Karl Rove, along with the editorial staff of the Wall Street Journal, are concerned that the GOP will nominate an unelectable whackjob for President.
Really, Karl? You spent your career catering to teh crazee and conditioning voters to respond to a whole symphony of dog whistles. And the worldview you helped create out of sound bytes and hysteria has now been so internalized by many Republican voters that it’s all they will respond to. So what’s the problem, Karl?
You used to be able to play the whackjobs like a fiddle. You’d signal the fringies with winks and nods while keeping up a sane, rational facade for the rest of the public. But now the Frankenstein’s monster has escaped from the laboratory; the Terminator is out of control.
Towards the beginning of the original Terminator film, Kyle Reese, who has come back to the past to save Sarah Connor – whose spawn will save mankind – lets her know what she’s facing in her new cybernetic stalker. “Listen, and understand. That terminator is out there. It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.”
Substitute “Tea Party” for “Terminator” and “U.S. Government” for “you,” and with the exception of “fear” (which I’d argue is what drives them), this pretty much sums up the story of the 60-odd birdbrain Birchers who have rebranded themselves Tea Partiers and brought more crazy than Kanye West to the House of Representatives.
Steve M. wrote, “I love it that Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul scored nearly 30% of the vote each in the Ames straw poll and the result is that we’re told it’s now a two-person race — Perry vs. Romney.” That”s because Everyone Knows the GOP establishment isn’t going to let Bachmann or Paul get the nomination. That’s how the GOP primary process works. There’s some primary theater, and somehow the guy the establishment had already settled on gets to win.
What will the establishment do to get the process back in hand? I doubt editorials in the Wall Street Journal will do it.