At the moment, the Republican Party has been colonized by the most-radical elements of the American Right Wing. This was a deliberate strategy since at least Nixon's "Southern Strategy" (which was an implicitly racist strategy), perfected during Reagan's years when he cozied up the Religious Right against his own beliefs, but now this strategy has come back to haunt the Republicans.

The ignorant, superstitious, racist, paranoid elements that the Republican elite counted on for votes have now gained control of the Party and these elements can't help but appear atrocious to the mainstream of American thought. So the Republican elite face a stark choice:

1. Stick with the Teapublican faction and face repeatedly going down to electoral defeat nationally (while very easily winning regional elections, especially in the South) or

2. Return to their roots as a sensible, fiscally-conservative but socially-moderate party that can win national elections but one that will be out-flanked on the Right regionally by the Teapublicans.

Neither choice really appeals to the Republican elite.

Advice to the Republican party from the husband of a democratic state party rep.. Atlant Schmidt, husband of Jan Schmidt (D-Nashua).

How large can a grain of salt be?

Seamus:

So you have no *ACTUAL ARGUMENT* against my statement?

Thanks.

Atlant,
Excellent analysis, but,
you forgot about the third option that the Republicans have decided upon:

Cheat the system. The Republicans are using the power they have right now to secure more power by rigging the system in their favor. Check out what they are doing regarding Electoral College votes in Virginia.

They are planning the Republican future by changing the system in their favor today.

Ray:

Happily, the news today suggests that the Virginia State Senate won't go along with the amazing abuse of power pulled by the Virginia House.

Perhaps they realized that if mid-term redistricting becomes the norm, well, Democrats can do that too?

JGONH:

> Racist? Because Tea Party favorite Herman Cain was white?

One token black (or even two; I'll spot you J.C. Watts) doesn't make the present-day Republican Party non-racist, and *EVERYONE* who considers this dispassionately knows this. By the way, how did candidate Cain do in the contest for the Republican Presidential nomination? Did he lead the ticket in 2012?

So any conservative black is a token? That in an of itself is racist.

As for the racist republicans, what party had the first black secretary of state? which had the first black national security adviser? I suppose the Democrats could not find anyone qualified for a high level position until 2008...

Why does it always end in the race card?
The fact that democrats have come to a thread like this one to give recommendations indicates democrats still are concerned about republicans. Democrats trying to make republicans more successful has to be a joke.
Stick to praising Jessy Jackson and reverend Wright as signs of racial superiority. The accomplishments made by the democrat party are just as inadequate as the republicans. 2 part systems are not all inclusive nor should they be.

Had Senator Obama been vetted like Cain he would be back doing community organizing on a city level.

OK Atlant, name the leading minorities in the democratic party. I will even take name of mixed race like OUR president. Which we will thank Harvard for his education. ;->

What does it tell you when the Republicans had more minorities on stage at their last presidential convention, than they did in their entire audience?

300 million Americans vetted President Obama.

And they did a very good job.

Seamus:

> So any conservative black is a token? That in an of itself is racist.

Of course not. But let's look at the statistics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Americans_in_the_United_States_Congress#The_modern_era

In the Modern Era, there have been *5* African-American Republican Congressional Reps. Right now, there are (drumroll please) *0*. There have been *100* A-A Democratic Reps with 39 currently serving.

In the Senate, the numbers are closer: 2 Republicans and 3 Democrats (and although you've actually got one serving, one of ours "grew up" to be President Obama).

Your party can't even find minorities to sit behind your candidates at rallies; you've got nothing but tokens.

Come on Ray, if you are right there must have been a power outage. They never even confirmed his birth certificate for months after the election. Still have not met one girl friend or seen one college paper written by Obama. I won't count the paper that said he was from Kenya.

http://www.westernjournalism.com/obama-literary-agent-obama-born-in-kenya/

Patriot,
Come to think of it, we never saw George W's birth certificate, nor Clinton's, nor George HW's, nor Reagans. Nor have we seen any other president's college work.

Why is it again that Obama had to produce his birth cert and or college papers, where we never asked for this stuff before?

Oh that's right, the color of his skin makes President Obama untrustworthy.

Patriot,
"Breitbart.com"

LOL!!! HAHAHA

Thanks for making me laugh today! You guys are funnier than performance artists like Colbert.

Maybe had any one of the presidents written or had someone write a paper for them making that kind of a statement one would have questioned them. Are you saying that the document did not exist?
If in fact Obama had written such a statement on his application to Harvard, that would explain his reluctance to release his paper work. Sounds similar to Senator Warren.
I know discredit the author. Even if Obama explained it as a mistake.

Charles are they really independent? If so, why not run as undeclared? See that is why people have no respect for "politicians" these people just can't tell it the way it is. They attach themselves to the ticket with their best chance of winning. It's like living a lie.
Just so you know, Obama is white! Don't believe me? Play golf, vacation at the Cape, and ride a bicycle with a helmet. Just like Clinton!!!!

Charles:

Thank you. I have no animosity, per se, against Republicans. My neighbors are Republicans and some previous neighbors were Republican elected officials. I like Donna Lee Lozeau and think she's doing an effective job as Mayor. I knew and liked Don Davidson. I think government should consider all positions and that is done best when there are actually advocates for all positions.

But the Teapublicans are damaging our state and damaging our country. While they're keeping our government from doing *ANYTHING* productive, the Chinese are marching on towards economic hegemony. And meanwhile, we're wasting lives and treasure on pointless wars in Southwest Asia.

I would welcome a return of sanity to the Republican Party, but if they choose to marginalize themselves, I hope it happens fast-enough to save our country from the ruin it's presently speeding towards.

Amen, Atlant

Racist and stupid. What a combo JGONAD

Racist? Not a chance. I think all men are created equal and have equal opportunity to be successful, then taxed to death by Democrats.

And abortions help get rid of unwanted people.