November 15, 2012

Haley Barbour wants to give the GOP "a very serious proctology exam."

"We need to look everywhere.... We have to look at everything in depth.... and be brutally honest."

That's perilously close to the rape theme that got the GOP into so much trouble this year.

Meanwhile, the Governor of Wisconsin — the illustrious Scott Walker — said the GOP needs a new "tone."

Yes. Back away from the nether orifices.

38 comments:

machine said...

well, after a blowout like that some type of exam seems necessary...

Farmer said...

The incumbent won. Incumbents usually do. It's a good idea to look at your party's faults after a loss I suppose, but this is pretty ridiculous. Romney ran a good campaign. He was a good candidate. The only thing that needs fixing is the one thing the GOP will never fix - a refusal to raise taxes on the wealthy. Right or wrong, most people hate that. Stick to your guns on it and you'll lose when all other things are equal.

Phil 314 said...

He called for a top-to-bottom review of the party’s ground game

Sounds like a bottom-to-top review.

Shouting Thomas said...

We need to look everywhere.... We have to look at everything in depth.... and be brutally honest.

No.

Try listening to your constituents, i.e., the people who actually will vote for you. That is, ahem, white married middle class people.

Win a huge block vote there. You know, like the Dems do with blacks?

Oppose illegal immigration with a vengeance. Fight to end racial and sexual quotas.

Represent the people who will vote for you. Go ahead, you don't have to be ashamed.

Wince said...

He called for a top-to-bottom review of the party’s ground game, which he said was outmaneuvered by the organization built by President Obama’s campaign.

In that context, Barbour's "proctology exam" is probably closer to the truth than a need for a "soul searching".

It needs to be a party role. The infrastructure needs to be there before your candidate is chosen. There must be something in place for a good candidate to activate.

Logistically, an individual challenger is unlikely to be able to beat the ground game of an incumbent in the space between getting the nomination and election day. Especially an incumbent whose entire term in office was an extension of his campaign.

Saint Croix said...

Republicans should take two things Democrats love--abortion and tax increases--and combine them into one lovely package. Let's raise taxes on abortion! And we can cite Chief Justice Roberts' wonderful opinion in NFIB v. Sebelius as justification.

shiloh said...

The difference between Barbour and Walker is Walker wants to get re-elected.

It's that basic re: Barbour's honest political assessment.

McTriumph said...

Just raise the debt limit and let ALL the Bush tax cuts expire. Taxing the wealthy alone is just symbolic, just a drop in the ocean, solves nothing. We're heading for another recession anyway or as Pelosi calls it "fun-employment"

Saint Croix said...

Bill Clinton said abortion should be "safe, legal and rare." Didn't say anything about cheap! You want to make abortion rare, make it more expensive. And raise money while we do it!

Unless Democrats like abortion. Discuss.

Peter V. Bella said...

The GOP needs an over haul. First, they need to stop all the infighting between the so called conservatives, moderates, and liberals. Unlike the united Democrats, the GOP is a bunch of battling old ladies.

Next, they have to vet their candidates. It is really bad when some of their candidates make Joe Biden look smart.

They have to ignore all those social, family value, moral issues too. Not for or against. Just ignore them.

Last, they have to learn how to count votes. They have to go to the enemy strongholds to campaign. They have to go into the Black and Hispanic areas. They have to stop writing off people just because they believe those are lost votes.

They should learn from Reagan and Obama. Reagan won big because Democrats of all persuasions crossed over and voted for him. Obama won his first term because Republicans crossed over and voted for him.

The GOP has to appeal to all voters not just their ever diminishing choir.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

The Obama agitprop machine dragged his ass over the finish line.

Still, I take heart in the fact that Obama lost 6 million of his 2008 voters.

Saint Croix said...

Obamacare is raising taxes on medical device manufacturers. You know, like pacemakers? It makes no sense to raise taxes on the life-safing medical devices while you keep the abortion death cult as cheap as possible.

Raise taxes on abortion and do away with the tax on medical devices! And let Obama explain why he wants more abortion and less defibrillators, pacemakers, artificial joints, stents, and chemotherapy delivery systems.

Get out of our asshole, Haley, and fight the fight!

Meade said...

“Stop! We have reached the limits of what rectal probing can teach us.”

Unknown said...

Brutally honest is a synonym for rape?

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Haley is an old fart. Go away.

garage mahal said...

Maybe there were just a lot of voters that liked the Muslim Brotherhood?

Rusty said...

Get in their faces. Hit back twice as hard.

ricpic said...

Go left Republicans, do what all the best and the brightest, with only your best interest at heart, implore you to do.

Rusty said...

DOW down 29.10.

Man. That recovery is just zooming!

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

I find it somewhat disconcerting that Haley Barbour thinks there can be such a thing as a proctology exam that is not very serious.

edutcher said...

How about starting with 98 - 140% turnout in counties that the Demos carried?

How about the voting machines that flipped R votes to O votes (but never did the opposite)?

How about finding out how Broward county (another 100% O vote) ends up with 1000 votes uncounted in a warehouse?

How about finding out how the Chicago voters were bused into WI?

How about investigating the people who bragged about voting twice on election day?

How about standing your ground and saying that, considering there was a huge enthusiasm gap even the network polls conceded, there's no evidence to support the idea 8 million white people stayed home on election day?

How about bringing up the fact Zero defied every metric of what defines a winner in a Presidential election and that all the people who were "amazed" had every right to be because the numbers right up to election day said he'd lose?

How about quit being "gentlemen" for once and calling out the Democrats on the fact that, once again, they stole an election?

Shouting Thomas said...

We need to look everywhere.... We have to look at everything in depth.... and be brutally honest.

No.

Try listening to your constituents, i.e., the people who actually will vote for you. That is, ahem, white married middle class people.


Just white people. That would do it.

And scare the Hell out of the Ned Silver crowd because white people are still 60% of the electorate.

Methadras said...

Can someone tell me how the republican party can undo six decades of leftist indoctrination and inculcation from k-phd? Anyone? Bueller?

I'm Full of Soup said...

There are only 5-6 facets to an average person's successful life:
1- family and friends
2- Owning their own home
3- Having marketable skills so they can earn a good living.
4- Security which includes military, police, courts & laws, roads and highways and other key infrastructure.
5- Retirement savings.
6- their childen's education.

A fair person would say the govt has f-ed up bigtime home values {#2 on my list], the cost of college {#6 on my list] and retirement savings {#5 on my list].

So a true conservative would get govt out of the way for those three, keep its damn nose out of #1and devote its energies to #3 and #4.

That is how I would re-jigger the Repub party.

Methadras said...

The Farmer said...

a refusal to raise taxes on the wealthy. Right or wrong, most people hate that. Stick to your guns on it and you'll lose when all other things are equal.


Right. Because if you do that, then everything will become magically better. Have any other moronic populist views do ya?

Saint Croix said...

Maybe Republicans should just give up and Soak! The! Rich!

edutcher said...

Methadras said...

Can someone tell me how the republican party can undo six decades of leftist indoctrination and inculcation from k-phd? Anyone? Bueller?

The word revolution ring a bell?

Short of that, we have to reverse the Gramscian march through the institutions.

Take back the churches, the media, the schools and government at the local level. Change the culture. Push back on social issues.

I know the Libertarians can't abide the last one, but, to get the hands-off society they want, you have to change the culture and that means push back on social issues (say it ain't so).

Chef Mojo said...

A "proctology exam" is a great way of putting it. As I know from experience, a colonoscopy can save your life, done early enough.

The question is whether the GOP's cancer is too advanced for that particular procedure to be of benefit. Regardless, you won't know until you get up there.

McTriumph said...

Obama campaign barely won because their data mining was better, it's not an accident Google is a big Obama supporter. They figured out how and when to run ads at cheaper times and cable channels watched by the unemployed during the day.

Jim said...

How about finding out how Broward county (another 100% O vote) ends up with 1000 votes uncounted in a warehouse?

Huh? Broward went 67-32 for Obama. That's not 100%. Though 100 votes in a warehouse is troubling, it wouldn't have made a difference in the result, even if you assumed all of them were Romney votes.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

Althouse wrote:
"That's perilously close to the rape theme that got the GOP into so much trouble this year."

Taint close at all.

Meade said...

Ahh, but if you throw up it's as a jealous woman of the Democrat Party: Taint your lady parts, or uh... fuss.

GOP? Haff t' be the gooch, Bob.

Joe Schmoe said...

First, they need to stop all the infighting between the so called conservatives, moderates, and liberals. Unlike the united Democrats, the GOP is a bunch of battling old ladies.

Ultimately I see this as a feature, not a bug. There is a diversity of thought in the current GOP that is nonexistent in the Democrat party right now. There are Repubs and conservative-leaning libertarians on many sides of contemporary issues. Democratic ideology becomes more rigid by the second. Unanimity of thought is not healthy for long-term prosperity.

Strelnikov said...

I'd have to see the size of his hands first.

shiloh said...

"Haley is an old fart. Go away."

Much like Willard's #1 political spokesman, dinosaur John Sununu as Strom Thurmond had passed away and was not available.

Fond memories ...

jr565 said...

Job numbers in - jobless claims up over 75,000. Areas hardest hit Ohio and Pennsylvania.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/11/15/Surprise-Jobless-Claims-Up-Over-75000

You stupid rubes.

ampersand said...

All this handwringing by The Republican establishment reminds me of this Bertolt Brecht quote.

"Some party hack decreed that the people had lost the government's confidence and could only regain it with redoubled effort. If
that is the case, would it not be be simpler, If the government simply dissolved the people And elected another?"


McTriumph said...

All republicans need to do is stop telling the truth. The electorate is economically illiterate,they don't understand the doom they just subscribed to. We are so buried that tax increases won't bring in any increased revenue and revenues don't even cover the cost of entitlements and interest on the debt.

McTriumph said...

Considering that the republicans haven't ran a true conservative since 1984, maybe we should try that.