61% View GOP Unfavorably

America is awake. Can you feel it?

Gallup: The Republican Party's image has gone from bad to worse over the past month, as only 34% of Americans in a Nov. 13-16 Gallup Poll say they have a favorable view of the party, down from 40% in mid-October. The 61% now holding an unfavorable view of the GOP is the highest Gallup has recorded for that party since the measure was established in 1992.

GOP Can't Decide on Palin's Future

I say send her packing.

She's divisive and brings out the absolute worst in people or at least draws the fringe supporters out of their shells. That's not what anyone needs. 

Surely the republicans can find a better representative to oppose abortion and be pro guns. She's just downright mean and not the least bit worldly, an anti-intellectual. As a nation, we should be aspiring to be smarter. Someone can be down home, folksy or Joe Six Packy and smart at the same time. The republicans need to find themselves grownup leaders, not the mean girl.

The fact that the republicans even have to wonder what to do with her illustrates why the republicans are losing. Republicans need to get a platform. They can't just loathe government. They can't just hate non Christians. They can't just hate immigrants. They can't just be pro war. They can't just like guns. They can't just be pro abortion. They can't just hate taxes.

Republicans need to understand the real problems in America and figure out solutions. They need to be more inclusive.

Republicans completely failed to recognize the importance of restoring America's standing in the world. It wasn't even a topic for McCain in this election. The whole party seems outdated. 

CNN: In one corner are some conservatives who believe the Alaska governor has been a detriment to John McCain's presidential bid and threatens to lead the party astray for the foreseeable future.

Another faction says Palin's core-conservative beliefs, demonstrated political acumen, and compelling frontier biography position her to reshape the face of a party now viewed by many voters as out of touch.

It's a debate,somewhat ugly at times, that is beginning to play out in public view as Republicans brace themselves for the possibility of losing the White House and a significant number of seats in Congress come Election Day. And that may leave the party in shambles with drastically reduced influence in Washington

McCain Set to Be More American

this is sort of a twist on hillary's campaign -- don't elect the "exotic" one, elect the more electable one. that anyone could win by claiming he or she is more american is kind of a scary thought.

wash post: If the McCain campaign is still trying out songs, there's one by a couple of Brits, W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, that it should consider. We have to change the words "an Englishman" to "American" to get it to work, but, that done, the song expresses succinctly and entirely the case for John McCain and, by implication, against Barack Obama:

For he himself has said it,
And it's greatly to his credit,
That he is American!
That he is American!

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the sum total of the Republican message this year. That is why McCain's first post-primary ad proclaimed him "the American president Americans have been waiting for." Not the "strong" or "experienced" president, though those are contrasts he could seek to draw with Obama. The "American" president -- because that's the only contrast through which McCain has even a chance of prevailing.

Now, I mean to take nothing away from McCain's Americanness by noting that it's Obama's story that represents a triumph of specifically American identity over racial and religious identity. It was the lure of America, the shining city on a hill, that brought his black Kenyan father here, where he met Obama's white Kansan mother. It is because America is uniquely the land of immigrants and has moved beyond a racial caste system that Obama exists, has thrived and stands a good chance of being our next president.

That's not the America, though, that the Republicans refer to in proclaiming their own Americanness. For them, "American" is a term to be used as a wedge issue, a way to distinguish their more racially and religiously homogeneous party from the historically more polyglot Democrats. Such separation has a long pedigree: Campaigning for GOP presidential nominee Alf Landon in 1936, Republican leader Frank Knox said that the Democratic Party under President Franklin Roosevelt "has been seized by alien and un-American elements. Next November, you will choose the American way."
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