Another possibility
Joepistole said:
All their distortions and misrepresentations are being destroyed one by one in front of their noses.
I'm not sure that's it, though.
Let us start with a premise drawn from what used to count as conventional wisdom:
This should be the Republicans' year.
So what happened? Well, sure, to you and me it's kind of obvious, but for the faithful conservatives?
In a year that should be theirs, the Republicans came to their convention acting like they had something to prove. This is backwards compared to the former conventional wisdom.
In a year that should have Democrats writhing, they're not. Clearly, the Democrats are more confident and comfortable than the former conventional wisdom suggests.
True, Obama
does have a record to run on, despite the paradoxical Republican couplet arguing, to the one, that Obama has accomplished nothing and, to the other, that everything he has accomplished is evil or otherwise wrong. However, the economy is still rough, so that old conventional wisdom says ....
But look at the conventioneers. Republicans celebrated vicious dishonesty. Democrats are just having a good time.
It's something akin to a group dynamic related to body language.
More than any argument, this is the indicator that gives FOX News indigestion.
And it is almost ironic: Republicans have worked so hard to turn conventional wisdom upside down, and now they appear to be suffering their own wrath.
It might even be a mass neurosis. The primary season played as strangely as it could. Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum ... and then, at last, Mitt Romney.
I don't know, did I leave anyone out?
At the outset, Romney was supposed to be the viable one. Right now, the GOP might well be faring better with Gingrich at the top of the ticket; his big advantage over Romney is that fighting dirty is second nature—Mitt clearly isn't honest, but he has never really mastered the art because his privilege hasn't demanded it.
Who knows? Maybe Republicans would be owning this election if they had nominated Pawlenty. Sure, the guy is "boring", but compared to Mitt Romney, he's also respectable; that's a huge asset, as Republicans are discovering.
But it really does seem like Republicans don't really want it this year. Sure, there are plenty of rank and file conservatives who want it that badly, but ...
• ... this is not really a presidency anyone should look forward to, given the state we're in.
• ... really? Mitt Romney is the best the GOP could come up with? And that only after trying the half-wit, the moon-bat, the pizza guy, the blowhard, and the anal-retentive sweater vest? There was no better candidate to run against a charismatically wonky nerd with a bad economy on his plate? This is the best they can do? RomBot 3000 and "Two-Fifty" womb envy?
• ... the Republicans are much better at playing the long game. Sure, Clinton had the White House for eight years, and sure, Bush Jr. was an embarrassment to the Party, nation, and human species. But, meanwhile, we're fighting over abortion again, and birth control. Democrats are warmongering. Obama is prosecuting whistleblowers at an alarming rate. Deportations are up. And Democrats just fought tooth and nail for a Heritage Foundation healthcare brainstorm. Yeah, maybe Republicans are losing on the gay marriage front, but conservatives are still winning, despite Democrats in the White House and Senate.
Republicans know how to lose battles and win wars. And they have every reason to
not want the next four years of the White House on their record. It doesn't need to be a conspiracy theory; mass neurosis suffices. They need not explicitly recognize they're tanking.
It's one possible explanation. In that case, whether it's a matter of the stars falling from the eyes of hopeful rank and file conservatives, or simply a coming to terms with what they've known all along, relatively few would be the hardliners who are actually choking on themselves over the growing prospect of Obama's re-election. Those poor souls are likely gathered in specialty blocs; the most delusional of the evangelicals and would-be libertarians. A lot of them will be Tea Partiers.
In some respects, it's a more hopeful assessment than accepting that Republicans are actually so deluded as the Party and its agents are depicting it. Mitt Romney seems to be just going through the motions; I've suggested previously that, "
He's trying to run an election campaign without sweating. He's trying to achieve the White House without feeling sore."
And that would explain it, to be certain. At some level, he does not believe he can win, so why open up his tax records? Why bother with policy details? Why make any effort toward recognizing facts?
And perhaps the specific reality isn't so clearly resolved, but the FOX News fanatics are not going to be swayed from their delusion just because a bunch of Democrats get up onstage and say so. It is, as such, very likely that some amorphous sense of doom is finally settling over Republican hopes for the White House. Revelation, perhaps, but at least as likely to be a moment of clarity amid otherwise intoxicating neurosis.
The question for the Democratic convention was one of restraint. It was not a question of fending off Republican attacks, but, rather, showing enough dignified restraint to not rub the GOP's noses in it. And, in truth, I'm not sure they're pulling it off. Republicans' heads are so far up their own asses that they can't help rubbing in something.
And there comes a point when, though they might not like to admit it, even FOX News can see the obvious.
Conservatives' best hope now is just to weary voters into numbness and hope people vote against Obama. Mitt Romney is still, despite all else, the leading brand for voters who decide so superficially.
