This is the problem in a nutshell, most of the republican leadership is not smart enough to understand how dumb they are.
And during the eight years of GWB, the GOP conservatives got everything they had been bellyaching for during the past 50 years, as they cheerfully dismantled 100 years of common sense reforms dating back to even before Teddy Roosevelt. And when those new GOP policies totally crashed our economy, the very dumb GOP leadership still can't understand that many of their core assumption need some modification.
At least honest conservatives like William F. Buckley understood and was taking steps to spread the alarm, shortly before he died. And now Mr. Republican is Rush Limbaugh and or Dick Cheney. And Mrs. Republican seems to be Sarah Palin.