I was listening to Mark Lavin and laughing my ass off. This right wing kook was telling people that he was not sure if he could endorse McCain and that the best thing that conservatives can do this year is wait until four years from now and get a real conservative in the off.

These rigties are cooked and they know it.

So what is the future of the Repubs?

And if the Republicans are pushed to the side than who will take their place?

Personally, I hope the Green Party moves in to fill in the gap.

Imagine, your choice in 2012 could be Obama running for re-election and the Green Candidate. Now that would be a real choice. :nice:

I was listening to Mark Lavin and laughing my ass off. This right wing kook was telling people that he was not sure if he could endorse McCain and that the best thing that conservatives can do this year is wait until four years from now and get a real conservative in the off.

These rigties are cooked and they know it.

So what is the future of the Repubs?

And if the Republicans are pushed to the side than who will take their place?

Personally, I hope the Green Party moves in to fill in the gap.

Imagine, your choice in 2012 could be Obama running for re-election and the Green Candidate. Now that would be a real choice. :nice:

The political pendulum swings from side to side in this country. The GOP will be back. They survived decades of democrat ascendency, and will survive this latest bit, just like the democrats fell into disarry under Reagan and have only now begun to come back. If they can't beat McCain in the fall, it will be a huge blow.

Until the pendulum swings back the GOP will have the same political clout in our country as the other fringe political groups, like the Libertarians and Socialist Workers Party. Once a new generation of voters arrives who have no appreciation of what the GOP did to us, we'll go through the same thing all over again.

People get so fickle when all they know is peace and prosperity. They feel like mixing things up, a little action.

wishful thinking much?

In 2004, when George W. Bush won re-election, and the GOP won even bigger majorities in both houses of Congress than they already had, everyone was saying that the Democratic party was done for. That was four years ago. Remember that? I think I'll go bump up some posts to remind everyone...

wishful thinking much?
wishful thinking indeed.

Like I would wish that on anybody. Not all of us are soulless.

Like I would wish that on anybody. Not all of us are soulless.

No, only the zombies controlling the democrats. :eek3:

Control Democrats? Ever try to herd cats?

You got them confused with Republicans, who tremble with ecstacy when being told what to do by an authoritarian figure. Dems tend to exercise what they hold most dear, individual liberty protected by the proper function of government.

But we digress. The GOP has been relegated to the dustbin for the foreseeable future because they were given carte blanche to self-destruct. Unfortunately they took a lot of people down with them who had no affiliation with their bizarre, unworkable failure of an ideology.

Good riddence to bad rubbish.

Until the pendulum swings back the GOP will have the same political clout in our country as the other fringe political groups, like the Libertarians and Socialist Workers Party. Once a new generation of voters arrives who have no appreciation of what the GOP did to us, we'll go through the same thing all over again.

People get so fickle when all they know is peace and prosperity. They feel like mixing things up, a little action.

I see it this way, once the Democrats take charge, then we will get some real change. We will get National Health Care. We will get real reform. The war in Iraq will end. And election reform will be a reality. There will be consumer protection and environmental protection. Corporate america will take the back seat to the people.

And if the Republicans do come back, well there will be no turning back. The people will not let them.

Now getting the Socialist Workers party elected... hmm that could be interesting.

My vision of the future is that there will be three political Parties on the scene... the Greens (who will merge with what is left of the socialist party) on the left, the Democrats on the center and Libertarians on the right. As for the GOP, it will be comprised of a few extreme rightists and corporate elitists and will be driven to the periphery of the political scene. Yes its wishful thinking but we can always dream. :)

Now getting the Socialist Workers party elected... hmm that could be interesting.

My vision of the future is that there will be three political Parties on the scene... the Greens (who will merge with what is left of the socialist party) on the left, the Democrats on the center and Libertarians on the right. As for the GOP, it will be comprised of a few extreme rightists and corporate elitists and will be driven to the periphery of the political scene. Yes its wishful thinking but we can always dream. :)I'm not rooting for the SWP in particular. They're communists, which are no better than the fascists we're dealing with today in this administration.

I agree with your vision of a real Liberal Party coming onto the scene, the Dems in the middle where they've moved after the GOP gave up its claim to that territory, and some rightwing fringe group calling themselves the New Republicans or something like that (like that would be enough to cover the stench of the current bunch). Having an assortment like that in congress and being able to choose a president from any of them is a step up from our current two-party system where only moderates and ostriches are represented.

Yeah, they have a future, they've just don't some long-term damage to their rep. It was their turn, so to speak, with the natural political pendulum we have, but they managed to pretty much ruin it as fast as they could. Sooner or later people will tire of the Democrats, too, and the GOP will gain again.

Best case scenario is that the GOP doesn't ditch the rightwingers, neocons and theocrats, and instead loses all the moderates to the DNC, making the Democrats the majority party, who then loses their more extreme members to the Greens or something, making a strong, moderate DNC, with smaller, more fringe oriented Republican and Green parties as dual opposition. I don't expect that, though.

The Republicans are going to have a hard time repairing the damage the neocons and theocrats have done to their image, though.

I'm a bit surprised nobody has mentioned the demographic trends that are going to make the Repubs a permanent minority party by 2020 or so, maybe a bit later than that, and that these trends are just about locked in at this point. An example of what I mean: California not so long ago was as likely to go Republican as it was Democrat in a presidential election, yet it has not done so since 1988, and I see no evidence it ever shall again. And given that states that are currently reliably "red" like Arizona and Texas, or at least "purple" like Florida are well on their way to a similar ethnic/racial makeup as California, I see no reason not to think these states are not going to ultimately follow California's voting patterns. Possibly the Repubs will find a way to entice groups like Latinos in without at the same time alienating their present base...but I honestly see no way they can do it.

In short, I do think the Republican Party is done long-term, but also that it is not quite time to count them out completely. I'd say 10-1 odds for them still mattering by 2040.

The GOP will have a good chance at a future if they clean out the bixarre people who hijacked it in 1994 during the Gingrich Revolution. That's when the idiots who did things like turn the Terry Schiavo tragedy into a political football (with a straight face, no less) and goosestep like cartoon Nazis behind the Bush/Cheney cabal until they put together the worst string of political missteps every recorded by any one group in American poltical/policy history. When you turn your party over to bug exterminators (Tom Delay) and quack MDs (Bill Frist), then you have no one to blame but yourselves when it all goes to shit. Common folk don't govern like geniuses. They govern like bug exterminators and auto mechanics. Which means that they don't actually govern at all.

The GOP used to be the adult party in American politics. Then the backbench crazies took it over and turned it into the lunatic fringe party. Until the grownups take it back, they don't have a future. They were given total control for only four years, and the crazies did what everyone knew they'd do with that power. Blew the whole thing up in their faces. I hope the GOP gets the adults back in control. It was nice having some solid and steady leadership in that party.

Until another corrupt, charismatic "leader" for them is groomed by the corporate/military establishment, the GOP will remain fractured into several feuding, disparate camps, not unlike Shiites and Sunnis.

except for their common, delusional hatred of all things Clinton, there is little common ground and no political center of gravity for the small-govm't libertarian sect, the theocratic thumpers, or the big-gubmint big-deficit neocons.

except for their common, delusional hatred of all things Clinton, there is little common ground and no political center of gravity for the small-govm't libertarian sect, the theocratic thumpers, or the big-gubmint big-deficit neocons.I hadn't thought of that. Perhaps one way to keep the forces of evil at bay is to elect Obama. Although she's my choice, Hillary would be a constant red flag for them to rally around as a target.

I hadn't thought of that. Perhaps one way to keep the forces of evil at bay is to elect Obama. Although she's my choice, Hillary would be a constant red flag for them to rally around as a target.

bingo

I'm not rooting for the SWP in particular. They're communists, which are no better than the fascists we're dealing with today in this administration.

I agree with your vision of a real Liberal Party coming onto the scene, the Dems in the middle where they've moved after the GOP gave up its claim to that territory, and some rightwing fringe group calling themselves the New Republicans or something like that (like that would be enough to cover the stench of the current bunch). Having an assortment like that in congress and being able to choose a president from any of them is a step up from our current two-party system where only moderates and ostriches are represented.


You are right. The Socialists are OK but the SWP are Trotskyites who are Marxist communists. The only reason that the Trots got a free pass in the past is because their leader was murdered in Mexico. But Trotsky was certainly no angel.

i dubt it will end for teh republicans, ever. its an institution of power, they will find new ways to cheat people.

I see it this way, once the Democrats take charge, then we will get some real change. We will get National Health Care. We will get real reform. The war in Iraq will end. And election reform will be a reality. There will be consumer protection and environmental protection. Corporate america will take the back seat to the people.

*poof* all of that stuff will just magically happen!


Now getting the Socialist Workers party elected... hmm that could be interesting.

My vision of the future is that there will be three political Parties on the scene... the Greens (who will merge with what is left of the socialist party) on the left, the Democrats on the center and Libertarians on the right. As for the GOP, it will be comprised of a few extreme rightists and corporate elitists and will be driven to the periphery of the political scene. Yes its wishful thinking but we can always dream. :)

*shudders*:tinfoil::yikes: