Call me crazy, but I have to believe that the Republican Party is only half as dumb as it looks, based on the current crop of personalities masking as Presidential candidates. If you take them at face value, they all share the characteristic of ego at some multiple of native intellect. None seem to have a credible chance of beating Obama in the general election, even with historic trends portending an incumbent defeat. At this moment, Obama's chief strength is the relative weakness of his opponents, most of whom will arrive at the convention DOA.
So what if...
Here's a ticket that I can picture arising from the murk of the Convention back room machinery: a general and a woman v.p.
Who might they be? General Stanley McChrystal and Senator Lisa Murkowski. Why?
McChrystal has strong identity with one of the few institutions in this country that still retains substantial citizen respect. And his dissing of the Commander-in-Chief gives him added creed with those who viscerally hate the CiC, irrespective of his accomplishments as such. McC has been lecturing on leadership at Yale as he contemplates his life's next mission. Walking through the door, he'd be a better front man for the party than anyone currently in the race.
Murkowski is a woman, and, as proven in her last election victory, and independent one with more backbone and possibly more principle than allot of her male colleagues in both parties. She has strong conservative credentials, but sufficient independence of thought to suggest that she's not a wind-up doll of the Tea Party Wing Nuts or the Party's Corpocracy Wing. She could conceivably attract a significant female constituency across party lines, as McChrystal could conceivably attract a significant male constituency with the Leadership mantra wrapped in the Flag with the Star Spangled Banner playing in the background on loop. Forget that he may be no better prepared to lead Congress, even with his own party in control, than was his former boss.
* * *
As I said, I have to wonder if the Republican Party is only half as dumb as it looks. I have wondered how some of the dwarfs have managed to stay in the race as long as they have, other than on their seemingly indefatigable egos. It occurs to me that the Republican institutional brain trust, burdened with the unintended consequences of the Tea Party, finally concluded that if you can't beat them, co-opt them. Let the show run; maybe even breath life support into the highly unlikely among them (Perry, Cain, Santorum?). Blur the field and drain the undesired energy. Then fill the vacuum with a totally plausible dark horse ticket that looks like a move of desperation at the eleventh hour and fifty-ninth minute, but was really in the works for a while. It gives the Repugs the decided advantage of springing on the Dems a totally unexpected ticket which demands a totally different strategy. It further shields the dark horse ticket from all the ugly baggage that has accumulated in the pre-convention debate-primary slug-fest.
I know, it sounds so conspiratorial. But then again, we have a long and vibrant tradition of that in our politics. Look at the Republican discipline in the Senate. That's not the product of principled consensus.
Mind you, I'm not advocating for such a ticket. Just speculating.
Onward.
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