GOP teetering

Lots of posts about politics lately.  Well, it's election season after all.  So here's another...

Given that the GOP seems poised to make big gains this year (at least, on the national level), for anyone to suggest that the party of Abraham Lincoln is on the brink of collapse would be likely to evoke puzzled stares, if not peals of scorning laughter.  Nonetheless, I do so, now.

Because, you see, expectations for the GOP are running so high that, if it does not succeed in taking control of the US House of Representatives, the election will be perceived as a failure.  At least, from a Republican point of view.

All the political conditions are set for a "wave" election, in which the party out of power is swept into power:  high unemployment, an unpopular president from the opposition party, a fired-up base.  If Republicans can't win big this year, they've really got problems.

And, folks, let me tell ya, they've really got problems.

Here comes the GOP cavalry!

The redneck base of the party, the low-information Glenn Beck/Rush Limbaugh crowd, wheeling from McDonalds to Walmart on its Medicare-supplied "fatboy" scooters, has routed out the "establishment" GOP candidates in favor of tea-baggers like Sharron Angle, Christine O'Donnell, and Rand Paul.  Republican stalwarts like Mitch (the walking corpse) McConnell and John (Orangeman) Boehner are running scared.  After all, if GOP champions like Lisa Murkowski, Mike Castle, Trey Grayson, and Bob Bennett can be defeated by apoplectic tea-baggers, how long until Mitch and John get tied to the whipping post?

In order to avoid such a fate, GOP gray-beards are swarming to the right, to appease the xenophobic, racist rabble.  And, in so doing, they are motivating traditionally Democratic voters.  For example, the stunts that Sharron Angle pulled in Nevada are sure to have Latinos flocking to the polls.  Harry Reid should thank her for that.

Will moderate and liberal voters turn out in sufficient numbers to thwart this uprising of tea-bag pseudo-patriots?  That remains to be seen.  But if the GOP does not come out of this election with anything less than overwhelming victory, the simmering intra-party feuding between tea-baggers and the traditional GOP plutocrats will erupt into full-scale, bloodthirsty war.  This really could kill the GOP.

And that's good news for everybody.