GOP: A party in need of a party

ALTHOUGH THE national polls told us that President Obama's first address to the joint session of congress  was a grand slam, one needed only to look last night at the Republican faces on the cadaverous side of the aisle to see how those who now represent the  other 30 pct. were living these days. The party's leaders, Sen. Mitch  McConnell and Rep. John Boehner, were gloweringly  stone-faced. And Sen. McCain, who wants to be the GOP's pater familias,  offered us nothing more than a fleeting simpering smile.  On windy days, there is more action on the sculpted  faces of Mt. Rushmore.  

As Mike Maslansky, the CEO of a conservative research group, said:  "The Democrats loved almost everything Obama had to say.  The Republicans hated almost everything that Obama had to say." Sorry, guys and gals on the Hill:  Obama may be around longer than some of you who face reelection in 2010.  So get on the bus and lend a new idea, if possible.

To make matters worse, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, the Republicans' latest heart throb to fill the vacuum left by Sarah Palin, laid a dinosaur egg in his response to Obama.  Democrats probably didn't regard it important enough to seriously evaluate it,  but conservative analysts were clearly troubled by the emptiness of Jindal's message. David Brooks grumbled, "I thought it (Jindal's speech) was poorly drafted  - but to come up at this point in history with a stale 'government is the problem...we can't trust government'...It's just a disaster for the Republican Party.  The country is in a  panic now."  Brooks said Jindal laid out a plan that was "a form of nihilism" and added that the current direction of the Republican Party toward a deeper ideological trench was "insane."  

There's more:  Brit Hume, the Fox News guru-emeritus, lamented that it was not "Jindal's greatest oratorical moment."    Others referred to Jindal's remarks as "simplistic"...."almost childish." Who is in charge of the GOP's central casting office anyway?  

Meanwhile, back on the Hill, McCain has accused the Republican National Committee of choosing a song for a presidential campaign ad, without his knowledge,  that is now in court for copyright infringement. And there are reprisals being mentioned by a  prominent member of the Bush family  against Florida Republican Gov. Charlie Crist for aupporting the stimulus. And Sen. Jim Bunning, the Kentucky Republican who has been in trouble before, is threatening to sue the Republican National Committee, accusing it of trying to recruit another candidate to oppose Bunning in the primary.  Sen. John Cornyn , Texas Republican and chairman of the RNC's Senatorial Committee, denies it.  But listen to Bunning: "I don't believe anything that Cornyn says." 

Might it be time for the Republican Party to declare bankruptcy and start all over again with a whole new cast of characters?