Former Republican Douglas MacKinnon, who served as press secretary to former Senator Bob Dole and has worked in the White House and Pentagon, pens a very sensible op-ed in today's Los Angeles Times. Money quote:
The party doesn't even seem able to field a presidential candidate who understands why he or she is running. As one high-level Republican friend said to me of the 2008 race: "McCain was like an old dog chasing a car. He wasn't quite sure why he was chasing the car, and wouldn't know what to do with a car if he caught it, but at that stage of his life, he felt he had to chase the largest car going by."
Clearly, the GOP is without an anchor, sail, rudder, or even navigator. They are totally adrift in a sea of hysterical race-baiting, pseudo-fiscal responsibility, and homophobia. And yet today, a new Gallup poll shows that Sarah Palin, over Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, is the most popular figure in the GOP, by a mile.
A woman who has repeatedly lied to maximize her feelings of persecution and minimize her glaring flaws, a woman whose best efforts to oppose the Obama administration's cap-and-trade program to combat global warming utterly fails to mention the words "environment" or "global warming," Palin represents the best the GOP has to offer, as far as the rank and file are concerned.
Now, Democrats are certainly not without their own problems. They are not without hypocrites. They are not without degenerates. But Democrats do not portray themselves as the party of morality, decency, and "real American" values.
From the op-ed's comments section comes this astute observation:
Now, Democrats are certainly not without their own problems. They are not without hypocrites. They are not without degenerates. But Democrats do not portray themselves as the party of morality, decency, and "real American" values.
From the op-ed's comments section comes this astute observation:
Mr. MacKinnon omitted the fact that the GOP is so brain-dead that it's significantly alienated what could be one of its major constituencies: Latino voters. Latinos are traditionally culturally conservative as demonstrated by the rising rates of their memberships in evangelical churches over the past thirty years. And yet, the Republican Party insists on poking its finger in the collective eyes of Latinos with its race-baiting on immigration and the Sotomayor nomination. The GOP richly deserves its shrinking position and its irrelevance. Demographics will continue to doom this party if it insists on being the white people's party.
Add "Christian" to that mix and that's what the Republicans primarily are.
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