The wingnut test of wills
by David Atkins
Newt Gingrich has surged into the lead not only in Florida, but nationwide as well.
That means one thing: the GOP has about a week to discover who is more powerful: its establishment or its base. If Newt Gingrich wins an upset in Florida and proceeds to roll through to nomination in spite of all predictions, he will almost certainly lose the general election against a vulnerable President. The conspiracy-minded will declare that the big money men are pleased with Obama and are throwing the race to ensure four more years. But that assumes a level of coordinated puppeteering that doesn’t likely exist. Even if one assumes that on certain issues the Parties don’t differ all that greatly, there are a very large number of influential people who depend on the tendrils of power and influence that alter depending on whether a Democrat or a Republican holds the White House. There is simply no way that the vast bulk of the Republican establishment is lying down for four years, allowing its favored sons and daughters to languish while Democrats fill all the appointments in the White House’s power.
No, the Republicans want to win in 2012. They have to. They’ve spent enough time, energy and money labeling the first African-American President a socialist, communist unAmerican professorial elite aligned with Black Panthers and food stamp cultures of dependency, that they can’t afford to lose to him and still save face.
That’s the danger of using ridiculous hyperbole to smear your opponents. If you lose, it means that the people either didn’t believe the best lies your money could tell, or worse, believed them and didn’t care.
The Republican establishment can’t afford to see Gingrich win the nomination. But the base isn’t about to let a Mormon governor from Massachusetts with a more moderate record be their standard-bearer.
In the next week, we’ll find out if the GOP wizards are still in control of their monster, or if their monster is about to eat them alive. If the former, the monster won’t exactly be happy about going back in its cage. If the latter, it could mean no less than the beginning of the end for the Republican Party: the year when its rabid base officially seized control, hastening the demise of a political party in rapid demographic decline.
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