Or so says The American Thinker.
Honestly, this article is too delicious not to share. I may violate some Fair Use, but it will be worth it.
So the article starts innocently enough:
Let's talk political reality first. To the question "can the GOP win in 2016?" The answer is "yes, but only if they win Florida." If by 9 pm on election night 2016 the early results indicate Florida has gone to the Democrat, then Republicans of all stripes could simply turn off their televisions, as there would be no path to victory in the Electoral College.
But then it goes WAY off into the tall grass. Because it "extrapolates" from all the data exactly what the GOP needs to win:
Jeb Bush and Sarah Palin.
Seriously.
The "Smart" Bush and Bible Spice. Running together as a ticket. The man who one day espoused comprehensive immigration reform in his book, and the VERY NEXT DAY went on all the talk shows and rewrote his book and disavowed anything he said in it. And "In what respect, Charlie?".
On the same ticket.
Jump below the Chee-to for some highlights
The article begins fairly sensibly by talking about Jeb's potential Electoral College chances. He has a good shot in Florida, they say, and decent ones in VA, OH, NH, NC, and IA. Or, at least, no worse than any mainstream candidate the media has talked about so far. That's pretty standard boilerplate politalk that's been going around.
Fair enough.
But then they start going off into Fantasyland imagining scenarios for victory.
The Electoral College would be of a secondary consideration should President Obama be as unpopular as G.W. Bush was in 2008, and the economy still in a suboptimal situation as regards the unemployment figures after eight years of a Democrat president. Under those circumstances it would not necessarily matter who the GOP candidate was, as electoral victory would be more or less a given. At that point the GOP establishments call for an "electable" candidate would have no resonance and a genuine conservative, a Palin for example, would have every chance for the nomination and subsequent election as president.
GOP strategy Number One: Make Obama as unpopular as Bush. That way ANY Republican would be better than a Democrat. This is how they saw Obama's victory in 2008. They honestly think that it was only because Bush was unpopular that McCain lost. Well, that and ACORN, but they're not going the tinfoil route, because they're supposedly a "serious" publication.
Then they swerve back closer to reality, and state that if the economy is SEEN to be improving, and we're running Hillary, then it becomes more about electability and the Electoral College. But that won't be enough. Because an "electable centrist" candidate won't bring the--in their words--Palinite conservative forces don't vote. They point out that while Romney won the Evangelicals, there were two million "Perotite White voters" that stayed at home.
Uh oh, they're looking for the "missing White voters"
The article's desperate thesis:
In the scenario outlined above, i.e. a Clinton candidacy during a relatively non-negative economic and political environment, a centrist presidential candidate with a charismatic conservative VP running mate may be the GOP's only best hope. A Jeb Bush/president - Sarah Palin/vice-president ticket covers all the Electoral College, Evangelical, pro-life, centrist-conservative, experienced governorships, male/female bases.
The rest of the article is mostly a paean to Our Lady of Wasilla and how she was the subject of oh so much leftist hate (What newspapers do you read) by the media and leftist liberals. They speak of how shutting her out of the convention in 2012 was a huge mistake. They speak of how she now speaks "with authority" on all subjects on Fox so she has put to bed all the media lies about her intelligence. And of course, they say, she would be a more than formidable debater, "as Joe Biden found out in 2008".
Snork.
As far as Jeb goes, their argument is that as Obama's administration "sinks in popularity and credibility", the administration of George W Bush rises and will be seen by 2016 as one of the great ones.
They conclude with the "obvious" question--would Palin accept the second spot again? Would Jeb agree to be Vice President to Palin's President? They gloss over these questions as things to discuss in the long term.
They only offer one warning: Immigration could be the dividing line between the two halves of the Party. If it gets passed, it will be done and over with, and the two halves will make nice to defeat Hillary. If not, they say it could spell a bitter primary fight between Sarah and Jeb for the nomination.
So if we think we have issues, we need look no further than the other side of the aisle, where there's REAL dysfunction.