GOP needs a new catalyst

Many have no doubt seen the fox video that details just how ignorant sarah palin was when she was selected to be the potential vice president. This is just the beggining of the internal war for control of the GOP. Sarah Palin is going to get obliterated in this fight. Many others are likely to be in the same boat. Palin, because she is an obvious target, and any remaining moderates because they will be outnumbered and encumbered with the failure of John McCain. With the moderates gone the dominante narrative for why they lost the election is going to be the economic crisis, sarah palin, and bush not being a true conservative.

Exhibit A,



Chafee is correct that the republican's failed in governance. They were good at winning elections but not governing. The problem is that he specifies the failure of Bush mostly in profligate spending. He blames Bush for not being a true conservative. So even Chafee has the wrong idea about what the conservatives need.

The conservative party at its core is a reactionary party. They run against things. Unfortunately after eight years in power they ran out of things that made sense to run against. To some extent this is where you can blame Bush because he undercut all of their arguments against the democrats with his abominable record. Bush alone though is not the answer. Look at the polling on the issue over at pollingreport.com and what you find is that a majority of americans side with the democrats on issue after issue.

The Republican party is stuck in a time freeze. They imagine that America is just as it was during 1980 when Reagan was elected. This is clearly not the case as the election of Obama proved. The white vote is becoming less powerful as time moves forward and the GOP has become the white party. They need to restart their outreach to minority communities, they need new rhetoric. Until we see people of color leading the Republican party i really doubt they manage to reestablish a national power base.

What the Republicans need most is new ideas. The ideas the currently run on have been neutralized in many ways. they no longer have welfare to run against, the terrorism smears failed against oabama. Abortion is not a winning issue with the voters they need to reach. Bashing guys is an issue that has just about reached its sell by date. Although several propositions were passed around the country attacking gay rights the age breakdowns suggest that they wont last very long. What is eventually going to spur a Republican resurgence is an Obama administration failure.

Obama is going to do something that does not work and as soon as that happens the GOP will latch onto that and ride it into the ground. As a party they do well in the opposition where they can be passionate and ideological without serious responsibility. They can tear down instead of building up. Until Obama puts a foot wrong though they wont have the location of their new attack strategy.