despite the Tea Party, the Twitterverse and the multimedia dilution of traditional Republican authority, the old-school GOP rules the roost. Members of Congress, governors, big-time fundraisers, well-paid pundits and activist shoguns in early-voting states such as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina still have the loudest voices. Winning the party’s nomination without the backing of a majority of these groups is a nearly insurmountable challenge.”
“Some are resigned to supporting Romney as the best available option for a viable general-election challenge — especially those who fear the Michele Bachmann surge. Others want to see if Huntsman is for real, if Tim Pawlenty can muster enough dynamism to be the Romney alternative or if Perry will be as tough and determined a national candidate as he has been a Texas battler. It could be early winter — or even the spring of 2012 — before the establishment gets off the fence. They want to beat President Obama but still can’t figure out how.”
What do you, my reader, think?
IMO, the GOP will survive and for thew same reason that Halperin mentioned……the GOP allowed the TP to have its moment in the sun, so to speak, in the mid-term…..why? A chance to win back the House….but the upcoming presidential election is too important to allow the right wing wackies have their way…..the GOP will return and support the mainstream Repub thought candidate….even if some of the far right candidates per chance win the nomination….they will be drawn back to the mainstream or lose financial support……NEVER fear…..the conservs will have their mainstream candidate in the next election…
The traditional Republican Party has been hurt by the extremists in the Tea Party and has jerked it hard right for now. Along with this, the christian right still has its claws in the GOP and will form alliances with TP’ers. I suspect it will survive but moderate conservatives will not necessarily dominate for time, if ever.
I agree with everything you have stated and I also see that if the GOP is to have a chance in 2012 it needs to draw some of these extremists back toward the middle (for lack of a better word)……the real money is more in line with the GOP of a couple of decades ago…..I think that that support will draw them back….
Good post. I’m not American, so I can hardly really comment except that the end result (for 2016 perhaps) might well be a party (call it the GOP or GOP2, or whatever) that is far more centre right in ideology and that SOME more right-wing Democrats might migrate towards.
Then again, it might all just go to hell in a bucket… 😈
Our system is already in that bucket……..and the conserv money machine sees that and that is why I say that they will becoming more traditional in 2012 election….
Both major parties have had their fair share of ups and downs—and their fair share of extremists. The problem with the GOP these days is that they are allowing themselves to be co-opted by radical groups, such as the Religious Right and the Tea Party. There are very few current elected officials who hold traditional Republican values. Real Republican values. The Religious Right had a lot to do with making people forget what those are when they started influencing things during the Reagan Administration.
The GOP is a lost cause if their old base doesn’t demand they go back to being the party of Teddy Roosevelt, and start the effort to make that happen.
I suspect you are absolutely right.
Angie….I believe that the GOP will never go back to the good old days TR….but it should settle down a bit more by the 2012 election…..