Especially in light of
kos' diary about the WH badgering 2008 GOP hopefuls, I found
this piece by Howard Fineman to be particularly interesting. To whet your appetite, here's a little morsel:
President George W. Bush may have no military exit strategy for Iraq, but the "neocons" who convinced him to go to war there have developed one of their own--a political one: Blame the Administration. Their neo-Wilsonian theory is correct, they insist, but the execution was botched by a Bush team that has turned out to be incompetent, crony-filled, corrupt, unimaginative and weak over a wide range of issues.
Meet me on the flip for the main course.
Fineman posits that the GOP is falling apart from within, and it is all Bush's fault. Is he right? I'm not sure -- I worry that reports of the Republicans' demise have been greatly exaggerated (here and elsewhere). However, he makes some good points. We've heard all about the Miers uproar, but Fineman puts a pretty fine point on it:
The Harriet Miers nomination was the final insult. Religious conservatives have an inferiority complex in the Republican Party. In an interesting way, it's the same attitude that many African-Americans have had toward the Democratic Party over the years. They think that the Big Boys want their votes but not their presence or their full participation. And what really frosts the religious types is that Bush evidently feels that he can only satisfy them by stealth--by nominating someone with absolutely no paper trail. It's an affront. And even though Dr. Dobson is on board--having been cajoled aboard by Rove--I don't sense that there is much enthusiasm for the enterprise out in Colorado Springs. I expect that any GOP 2008 hopeful who wants evangelical support--people like Sam Brownback, Rick Santorum and maybe even George Allen--will vote against Miers's confirmation in the Senate.
Does he really think that those folks will vote against Miers? I'm not so sure, but it would be nice if they did -- I'm just not sure if any of them have the, ahem, intestinal fortitude to stand up to Chimpy.
Well, what about the business folks, you say? A take I hadn't considered about corporate CEO's:
For them, Bush's handling of Katrina was, and remains, a mortal embarrassment to their class, which Bush is supposed to have represented--at least to some extent. These are people who believe in the Faith of Management--in anticipating problems and moving mass organizations. They also like to think of themselves as having a social conscience. And even if they don't, they are sensitive to world opinion. The vivid images from the Superdome were just too much for these folks. Recently, a prominent Republican businessman, whom I saw in a typical CEO haunt, astonished me with the severity of his attacks on Bush's competence. And Bush had appointed this guy to a major position! Amazing.
Fineman also makes compelling arguments for why the defecit hawks, neocons, isolationists, and supply siders are (or will be) running for the hills. Seriously,
go read this article because it might make you feel better.
Is a Republican implosion going to fix everything that's wrong with our nation right now? Absolutely not....but it's a good start!
UPDATE: There is some discussion down below about how Hillary's Iraq beliefs are similar to those of the neocons. One poster asks how Hillary will deal with this in 2008. My thoughts: hopefully, she won't have to. I think that the only thing that could save the GOP right now is if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee for president in 2008. All of these Republicans may differ on a lot of things, but the one thing that unites them
MORE THAN ANYTHING is an utter hatred for all things Clinton.