David Frum: GOP is on the path to extinction.

[denem]

"... especially on gay-rights issues, the under-30 generation has arrived at a new consensus. Our party seems to be running to govern a country that no longer exists."

Why Rush is Wrong ... A conservative's lament.
David Frum. Newseek. Mar 7, 2009

We lost the presidency in 2008. In 2006 and 2008, together, we lost 51 seats in the House and 14 in the Senate. Even in 2004, President Bush won reelection by the narrowest margin of any reelected president in American history.

The trends below those vote totals were even more alarming. Republicans have never done well among the poor and the nonwhite—and as the country's Hispanic population grows, so, too, do those groups. More ominously, Republicans are losing their appeal to voters with whom they've historically done well...

In 1984 Reagan won young voters by 20 points; the elder Bush won voters under 30 again in 1988. Since that year, the Democrats have won the under-30 vote in five consecutive presidential elections. Voters who turned 20 between 2000 and 2005 are the most lopsidedly Democratic age cohort in the electorate. If they eat right, exercise and wear seat belts, they will be voting against George W. Bush well into the 2060s.

Between 2004 and 2008, Democrats more than doubled their party-identification advantage in Pennsylvania. A survey of party switchers in the state found that a majority of the reaffiliating voters had belonged to the GOP for 20 years or more. They were educated and affluent. More than half of those who left stated that the GOP had become too extreme...
http://www.newsweek.com/id/188279/page/1

And on Rush

"...if people don't appreciate what we are saying, then say it louder. Isn't that what happened in 1994? Certainly this is a good approach for Rush himself. He claims 20 million listeners per week, and that suffices to make him a very wealthy man. And if another 100 million people cannot stand him, what does he care? What can they do to him other than … not listen? It's not as if they can vote against him.

But they can vote against Republican candidates for Congress. They can vote against Republican nominees for president. And if we allow ourselves to be over identified with somebody who earns his fortune by giving offense, they will vote against us."

Rush is a walking stereotype of self-indulgence—exactly the image that Barack Obama most wants to affix to our philosophy and our party. And we're cooperating!

I find myself increasingly agreeing with conservatives !!??

[ck4829]

1. Good.

[Xipe Totec]

2. The GOP suffers from Adipose Complex

They are in love with the Mother Of All Fat Asses

[Cha]

3. What a condition to

suffer from!

[Johnyawl]

12. That made me laugh out loud!

I read it to my wife, who burst out laughing and said "I'm so stealing that!"

[Xipe Totec]

18. Use it with my compliments

Spread the lard!

[rasputin1952]

13. LOL..."Adipose Complex"

That's a keeper!!!...

[NC_Nurse]

25. BWAAAHAHAHAHA!

Awesome!

[Odin2005]

30. LOL, That made me start laughing my fat ass off!

[Xipe Totec]

32. No offense to the Cherubim at DU!

[Cha]

4. That's the beauty of what Obama and the

Dems have done.. "And if another 100 million people cannot stand him, what does he care? What can they do to him other than … not listen? It's not as if they can vote against him."

Thanks to O and the Dems getting him out from under his rock because he said he wanted Obama to fail..now they can give him his rightful throne to accept apologies from the republicon party members who lash out at him armed with the truth.

[Trajan]

5. "I find myself increasingly agreeing with conservatives !!??"

Nope ....

Some conservatives are now, reluctantly and sorrowfully, agreeing with you ....

I disagree with those who think the Rush=GOP gambit is foolhardy .... I think it is a winner with 'common folk' all over the land, where it reaffirms the negative aspects of Rush's affiliation with the party of failure. While it is preferable to win over voters with the superiority of Democratic party philosophy, winning voters by default is good too ....

Rush is a big fat liar in a party full of big fat liars - He carries the idiot standard for them ....

I say; go get'm ...

[mvd]

6. It is, and that is great for America

[lunatica]

7. Congratulations to you too David Frum!

You sure did your part to destroy your party also...

Pot,kettle,black.

[WeDidIt]

8. The Rush Conundrum RAWX!

IF you go against Rush, the base demands you immediately bow down and kiss his anal cyst or get the fuck out of the Republan Party.

The Republan Party created this Frankenstein. Now, they have to deal with it as their membership decreases daily.

And Limbaugh loves it because he makes money, which is all he gives a fuck about any way. The more the Republan party shrinks, the more he has to rant against and the more his mind numbed robots listen to his every word.

As he builds his empire, the Republan party shrinks ever closer to oblivion, and he laughs all the way to the bank.

[Beetwasher]

9. I Like That! The Rush Conundrum!

Indeed. It's a sublime trap. BRAVO DEMS!!!

[Raine1967]

10. This is an amazing article.

The party is going so far to the right that Frum is now considered moderate in his eyes...

and Frum knows as well as most of us do -- he is not a moderate.

They are sending him e--mails to leave the party!

Thanks for posting this. In the end, Frum will be tossed to the curb, This I predict.

[RepublicanElephant]

11. so instead of the elephant, the gop symbol should be...

[rasputin1952]

14. LOL...

I had to save that pic...

[smoogatz]

15. Frum apology forthcoming in T-minus two days and counting... nt

[Hekate]

16. From his lips to God's ears. The wingnuts are very dangerous, but if the Party can be splintered...

... and if the corporatists and wingnuts can be shown for the unAmericans they are, the Republican Party may go back to the shadows for a long time to come.

PNAC Republicans like Frum thought they could control the wingnuts, but that only goes so far. Certain types want a demagogue to lead them -- someone on the order of Rush Limbaugh. I wonder at what point it will occur to Frum et al that Rush may be a clown, but then so was Hitler. The Republican Party hacks still seem to think that they can retain (control) their base and not drive away more moderate adherents.

Increasingly, it seems they are wrong.

Hekate

[Joe the Liberal]

17. I believe they have sunk their own battleship............

all that is left is the most loyal, crazy and radical of the party membership everyone else has left that sinking ship.

[old mark]

19. I am very happy to read this, especially the part about no more GOP presidents till 2060!

I will be long dead by then, meaning that I will never again live under Republican "leadership".

Thenks to all you young people, and stay healthy, live long, and vote Democratic every election forever.

I would love to see the GOP destroyed completely, but I will settle for them becoming totally pointless - and they are very close now!


mark

[Jiradog]

20. I hope the republican party dies also

But the democratic party should also die. Both parties are controled by elitists and manipulate the masses. I don't like big government either from the right or the left. Lets go back to a limited Constitutional Republic.

[warrior1]

21. the bush lost the election

and probably there had been other elections where the repukes stole the office.

So they have been losing a lot longer than he supposes.

[saltpoint]

22. The extinction of the Republic Party? Now wouldn't that be a damn shame.

[polichick]

23. That's one endangered species we won't miss.

[tanyev]

24. Like the dodos they are.

[janx]

26. Frum extolls the virtues of Reagan, but fails to mention that

the extreme religious right--which Reagan ushered into the Republican party in the first place--is exactly what Frum is lamenting now.

I find this opinion piece ultimately pathetic.

Edited to add Newsweek (March 16) cover:

[denem]

27. Cancer is malignant BUT

Frum cides the single issue Right To Lifers. Lip service is not a blow job.

[janx]

29. He should have figured that out 20 years ago. n/t

[sampsonblk]

28. Frum is a jerk, but he's right

If we play this right, the GOP will never again be a competitive political party.

[Zhade]

31. And the DLC's going right along with their rightwing buddies.

Good. Fuck them and their conservative, misinformed supporters.

[olegramps]

33. I see an analogy between the Catholic Church and the Republican Party.

In our large extended family there are only a couple of the young people who even attend church. This is in spite of the fact that most of them went to Catholic Schools and some to Catholic Colleges. They find the church to be totally irrelevant to their needs and life styles. They are totally uninterested in even discussing the church's dogmatic controversies. Nothing is more deadly than being ignored. I believe that Republican Party's message has little resonance with the majority of young people. The only younger people that I see backing the Republicans are rather nerdy pathetic souls. What energetic young person would want to be identified with Rush Limbaugh? How many young people, except some home schooled Jesus Camp victims, think gays are going to hell and abstinence sex education should be the norm? It is a party totally out of touch with reality with its leadership desperately clinging to policies that are totally irrelevant to the nation's needs.