ELECTION junkies in acute withdrawal need suffer no longer. Though the exciting Obama-McCain race is over, the cockfight among the losers has only just begun. The conservative crackup may be ugly, but as entertainment, it’s two thumbs up!
So begins Frank Rich's weekly NY Times column, entitled as it this diary The Moose Stops Here. In it we are treated to Rich's comprehensive analysis of the election just past, and his observations about what might be forthcoming.
Why wait until Sunday morning when you can delight yourself on Saturday evening with another "Rich" serving? So allow me to offer a few more samples below the fold, as well as a few remarks of my own.
Rich is kind enough to revisit some of the ridiculous comments offered during the campaign by conservatives attempting to defend Palin and take down her critics. That section is of course delightful, especially for those of us who do not regular corrupt our brains with the ravings of the like of the Michael Barones and Ross Douthats of the world.
Rich lays down some clear markers:
Will the 2008 G.O.P. go the way of the 1936 G.O.P., which didn’t reclaim the White House until 1952? Even factoring in the Democrats’ time-honored propensity for self-immolation, it’s not beyond reason.
Now here I must interject. I would hope that by now Frank would realize that constant repetition of previous political "wisdom" such as that little snark about "propensity for self-immolation" may well now be more than obsolete. One might argue that one reason so many in the punditry and many professional politicians failed to understand what was happening was their insistence upon viewing the current cycle through lenses derived from previous cycles. In other words, they were applying obsolete paradigms, not applicable to the current mood of the electorate. Whereas many in the blogosphere recognized early on what seemed to be happening, whether it was our own DHinMI talking about the possibility of another 1932, or others predicting that Obama would win some Southern states, most certainly Virginia, from which I write these words.
Frank Rich may offer some of the most pungent and biting observations to be found in the traditional media. For example, after using the phrase "vanilla pudding" Rich offers up this wonderful line:
When David Letterman said that the 10 G.O.P. presidential candidates at an early debate looked like "guys waiting to tee off at a restricted country club," he was the first to correctly call the election.
And after reminding us of many examples of prejudice on the Republican side, whether Romney's defending his Mormonism or Michael Medved propagating the rumors bout the sexuality of Charlie Crist or McCain's blowing Florida by not picking Lieberman or his courtship of the truly noxious John Hagee, we encounter this wonderful paragraph:
The icing on this rancid cake was the race-baiting of Obama and the immigrant bashing by G.O.P. hopefuls who tried to outdo the nativist fringe candidate Tom Tancredo. Yet Republican denial is unabated. In an interview with Palin the weekend before the election, a conservative Wall Street Journal editorialist asked whether "the G.O.P. doesn’t in fact have a perception problem, that it is no longer viewed as a big tent." A perception problem? Hello — how about a reality problem?
Before directly getting to Palin, Rich revisits the use of "window dressing" in how Republicans have approached the issues of race in recent years. But when he finally does get to the Governor of Alaska, it is quite interesting, even were it not at the end of what is a long - and I think effective - diatribe against so many aspects of the Republican party as it is now.
And Rich hoists Republicans in general, and McCain in particular, by petards of their own construction. Consider:
Indeed, the only two "new" ideas that the G.O.P. is pushing in defeat are those they condemn when practiced by Democrats: celebrity and identity politics. Palin’s manic post-election publicity tour, which may yet propel her and "the first dude" to "Dancing With the Stars," is almost a parody of the McCain ad likening Obama to Paris and Britney. Anyone who says so is promptly called out for sexism by the P.C. police of the newly "feminist" G.O.P.
After a paragraph in which he disses Palin by recounting her recent exchange with Wolf Blitzer, in which she demonstrated once again, as she had in interviews with Couric and Gibson among others, the total vacuity of her intellect, Rich closes as follows:
The good news for Democrats is a post-election Gallup poll finding that while only 45 percent of Americans want to see Palin have a national political future (and 52 percent of Americans do not), 76 percent of Republicans say bring her on. The bad news for Democrats is that these are the exact circumstances that can make Obama cocky and Democrats sloppy. The worse news for the country is that at a time of genuine national peril we actually do need an opposition party that is not brain-dead.
I note my objection to his dig about cocky and sloppy. Instead let's consider his key point - the Republican party cannot be an effective opposition party because it is brain-dead.
Consider some of the ammunition being discharged in the current round of the circular firing squad of Republican office holders and wannabees. We get Senators who argue that the Republicans were not conservative enough while a governor like Pawlenty seems to argue for a need for the party to become "Democratic lite." And circling above like a vulture ready to pounce on any evidence of carrion we again encounter the bloated caricature of Newt Gingrich, back for another foray at "leading" his party and - in his mind - the nation.
For some core part of the Republican constituency, however, Palin remains the figure of choice. Perhaps the bloviators like Kristol who helped foist her upon McCain will continue to tout her as the only future hope of the party. And some will use her as a stalking horse to take down other strands of what had been the Republican coalition. At the same time, she will become the primary target of many in the party who blame her, and her advocates, for the seriousness of the defeat just suffered.
In other words, it is now open season on moose. Which may be why The Moose Stops Here?
On the one hand, it is so delightful to see on the other side the kind of internecine battling that was a part of the Democratic experience in 1988, 1994, 2000, 2002, and 2004. On the other hand, I really believe we need a viable opposition party. And if, as Rich suggests, the Republicans are brain-dead, that does pose some difficulties. We lack any sense of commonality such as that in the election of 1820 (the Era of Good Feeling when Monroe ran without opposition). and clarification of ideas and proposals best comes from vigorous discussion.
But boy, it sure is fun to watch the other side squirm, isn't it?
Peace.