A party of many?

Roger Ailes has a very good post in which he essentially identifies the Miers nomination as a turning point for the Republican Party towards a Democrat style—though far more vicious, almost cannibalistic—of fragmentation and constant critical review from Republican bloggers and conservatives on the fringe of mainstream power.

The scuffle over Miers has exposed the right bloggers jockeying for (mostly imagined) positions of power once the Bush Era has ended. In 2004, there was no leadership fight within the Republican Party -- Bush was the unchallenged (though illegitimate) incumbent. The 'nuts did not have to back one candidate or another and ride his* coattails to glory. Back in 2000, most of the 'nuts did not exist as bloggers. So 2008 will be the first Presidential election in which the 'nuts will have to select a primary candidate and battle their fellow 'nuts who choose another contender.

He goes on to write:

The Miers battle is just a trial run for this ideological shakedown, and the 'nuts risk revealing their impotence if Bush's pick is approved despite their wailing. In any event, I'm looking forward to the day when the 'nuts start Swiftboating their fellow Republicans, and themselves.

Ready, aim, fire.

* Yes, his. It's the Republican Party.

Though Roger’s fantasy would be fun to see materialized, he’s overlooking several things. The first one is that modern American conservatism has relied on some form of another of McCarthyism to remain in or retain power. I can’t think of any conservative president of the post-World War II area that didn’t make his campaign and subsequent presidency about the fighting the “threat of” something or other—a perpetual war for perpetual peace. (A possible exception might be Eisenhower denouncing the very real threat of the military industrial complex, but that was in his farewell speech.) And Bush right now has nothing to fight against. He’s beaten terrorism into incognizance and the more he tries to rally the troops with Iraq talk—as he tried to do with that Stanislavskian satellite chat with soldiers—the more apparent it becomes what a failure of a commander he has been.

And the other factor that Roger overlooks is that the Supreme Court is difference. Bush could have appointed Browny, or Browny’s horse to head FEMA, and conservatives would not have cared. The court however has been a constant force of liberal democracy and a thorn on the conservative side.

Miers definitely shows the escalating weakness of the Bush administration within its party, and the power vacuum that it will leave, could possibly create much bickering, but I doubt it’s as permanent as Roger foresees.