I keep waiting for a point where the Right Wing responds to a loss by moderating itself.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

So far, after big losses in 2006 and 2008, their only response has been to become more intransigent and shrill.

I really think that Fox News (and the rest of the whole Limbaugh/Drudge apparatus) has quite a lot to do with this, and is the single biggest factor in the GOP failing to respond with any sense of moderation or humility to big losses.

Since their message making only goes in one direction, it would take wholesale defection of the heads of the GOP from the Fox propaganda in a moderate direction to change things, i.e. if they became concerned over their very viability as a political party.

Since the political cycle will likely deal the GOP some wins this year, even if they are entirely consistent with "off cycle" elections, the media chorus will of course overlook this and be totally all about the roaring GOP comeback. So unfortunately it will take Obama being reelected in 2012 for the GOP to begin to have to look at itself, if it ever will.

Will it? :shrug:

[jpak]

1. Don't hold yer breath - they will just get louder and shriller

yup

[laughingliberal]

2. You have, apparently, not read the history of Germany's Weimar government

and how the right wing brought them down and paved the way for Hitler's rise to power.

[livetohike]

3. I doubt it. I foresee decades of the GOP floundering because

they have no intellect in their leadership and their group of "rising stars" are nitwits. They are being led by the rabid voices of Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity etc. and followed by sheep who don't even know who their Congressperson is.

[The Magistrate]

4. That, Sir, You Will Never See

These people are so constructed that they imagine any defeat is due to their not being pure enough. Their response to defeat will always be to double down and go to even greater extremes.

[tridim]

5. David Frum just moderated himself. Who's next?

This is going to be FUN! :)

[malaise]

13. The ReTHUG who's ready to challenge that jackass Boehner

who is brave enough to vote with the Dems.

[tridim]

15. I keep thinking about that possibility

No doubt there are several members who want to vote with the Dems. Sucks to be them really, they're screwed no matter what they do.

My vote is one yes from the Repukes.

[malaise]

16. Well they should hold the losers accountable

by dumping them before the vote.
The real problem is that many ReTHUG Congressfolks only regurgitate talking points and don't even know they've been duped.

[leftstreet]

6. If the Dems and M$M weren't propping them up, they'd be in history books

Reaganomics is dead, the Republican party is dead

But you'd never know it from all the bi-partisanshippin' goin on

[laughingliberal]

9. Reaganomics isn't dead. It's being supported by many Democrats today

The Republicans are just housing the bat shit crazy coalitions, now.

[Oregone]

7. Why would they need to?

Even in the minority, they are quite influential

[Swamp Rat]

8. LOL! Not only will that NOT happen, they will continue to blame and obstruct until they disintegrate

for lack of substance. :D

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

19. Interestingly, David Frum echoes my belief that the GOP is letting FOX/Beck/Rush dictate its stance:

http://www.frumforum.com/waterloo

...

At the beginning of this process we made a strategic decision: unlike, say, Democrats in 2001 when President Bush proposed his first tax cut, we would make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. We were going for all the marbles. This would be Obama’s Waterloo – just as healthcare was Clinton’s in 1994.

...

We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat.

There were leaders who knew better, who would have liked to deal. But they were trapped. Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the Republican voting base into such a frenzy that deal-making was rendered impossible. How do you negotiate with somebody who wants to murder your grandmother? Or – more exactly – with somebody whom your voters have been persuaded to believe wants to murder their grandmother?

I’ve been on a soapbox for months now about the harm that our overheated talk is doing to us. Yes it mobilizes supporters – but by mobilizing them with hysterical accusations and pseudo-information, overheated talk has made it impossible for representatives to represent and elected leaders to lead. The real leaders are on TV and radio, and they have very different imperatives from people in government. Talk radio thrives on confrontation and recrimination. When Rush Limbaugh said that he wanted President Obama to fail, he was intelligently explaining his own interests. What he omitted to say – but what is equally true – is that he also wants Republicans to fail. If Republicans succeed – if they govern successfully in office and negotiate attractive compromises out of office – Rush’s listeners get less angry. And if they are less angry, they listen to the radio less, and hear fewer ads for Sleepnumber beds.

So today’s defeat for free-market economics and Republican values is a huge win for the conservative entertainment industry. Their listeners and viewers will now be even more enraged, even more frustrated, even more disappointed in everybody except the responsibility-free talkers on television and radio. For them, it’s mission accomplished. For the cause they purport to represent, it’s Waterloo all right: ours.

[Swamp Rat]

20. I'll settle for temporary FUX Noise profits at a long-term cost to the GOP.

Plus, their largest audience (demographic) is getting long in the tooth. ;)

[annabanana]

10. They have a tiger by the tail now.

They cannot hold on and they cannot let go.

They own the racist, homophobic, hate filled mob. And it can turn on them in an instant.

[proud patriot]

11. Buchanan just did on MSBNC

saying "this is a huge win for the Democrats"

[malaise]

17. Looks like Obama does more than use the teleprompter

well. I'm lovin' this. :rofl:

[hobbit709]

12. The only way they'll moderate themselves is if they die of apoplexy.

"He was the most even-tempered man in town. He stayed mad all of the time."

[Yavin4]

14. The GOP Is Fractured Into Various Groups

Tea Partiers, Paul Randians, Christian Theologists, Neocon War Hawks, and last, but not least, Greedy Corporatists. This coalition won't hold for very long, and it runs counter to the demographic changes in America. Sure, they can win an election here and there, but the overall national trends in politics are allied against them.

In short, they are the party of the old, the greedy, the stupid, and the religious whack jobs.

[Odin2005]

18. The DLC and the MSM let the wackos pull the national discourse further and further Right.

So now a POS give-away to Big Insurance is called Socialism.

[D23MIURG23]

21. The short answer is no.

The republican party will slowly whither and die over the next 3 - 4 decades as the non-white population of the united states increases and the fundies of the baby-boomer and silent generations die. It will not reevaluate its strategy or basic outlook at all within this time period because the elites of the party are a bunch of one dimensional horror movie villains, devoid of any reason or human emotion save for fear, greed and self-righteous hatred.

It is unclear what will replace the party, but I suspect that once it gets sufficiently irrelevant, irate progressives will split off from the Democratic party and form their own apparatus, leaving the Democrats to hold the center right (where they have really wanted to be since the Reagan era).

This is of course complete speculation, but it seems as good a guess as any.