Annals of Political Idiocy: Republican Nose Spites Republican Face

Ron Brownstein, who reported from Washington for the L. A. Times for some time before leaving the sinking ship like all the other reporter rats, has some ideas about the grumpy old cracker Jesustard assholeRepublican party's future.  It is what you (probably) wanted to hear: The G. Old Party is digging itself into a hole it may never crawl out of. Keep sticking to those "principles," boys & occasional girl. All that capitalistic, discredited by the end of the 20th century garbage will certainly take you to the top of the AmeriKKKan heap, because this is a center-right nation.

[T]he party's loss of regional and ideological equilibrium can reinforce itself. Because Republicans from swing and Democratic-leaning states now constitute such a distinct minority in the party caucus, they lack the numbers to prevent it from adopting positions unpopular with their voters. The caucus majority can impose a direction that solidifies the party where it is already strong but further endangers the minority. This isn't the first time a party has fallen into this debilitating cycle. The classic example came after 1854 when Congress approved the Kansas-Nebraska Act, effectively repealing the Missouri Compromise that had limited slavery's spread in the territories. Until then, congressional Democrats were divided closely between Northern and Southern members. But the backlash against the Kansas-Nebraska Act destabilized that balance by provoking severe losses for Northern Democrats; as Southerners gained the advantage in the Democratic caucus, they repeatedly identified the party with pro-slavery policies that further undercut Northern Democrats already struggling against the emerging Republican Party. As the late David M. Potter recounted in his magisterial history of the 1850s, The Impending Crisis, the House's Northern Democrats didn't entirely recover until the New Deal.

We're stuck w/ a complex political system, to put it mildly, but political (not Social) Darwinism will deal the Party of Bush its deserved death-whimper. Into the dustbin o' history w/ you lot! Siddown over there. That's right, next to the Whigs!