That Akin Thing...

... It just won't go away. The first day of the Republican Convention lasted 5 seconds, as RNC Chair Reince Priebus-- fresh from an ass-whooping by Chris Matthews on national TV-- gaveled it open and then shut it down, as Republicans trembled in their rooms because it was a little windy in Tampa. And the ones who weren't trembling, were plotting. Apparently Chris Christie, well aware Romney is likely to lose in November-- is trying to position himself as the GOP front runner for 2016.

Right after Priebus opened proceedings today by announcing that the man who's run the country for the last three plus years "hasn't even run a garage sale or seen the inside of a lemonade stand," he got into another childish tit-for-tat with Todd Akin, his party's Missouri Senate nominee. “He could be tied,” Priebus told conservative bloggers Ben Howe and Chris Loesch, "we’re not gonna send him a penny.” Todd's son, Perry Akin-- wouldn't it be great if he was named Belly instead?-- shot back “Reince Priebus’ comments are extremely dissappointing [sic]." He claims the mantle of freedom, liberty and the good of America, but this betrays his apparent personal vendetta against Todd Akin. He is putting party power and political games ahead of the good of the country.” Perry's his dad's campaign manager.

Meanwhile, the Akin "thing" hangs over the convention like a pall, as though all those balloons they dropped could have been dead, stinking skunks. Manu Raju reported yesterday that the Missouri delegates are freaking out... and blame Romney for the mess, which isn't going to impact his own win in that increasingly red state but is likely to keep a very winnable seat in the hands of the Democrats' weakest and most pathetic incumbent, Claire McCaskill.

Missouri GOP delegates are rejecting the heavy-handed push by Mitt Romney and national Republicans to boot Todd Akin from their state’s Senate race, revealing a split among Republicans that could imperil the party’s effort to take back the chamber in the fall campaign.

In interviews with Politico, delegates argued that Akin could still win the race in the conservative state, pushing back against the notion that his remarks on rape were a death blow to his Senate candidacy. Several delegates here in Tampa seemed angry at the national party, saying the decision to withhold millions of dollars in campaign funding is the real impediment in their effort to oust Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill in November.

“Absolutely,” said John Putnam of Carthage, Mo., when asked if he was disappointed at Romney for demanding that Akin exit the race. “I think he needs to rescind that, retract that. I think [RNC Chairman] Reince Priebus and [Sen.] Roy Blunt and all the people need to support the candidate that the folks from Missouri nominated and picked in the primary.

“I think the GOP party bosses that are trying to drum him out are creating a bigger split in the party than Todd Akin is,” said Putnam, head of the Jasper County Republican Central Committee.

Putnam wasn’t alone. At a breakfast meeting of Missouri delegates here in Tampa, a number were sporting “Akin for Senate” stickers and stood strongly behind the six-term congressman’s decision to stay in the race. The support of the state-level Missouri Republicans for Akin undermines the unified front that the rest of the Republican Party-- from Romney down to conservative pundits-- has tried to show in urging Akin to quit.

“I think there’s disappointment that they would disengage from a candidate that was elected by the people decisively,” said Vernon Harms, a Missouri delegate. “I think they made a mistake.”

“I think honestly that’s shameful. The party should not throw him under the bus simply because he made a misstatement,” said Mitch Hubbard of Fulton, Mo. “I think Mitt Romney should have focused on his race. … Todd Akin will win his race because of the support he has.”

“I really wish they had been a little more circumspect and had given him the courtesy of letting him explain and apologize,” said Beverly Martin of Fulton, Mo. “As I told my friend, Democrats don’t eat their own.”

...[N]ot all Republicans in the congressional delegation are ready to abandon Akin. First-term Rep. Billy Long, who represents the conservative southwestern portion of the state, said Akin was the party’s candidate, whom he planned to support.

“The people of Missouri voted for him, and he’s our guy,” Long told Politico. “And either you’re for Todd Akin and I’m not for Claire McCaskill. … He’s been an underdog his whole life, he won a lot of races he wasn’t supposed to win, so I think he can win.”

In light of the revelations that Romney refused to allow Ron Paul to speak-- even at Paul's own video tribute celebration-- unless he allowed them to script him, no one thinks Huckabee will get up on stage and talk about how Romney and Ryan betrayed the conservative movement by throwing Akin under the bus. But the whispering campaign is well underway. But this morning The Hill reported that the far right of the party is plenty pissed off that Romney's establishment types are trying to squeeze them out of the decision making processes for the future. [Note: When The Hill uses the word "conservatives," they imply Romney and Ryan and the establishment are something other than conservative, which is insane. Just substitute either the word "fascist" or psychotic right-wing extremist" every time you see "conservative" pop up and you'll be fine.]

Some conservatives are not satisfied with a proposed deal to avoid a fight on the convention floor over Republican Party rules for future presidential primaries.

Disgruntled conservatives say the proposed rules changes are an effort by inside-the-Beltway consultants and party leaders to wrest influence away from grassroots activists.

Conservatives on the convention rules committee are trying to round up 28 signatures in support of an effort to abolish the proposed changes. If 28 rules committee members-- about 25 percent of the panel-- sign the petition, it could lead to a roll-call vote on the convention floor on the issue. A roll-call vote would also need to receive support from six state delegations. ...A floor fight over the contentious issue of delegate rules in future primaries could distract from the central project of officially nominating Mitt Romney to take on President Obama in November.

...The changes are being championed by Ben Ginsberg, a high-profile Washington-based election lawyer who is representing Romney’s campaign.

Conservatives believe Ginsberg is supporting the agenda of powerful political consultants and insiders.

“The guy who pushed these obnoxious changes was one of two members from the District of Columbia. His name is Ben Ginsberg. Earlier this year he was employed by the Michele Bachmann campaign and now he represents himself as representing the Romney campaign and he is doing things which are vigorously opposed by conservatives. Ben Ginsberg is a man unencumbered by principal,” Blackwell said.

Blackwell has served on GOP convention rules committees since 1988.

Drew McKissick, a rules committee member from South Carolina, said he remains unsatisfied with proposed changes to delegate and primary rules.

He said the proposed reforms would weaken the disincentive for states with winner-take-all primaries to move their primary dates to early March, diminishing South Carolina’s influence in choosing future nominees.

He said another proposal to empower the Republican National Committee to change its rules in-between conventions would marginalize grassroots conservatives.

“There’s a proposed Rule 12 which would in effect give the RNC the ability to change its rules in-between national conventions, a power they never had before, and that ruins the influence of the grassroots, of conservatives,” he said. “It would make the RNC a battleground for future presidential campaigns because everyone would start to try to jockey for influence on the committee to try to rig the rules in their favor for the next campaign, and we’re not going to have that either.”

...Under current rules, states that hold primaries before April must assign their delegates proportionally, a safeguard against a frontloaded presidential primary schedule. States that move their primaries to March have less influence because their delegates get split among candidates. ... Blackwell said the Virginia delegation was “extremely angry” over a third proposed change that would empower a presidential candidate to disavow delegates from a state he or she won-- thereby allowing candidates, and not voters, the power to pick delegates.