Great post. What do you think of Jindal? He is doing a superb job in the Bayou, he is conservative, he's young, he is not corresponding with any of the women if Argentina, as far as I know. He doesn't come with the Palin negatives. I will be surprised if he doesn't toss into the ring after the next round of elections.

You are spot on though about the lack of a coherent plan. Possibly the smartest thing that Newt did in 94 was the contract with America. Someone needs to come out with that kind of specific plank - all down to one piece of paper or one screen shot - to be able to start generating momentum for the right, instead of just riding the frustration against the left.

What say we go to Washington and stink up Reid and Pelosi's offices?

And I'm sorry Michael Steele---your time is up. Every time you had the chance to be the Man, you weren't. Game over. Bring in Liz Cheney.

Re "the promise of a vast desert selection come November"-- Freudian substitution for "dessert"? Or a hint that the current smorgasbord of wimps will get their just deserts?

Both. But fixed for the former but mindful of the latter.

But... but... the Pubbies had a contract on with America man! Why get fired up when you can get all legislated up? It's so civilized that way, not crass and snowbilly like the backwoods heathen that just want to make their corn liquor and shoot guns.

Feh. I've watched it, and said it, for too many years: the Republicans are like beaten slaves to the Democrats and they've learned how to get their own political way by staying on the political porch. When they got into the leadership role, they hated its unfamiliarity and were determined not to abuse their power over the Democrats. Or still thinking "fair play and all that, old chap" was the way to deal with Democrats' terror tactics.

Next up: Universal Voting Act. It's not the votes that count, it's who counts the vote.

If the Republicans do not have 10,000 lawyers in Massachusetts on January 19, 2010 (That's election day, Steele) to insure that there is no fraud and Brown, should he win, gets seated immediately--no Democrat B.S. "re-counts" or "contests", then the Grand Old Party will have signaled its desire to die. It should be put out of its misery immediately so a new party that actually believes in freedom and liberty can take its place.

Your post is too true. Where do the Republicans GET these people??? I mean, someone from the World Wrestling Foundation running in CT??? I like Palin a lot, and Liz Cheney, but almost none of the other good Republicans are running. And I am getting a little tired of voting for the lesser of two evils. Michael Steele is a twit. And we are on dangerous ground becoming anti-intellectual just because PC types control the university curricula these days. There are plenty of smart conservatives with good educations who have solid life experience and decent values. The problem is getting them to run. Perhaps concentrate on getting more veterans to run? They are used to hell holes, and serving their country for little pay and with all kinds of PC jerks carping and criticizing. They have the stomach for dirty and necessary jobs. The problem is that they threaten the chattering and comfortable and cowardly...

"When they got into the leadership role, they hated its unfamiliarity and were determined not to abuse their power over the Democrats."

They also learned their lessons of leadership from Clinton. Clinton was incredibly popular because he largely coopted Republican ideas. The Republican congressional field seemed to have learned that lesson. They thought they should effectively govern by stealing Democrat ideas and making them their own. This did not work as it turned the Repubs into peddlers of bloat who were largely indistinguishable from Democrats.

GVDL, I had to quote you just now over at the Belmont Club comments. Your bumper sticker that is. So true. What in the h##l is Michael Steele doing up there? How did the Republicans get the one black man in American who can't deliver an extemporaneous chat with a modecum of humor passion or reasonable good sense? Amazing. He has a hard time formulating sentences that stick. He needs to go and now. There is basically no Republican leadership...

You're all confused. You're making the mistake of associating "Republican" with "conservative" or “in keeping with American founding principles”. As long as you're doing that you will continue to be flummoxed and exasperated. What makes you think that the Republicans disagree with the purposes and goals of the Dems? Where's the evidence? Feel free to go back over 100 years. You won't find it. Reagan was an anomaly, the Party leadership was embarrassed by him for his simple-minded conservatism, federal spending still doubled under Reagan, and steps have been taken in election law to ensure another Reagan won’t happen.

If you’re looking to the Republicans to fight the encroachments against liberty and actually turn things around, you’re barking up the wrong tree. Sorry to have to break the news, but you can’t fix a problem until you’ve identified it. The problem is that the GOP has been faking conservatives into voting for them, while furthering the Progressive movement all along. Even now they're polling us so they can figure out what it is they should pretend to believe. Suckers. A principled conservative party would never need to ask. Ever. No; the GOP must either die a quick death or it will have to be overthrown.

There better be a mighty coup at the GOP, and soon. Steele should be thrown to the curb and Fred and Jeri Thompson must take charge. Cheneys (father, mother or daughter, or all three) are fine, too. Get some people with some ba... ahem... guts. No guts, no glory.

If nothing happens to make the GOP change before the November elections, it is over. So. Over.

What you say may be true, Lyle, but in terms of sheer logistics the Republican machine will be needed. That's just the fact.

Needed for 2010 that is.

You can't replace the machine inside of a year with just internet links. Doesn't work like that.

You've got to, at the very least, get into the drivers seat.

To quote Rumsfeld you go to war with the party you have.

Sorry, Gerard, but Lyle is dead on target.

The much-maligned social conservatives... yes, the millions of Christian families in the fly-over states
who are such an embarrassment to the GOP elite, are the core traditional voters that float their boat.

The RINOs make a terrible error when they assume that we have no choice but to support them.
Make no mistake, this is cultural war for all the marbles. It is late in the day, and there is too much at stake here.
The "grassiest of roots", like the Sleeper, is awakening.

I'm 100% with Lyle and Robert. As Charlie Crist goes in Florida's Auguest primary against Marco Rubio, so goes the feckless GOP. Steele has been its last straw. It's a sinking, rudderless ship and---like rearranging deck chairs---the rest is already history. Cuppa red-hot tea? Doubts? Wait. See.

I'm with lyle. The problem is that the gop is too nice to the bullies in charge.
It's time to quit with all the "intellectual bullshit" All that bullshit ever did is get millions of people killed.
I'm for jacking up these asshats if they try to change the world I am living in.
It is time that the american people took back their country one politician at a time.

I understand the sentiment and I share it. My problem concerns the elections which are already upon us. To win you've gotta beat somebody with somebody and you have to have (sad as that may be) a machine, an organization,to do it with.

Right now, right here, in reality, alternative parties have no, none, nada machine capable. It simply does not exist. It can be built, sure. But that will take more time than we have.

It's a nice thought to simply "jack the asshats" but its the same thought that in many ways in 2008 brought us to where we are now.

I don't think there's any Republicans even running for anything here in the Bay Area - if there is it's a closely guarded secret.
Partly that (invisible, not-running thing) is because the Evil Party and their Media have so successfully demonized the Stupid Party AS the "Really Eviller Snidely Whiplash Party", but how can you compete in secret?
And we have had some pretty good Tea Parties, I've been to a couple - the anger is out there.

I'll grant Tea Parties may use the old dead husk of the GOP structure/machine to partially inhabit in upcoming elections, but that's all. The GOP is deathly afraid a third party will lose the 2010 elections. In the future perhaps we should see discontent conservatives living in moveable tents in the desert of our/their discontent.

It isn't Republican, and it isn't Democrat. It is 'Business As Usual'. That is what has people angered.

And the first of the two major political parties that understands that and takes action on that is the party that is going to win consistently. Otherwise it is going to weathervane between the two. And so long as politicians can get in for a few years and use that time to feather their nests there will be no action by the major parties to change Business As Usual.

So I will predict that we will see weathervaning between the two parties for quite some time.

What can the "Third Party" bogeyman do to me that the RINOS and Dems haven't already? Boo! We get another Dem! or Yea! We get another RINO? Pfftt!

Ain't skeered anymore. The man with nothing has nothing to hold for ransom. Inasmuch as the RINOs have thrown in their lot with the Dems, it's not like we have a two-party system anymore.

Gerard,

We do in fact need to go to war with the party we have. But probably not in the way you read it at first.