Who is the most influential Republican now?

[retrospooty]

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: GenHoth
Ron Paul?

He said "influential," not "credible."

Sadly, I think Ron Paul could be the savior of the GOP, but the audience doesnt want to hear common sense - Ron Paul is full of that.

 

[jonks]

Originally posted by: retrospooty

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: GenHoth
Ron Paul?

He said "influential," not "credible."

Sadly, I think Ron Paul could be the savior of the GOP, but the audience doesnt want to hear common sense - Ron Paul is full of that.

Well, as the Onion said, people enjoy having, you know, roads.

 

[daveymark]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
I think we will know in January when Obama takes office.

Someone will rise up and head the opposition at that time.

As for the RNC: I think we need Newt. He is ideologically sound, popular within the party and has the kind of star power that will be needed to compete with Obama. If Newt calls up and says he wants to be on your Sunday morning show you take him up at that offer. If Michael Steel calls up you might pass depending on the subject and other guests that are out there.

is he the one that divorced his cancer ridden wife on her deathbed?

 

[Arkaign]

Originally posted by: daveymark

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
I think we will know in January when Obama takes office.

Someone will rise up and head the opposition at that time.

As for the RNC: I think we need Newt. He is ideologically sound, popular within the party and has the kind of star power that will be needed to compete with Obama. If Newt calls up and says he wants to be on your Sunday morning show you take him up at that offer. If Michael Steel calls up you might pass depending on the subject and other guests that are out there.

is he the one that divorced his cancer ridden wife on her deathbed?

*sigh*

Newt is the perfect example of the conundrum we face with politicians. He's actually a pretty solid conservative, and the work he did in Congress in the '90s was impressive. Teaming with Clinton brought spending down. We actually had a budget surplus!

But on a personal note, Newt is incredibly creepy. Just a nasty horrible man.

So the choice becomes, do we support a competent cretin over an incompetent nice guy/gal? IDK, to be honest.

I have a feeling that Obama is both competent and a nice guy, but what he can do remains to be seen, and I have a lot less faith in congress and the DNC and RNC leadership to set our country straight.

Strap in and hold on tight, this is gonna be one weird ride.

 

[RightIsWrong]

To me, the answer is very clear.....

Karl Rove.

He has a track record (not that one....we all know about that one) of putting together very strong campaigns that turn all the right screws to get the base out to vote in droves. He is a maker of men. Hell, if he was able to get W re-elected after that complete turd of a first term, what do you think that others in the party with a little less baggage could do?

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: jonks

Originally posted by: retrospooty

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: GenHoth
Ron Paul?

He said "influential," not "credible."

Sadly, I think Ron Paul could be the savior of the GOP, but the audience doesnt want to hear common sense - Ron Paul is full of that.

Well, as the Onion said, people enjoy having, you know, roads.

The Onion is for finding entertainment, not political talking points.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: RightIsWrong
To me, the answer is very clear.....

Karl Rove.

He has a track record (not that one....we all know about that one) of putting together very strong campaigns that turn all the right screws to get the base out to vote in droves. He is a maker of men. Hell, if he was able to get W re-elected after that complete turd of a first term, what do you think that others in the party with a little less baggage could do?

Perhaps. But if the Dem's had a better candidate, they would have beat Bush to a pulp in '04. If you compare Obama to Kerry, it is easy to see what Kerry lacked.

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: RightIsWrong
To me, the answer is very clear.....

Karl Rove.

He has a track record (not that one....we all know about that one) of putting together very strong campaigns that turn all the right screws to get the base out to vote in droves. He is a maker of men. Hell, if he was able to get W re-elected after that complete turd of a first term, what do you think that others in the party with a little less baggage could do?

Nobody would have gotten a Rep elected in 08. They tried Steve Schmidt, who had a great record of getting Republicans elected and he fell on his face, predictably. Rove is damaged goods, discredited for what went on in the GWB administration. He's been fingered as one of the perpetrators of the leak that outed that undercover agent. In my mind he's been completely tarnished. How can a corrupt insider in a corrupt cabinet be seen as the front man for his party? Besides, he's not an elected official, right? The spokesperson for the party (if there is one) has to be someone who's in a creditable position, i.e. elected to prominent office.

 

[miketheidiot]

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: GenHoth
Ron Paul?

He said "influential," not "credible."

luckily, ron paul is neither

 

[RightIsWrong]

Originally posted by: Muse

Originally posted by: RightIsWrong
To me, the answer is very clear.....

Karl Rove.

He has a track record (not that one....we all know about that one) of putting together very strong campaigns that turn all the right screws to get the base out to vote in droves. He is a maker of men. Hell, if he was able to get W re-elected after that complete turd of a first term, what do you think that others in the party with a little less baggage could do?

Nobody would have gotten a Rep elected in 08. They tried Steve Schmidt, who had a great record of getting Republicans elected and he fell on his face, predictably. Rove is damaged goods, discredited for what went on in the GWB administration. He's been fingered as one of the perpetrators of the leak that outed that undercover agent. In my mind he's been completely tarnished. How can a corrupt insider in a corrupt cabinet be seen as the front man for his party? Besides, he's not an elected official, right? The spokesperson for the party (if there is one) has to be someone who's in a creditable position, i.e. elected to prominent office.

I understand your point and think that it is very legit.

However, I think that the one thing that has been proven over and over is that you can never be too guilty of anything as a politician (or those pulling the strings) to be considered "too damaged" or "too corrupt". Just look at Ted Stevens!

As for who is the most influential, I took it as meaning who has the most power in the party....not who is in the position to best to step forward as the face of the party. If that were the intent of the OP, I would have to say someone like Pawlenty.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: miketheidiot

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: GenHoth
Ron Paul?

He said "influential," not "credible."

luckily, ron paul is neither

Agree with his views or not, Paul is probably the most honest politician in Washington.

But I wouldn't expect much more from a troll such as you. That's about all you do at P&N, troll.

 

[Pepsei]

conservatives are different compare to republicans..... a lot of true conservatives are now complaining about RINOs.

 

[Lemon law]

Speak of the devil and the name Karl Rove pops up. And while Karl Rove and the GOP have been almost joined at the hip long before Reagan was elected, Karl Rove had little influence with Reagan administration.
Its seems Rove was always in the trenches for the guys that lost to Reagan.

http://www.famoustexans.com/karlrove.htm

While I do not believe that Reagan was anything but a national disaster, I also have to admit there is a very strong, especially inside of the GOP, reverence for the Gipper, and even today he is looked back as
a role model for the GOP to emulate.

And now will try to make a case that it was the lack of Rove as an Reagan adviser that may be the cause for the enduring affection. And by extension, why GWB set new world records for his duration of Presidential
unpopularity. In the case of Reagan's handlers, they knew they had a popular front man easy to manipulate, add the proper flattery, and Reagan could be used to advance their agenda. And while Reagan advisers may have lacked the incitement mastery of a Rove in slicing and dicing various factions of their base, they more than made up for it in their obsessive monitoring of events. If any story appeared on the evening news critical of Reagan, they applied to corrective actions immediately, preventing public relations problems almost before they happened. Or confounding the opposition with counterarguments, making even the Laffer curve seem believable. Their lone Katrina like failure may have been Iran contra, but they brilliantly defused it with the Reagan admission of fooling himself. By in large, Ronaldf Reagan had all the spend and borrow bad governance of GWB, and minus the two GWB quagmires, Reagan minus Rove just made bad medicine seem tastier.

In contrast, Rove was the first aboard the GWB bandwagon, seeing in GWB, the silly putty that could be molded into just the right shape. And came to GWB whispering, just put me in charge of everything and I can get you the 50.01% it takes to win. What is lacking in Rove is an iota of sympathy for the losing 49.99%, because those folks are losers, and deserve to be humiliated. And the as a results logic that delivering governmental success does not matter either. Various coalitions could always be manipulated into delivering a permanent bare majority because nothing could trump Rovian hard ball politics. The P.T. Barnum maxim at its finest, there is a sucker born every minute and Karl Rove best understood how to take advantage of it.

Even when Rove was forced out because his suspected role in outing a CIA agent, what was left in the GWB team was an extension of Karl's personality. And now Karl waits for that next candidate he can mold into
a winner.

 

[Genx87]

Give it 12 months. The smoke has to clear from the civil war.

 

[Robor]

Originally posted by: amdhunter
I'd have to go with Sarah Palin. To me, she presents herself as the perfect Republican.

If that's true it's pretty friggin' sad and only further affirms my decision to switch from (R) to (D) this year.

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: Robor

Originally posted by: amdhunter
I'd have to go with Sarah Palin. To me, she presents herself as the perfect Republican.

If that's true it's pretty friggin' sad and only further affirms my decision to switch from (R) to (D) this year.

Hopefully this is the GOP's darkest hour and they'll recover. They're mostly very pathetic. I'm not saying there aren't some good people among them, but I don't know of them personally. I only say this because it would not be good for the country moving forward if only one party has the spirit needed. A one party country is dangerously close to totalitarian, is it not?

 

[DrPizza]

Palin isn't the most influential; she's merely the most popular with the public. I'm not sure how her ratings are right now in Alaska, but I'd bet they've dropped considerably from the "80%" favorable she once had. Alaskans were simply happy to see change & thought they were rid of the "good ol' boy" ruling class. (Little did they know it was going to be replaced with "Awww, shucks, she was on my basketball team with me. She'll make a great ......"

But, I don't really think the republican party leaders really take her that seriously any more. Of course, if they see that there's something in it for themselves to elevate her status, they'll do so.

 

[Jaskalas]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn

Originally posted by: Perknose

Originally posted by: ebaycj
The correct answer is: Nobody.

Damn, he should have run this election, a lot of conservatives wanted to vote for him.

About 4 million conservatives did vote for him by staying home.

That's what happens when you nominate the guy who wants to reach out to Dems. Hopefully the RNC learned a lesson, unless they want to keep seeing us vote third party or not at all.

 

[CaptnKirk]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn


I think we need Newt.

Like the worst vision from McBeth . . .

Newt Gingrich in the background wearing an eyepatch, Sarah Palin in a celebrity guest apperance as the 2nd Witch,
circling around a boiling cauldron . . .


FIRST WITCH:
Round about the caldron go;
In the poisoned entrails throw.
Toad, that has spent
Thirty one days and nights under cold stone,
From whose sweat a sleeping venom was gotten,
Boil you first in the charmed pot!

ALL:
Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

SECOND WITCH:
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL:
Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

A sure cure-all for what ails the GOP movement.

 

[filetitan]

Originally posted by: Perknose
Right now, it's Ronald Reagan's dessicated corpse, followed closely by Tina Fey.

LOL

 

[Jhhnn]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
Look out for a hard charging Jim DeMint, who on Tuesday may lead the charge to disembowel Steven. DeMint has already scolded McCain, will probably make a bid to supplant McConnell as Senate minority leader,
and more importantly, is in agreement that the GOP lost its way by not being conservative enough; An easy message to sell to an ever gullible GOP.

However, as they say, six months is an eternity in politics, meaning the GOP has four eternities to reinvent itself before the next mid term elections. And if the democrats can't dig out of the hole we are all in now, its advantage GOP. While the other GOP advantage will be to choose the new identity that best fit the times for the next election, I might argue that was actually McCain in 2008, but not even the mighty McCain could carry the weight of a GWB monkey on his back. A weight the next generation of GOP candidates will not have to carry.

Giving new meaning to the correct answer being nobody, if the GOP is rational, it will bide its time and not rush any leadership decisions. And since the GOP is seldom rational, we can look forward to some open GOP infighting. Darwinian survival of the fittest may be replaced by survival of the most delusional faithful. As each faction will search for the next Ronald Reagan figurehead and right now the Joan of Arc version
has appeal. But the other polling consideration is that the GOP must do a far better job of appealing to younger voters, females, and it must do far better with Hispanics.

Few people realize that this economic situation has been brewing for a very long time, essentially since the Reagan era. It's part and parcel of the whole republican mantra of deregulated free enterprise capitalism- the downside of it, the flipside of the coin. They need that economic pitch, that pie in the sky trickledown Growth! Growth! Growth! to bridge the gap between the faithful, the Palinistas, and more moderate voters.

That dog won't hunt, certainly not until this storm has passed, and that will take a lot more than a couple of years- bet on it.

Leadership, having a figurehead, isn't their issue atm, but rather message, and until they find a new one, they're pretty much screwed.

 

[spidey07]

I'm going to go with Mitch McConnel as being the most influential, not necessarily the most powerful or the most public representative. The bi-partisan effort he's gathered regarding energy/oil is only testament to that.

-edit-
To make the distinction between influential and powerful:
Influential - ability to gather support
Powerful - ability to demand/force support

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: dmcowen674
Joe Lieberman

Today confirms what I said.

Lieberman is the most infuential.

He got to retain his committee chairmanship despite backing McCain.

I would say at this point in American politics Liberman is the most powerful man even more so than Obama.

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: dmcowen674
Joe Lieberman

Today confirms what I said.

Lieberman is the most infuential.

He got to retain his committee chairmanship despite backing McCain.

I would say at this point in American politics Liberman is the most powerful man even more so than Obama.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gag, choke, vomit, retch, IMHO, Lieberman is a legend in only his own mind, he was on the wrong side of the Iraq war, for some damn reason the press inflated an intellectual flyweight whose only real allegiance is to Israel, into a media darling.

When even the Connecticut dems could no longer stomach him in 2006, he ran as independent. He won the general election, not on the basis of any popular democratic and GOP bi-partisan appeal, but won as a total fluke, simply because the fellow the GOP ran was a total idiot, who could barely command 12% of the GOP vote. So Lieberman got some 85% of the GOP vote and a few pro Iraq war democrats. Had the GOP run some one credible, Lieberman would have lost.

If anything, Lieberman's national popular appeal has slipped in the past two years,
as his can't tell the difference between a Shia and a Sunni gaffs became national laughing stocks, and to add injury to insult, Lieberman kept doing it. But Lieberman
had one and only one appeal to fellow dems, he held the swing vote on who controlled the Senate. And the pocket threat of I could turn rouge republican.

But this coming congress, Lieberan's only charm may be to have that 60'th filibuster proof vote. Long odds, the final dem count will be only 58 at best, and 57 without Lieberman means doodly squat. And if the dem plus independents voting democrat stands at less than 60 in the Senate, ole Joe is odd man out, the dems don't need him, the GOP does not trust him, and Joe Lieberman has no political future in any case.

I respect the right of dmcowen674 to like Lieberman, but I doubt that makes dmcowen674 into anything but a vanishingly small minority. The country has changed and Lieberman will simply be left behind because he is clueless.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: Lemon law

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: dmcowen674
Joe Lieberman

Today confirms what I said.

Lieberman is the most infuential.

He got to retain his committee chairmanship despite backing McCain.

I would say at this point in American politics Liberman is the most powerful man even more so than Obama.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gag, choke, vomit, retch, IMHO, Lieberman is a legend in only his own mind, he was on the wrong side of the Iraq war, for some damn reason the press inflated an intellectual flyweight whose only real allegiance is to Israel, into a media darling.

When even the Connecticut dems could no longer stomach him in 2006, he ran as independent. He won the general election, not on the basis of any popular democratic and GOP bi-partisan appeal, but won as a total fluke, simply because the fellow the GOP ran was a total idiot, who could barely command 12% of the GOP vote. So Lieberman got some 85% of the GOP vote and a few pro Iraq war democrats. Had the GOP run some one credible, Lieberman would have lost.

If anything, Lieberman's national popular appeal has slipped in the past two years,
as his can't tell the difference between a Shia and a Sunni gaffs became national laughing stocks, and to add injury to insult, Lieberman kept doing it. But Lieberman
had one and only one appeal to fellow dems, he held the swing vote on who controlled the Senate. And the pocket threat of I could turn rouge republican.

But this coming congress, Lieberan's only charm may be to have that 60'th filibuster proof vote. Long odds, the final dem count will be only 58 at best, and 57 without Lieberman means doodly squat. And if the dem plus independents voting democrat stands at less than 60 in the Senate, ole Joe is odd man out, the dems don't need him, the GOP does not trust him, and Joe Lieberman has no political future in any case.

I respect the right of dmcowen674 to like Lieberman, but I doubt that makes dmcowen674 into anything but a vanishingly small minority. The country has changed and Lieberman will simply be left behind because he is clueless.

I don't like him one bit.

If this was the 1770's he would be hung for treason.