IS THE GOP'S FAR RIGHT COALITION FALLING APART ? THE SHORT ANSWER: YES

I'm doing my research of just how lame Bush-as-lame-duck really is (so far: very) and I hope to write something about that soon. Meanwhile there is something else that progressives should have learned from this week's election results. That's the story about the shattering of the right-wing coalition. It really is falling apart. Moderate Republican-leaning suburbs in Virginia and New Jersey-- no to mention in less spotlighted races like the local Suffolk County (Long Island) elections-- turned away from a GOP which is completely and utterly now under the total domination of Far Right maniacs with almost nothing in common with moderate Republicans or with Libertarians.

When the hate mongers in Texas were celebrating their huge win in their vile jihad to marginalize gay Americans, they immediately turned their bile and hatred towards divorce. Maybe they should consider moving to Iran where their primitive, theocratic way of thinking dominates the country.

Interestingly, my friend Joy in Austin sent me an e-mail this morning about how the Texas Republican Party, probably the furthest to the right of any Republicans in America, is tearing itself apart. This is a state party whose platform is further to the right on many issues than even Hitler or Mussolini tried to impose on Germany and Italy!

The article, which offers evidence that the most extremist lunatic fringe of the right wing of the already ultra-conservative and radical Texas Republican Party, and the wealthy Texans who control its machinations, are seeking to purge the normal conservative Republicans who've shown a tiny bit of independence from the ideologically fascistic line. This is part of the tumult that seems to promise the most lively Republican primary season in many years-- and opportunities for relatively moderate and pragmatic candidates to win some primaries. The article is by Harvey Kronberg from his QUORUM REPORT yesterday.

Kronberg starts with a bit of news that should come as no surprise to anyone awake enough to have followed the GOP's long and disgraceful history of dirty tricks in the electoral field. "In the days leading up to the November 8th election, a number of state Rep districts were targeted by an automated phone poll sponsored by the Republican Party of Texas. The automated survey starts out by asking whether or not the respondent intends to vote for or against Proposition 12. It goes on to ask questions ranging from appraisal and revenue caps to whether or not you think Ronnie Earle is up to his 'old dirty trick' by indicting Tom Delay. It includes a question about vouchers. It also asks if you intend to vote for your incumbent state rep and then names the state rep in the targeted district.
State Reps districts that appear to have been targeted include Charlie Geren, Delwyn Jones, Todd Smith, Tommy Merritt, Toby Goodman, Tony Goolsby and Carter Casteel." OK, we all know about Republican push polls. So what? They do this all the time. Well, the difference here is that all of the legislators mentioned above are Republicans, though not of the radical, loon variety, just old fashioned conservative Republicans.

Rep Todd Smith, whose district was included, wondered why the districts of independent-minded Republicans were targeted and he called the Republican Party of Texas' Executive Director, a neo-fascist hack named Jeff Fisher. Fisher lied and told him they were gathering information in case there was a challenge from a Democrat in the general election. According to DAILY QUORUM, Smith was not buyin' it. "'I can't be any blunter than to say without any doubt whatsoever that Jeff Fisher lied to my face. He told me that the purpose of that poll was to help me should I have a Democratic opponent in a general election. If the RPT is spending money to take a poll to help me in a general election in my district then the responsible party should be terminated for incompetence.' Smith's district is unwinnable for a Democrat. David Dewhurst beat John Sharp with 65.5% of the vote. Fisher declined to respond."

Fisher is steaming and wants to know "who's creating the list of witches and on what basis do they create the list... This is the robotization of the Republican Party. If you are not prepared to read off of a pre-approved script, you need not apply. I can only imagine or guess which vote the powers-that- be disapprove of. But I am prepared to defend any vote to the only people that matter to me, my constituents."

Kronberg writes that people are speculating "that this might what some anticipate as purge of independents sponsored by the Speaker" (DeLay clone Tom Craddick). Meanwhile moderate suburbanites are looking at the GOP's drift to the right headlong rush over the cliff of authoritarianism and fascism... and are running to the polls to vote for Democrats. Republicans on Long Island, who have tended to dominate Suffolk County, are now saying that the GOP is beyond recovering from the damage inflicted on it by the radical right. And Democrats in Virginia, where the vote-rich suburbs just abandoned the hapless Kilgore en masse, are actually starting to think about a serious race against Senator Allen next year.

I was just on hold upstairs, waiting 20 for a customer service rep from my phone provider, SBC, and I had nothing better to do than turn on CNN. Between a talking-head and former Far Right extremist congressloon-turned-pundit Bob Barr, you'd think they were reading DWT! I mean it was at least 10 straight minutes of connecting Chalabi to the GOP, connecting DeLay and Abramoff to the GOP, connecting the failed war policies to the GOP, connecting virtually everything that is troubling Americans (except not the attempt to inject Charlie with mercury-laced flu medicine yesterday) with the GOP! 2005 could be a very good year for our country!