You know the GOP has become unhinged when ultra-conservative strategist Karl Rove has become the voice of reason. He has started a ruckus by founding a new organization, Conservative Victory Project, that plans to raise money to crush Tea Party extremists in the primaries, so more electable mainstream Republicans can emerge to face Democrats in general elections.
Rove acted because the Republicans placed a series of screwballs on the ballot in 2012, most notably Todd “legitimate rape” Akin in Missouri, and Richard “rape is meant to be” Murdoch in Indiana. It appears that the GOP learned nothing from the 2012 defeats. Radical ideologues are already beginning to line up to run in the 2014 midterm elections. The latest to throw his hat into the ring is Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) who has signaled that he will enter the contest to fill the seat of Sen. Saxby Chambliss. Broun, a physician on the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, attracted attention last fall for saying that “evolution, embryology and the Big Bang theory — all of that is lies straight from the pit of hell.”
Lovely sentiment coming from a doctor who sits on an important committee that is supposed lead America into the future.
Needless to say, incensed Teabagger activists are throwing tantrums and want to dump Rove overboard, because they now view him as a perfidious traitor who is trying to wrest back control of the asylum from the inmates. Yeah, that ultra-liberal Rove is practically a bong-hitting, bead-wearing hippie to the severe conservatives who now elevate the Broun’s and Akins to primary victories. The madness of the modern GOP is such, that it ran moderate Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) out of office and turned former Florida Gov. Charlie Christ into an Independent/Democrat.
The problem Rove faces is that he seems to only want to place a thin layer of concealer on the face of the Republican Party, when it really needs a substantial facelift, and maybe even an entire new head. Simply electing candidates who are shrewd enough to mask their extremism will only go so far at a time when many voters have finally figured out that the GOP does not represent their interests.
Rove should take some good old fashioned homespun Texas advice: “The only thing in the middle of the road are yellow lines and dead armadillos.”
If his goal is to reform the GOP and drag it into the 21st Century, he needs to reform the party from top to bottom, not simply add cosmetic changes that are doomed to fail when up against the righteous fervor of Tea Party activists.
