A series of recent developments in various Republican Senate races has once again called into question whether the party’s committees are squandering a historic opportunity as they approach the 2010 elections. In several races throughout the country, candidates who either have the explicit backing of the party apparatus or are widely considered the establishment picks find themselves either in deep electoral holes or seriously challenged on personal or policy grounds.
As a whole, the GOP still stands to make major gains when voters go to the polls in eight months. But political observers and even some Republican strategists are wondering how and why the party is in its dysfunctional state when, traditionally, its guns should be united against Democrats.
"The GOP is going through a revolutionary change at the grassroots, but the national GOP has been tone-deaf," Craig Shirley, a longtime GOP communications hand, offered as an explanation. "The conservative/Tea Party/populist movement has been liberated from having to explain and apologize for the past transgressions of the national GOP and are in no mood to be dictated to. The status quo no longer holds sway over the base of the party, rather it is they who hold sway over the national GOP."
Those frictions were in evidence this past week when candidates implicitly and explicitly backed by the National Republican Senatorial Committee candidates, including a sitting senator, found themselves attacked from within the party.
The floundering prospects of Charlie Crist in the Florida Senate primary has produced a Hamlet act, in which the governor is now openly flirting with the idea of bolting the party and running as an Independent. A final decision should come later this week.
On Monday, meanwhile, the National Rifle Association sent out mailers attacking the NRSC’s favored candidate in the Indiana Senate race, ex-Sen. Dan Coats, for having a less than pure record on gun rights. That was followed by a stinging post from conservative activist, blogger, commenter and officeholder Erick Erickson of RedState.com, asking why Coats wasn’t filing information on his personal finances.
