GOP state parties are hurtin'

I found this March 24, 2008 Politico story through Crooks and Liars, and I am just amazed by it. From Politio:

At a time when the GOP presidential nominee will need more assistance than ever, a number of state Republican parties are struggling through troubled times, suffering from internal strife, poor fundraising, onerous debt, scandal or voting trends that are conspiring to relegate the local branches of the party to near-irrelevance.

In some of the largest, smallest, reddest and bluest states in the nation, many state Republican organizations are still reeling in the aftermath of the devastating 2006 election cycle, raising questions about how much grassroots help the state parties will be able to deliver to presumptive GOP nominee John McCain.

The state party woes are especially ill-timed since McCain will face a Democratic nominee who may be considerably better funded and organized, and since Republicans will be facing an energized Democratic party that is shattering primary election.

“After twelve years of being in power, you tend to get fat and lazy, and in some cases arrogant with respect to your positions,” said Saul Anuzis, chairman of the Michigan Republican party. “There is no doubt that we have had people who have gotten caught up in both illegal activities and immoral activities and none of that helps the party as a whole.

“If you go back to 2006 most people would agree that not only did we lose our brand, that we damaged our brand significantly,” Anuzis said. “We are clearly rebuilding.”

It took only 12 years for the Republican Party to get fat, lazy, arrogant, and corrupt. And now the GOP is in a rebuilding stage....During a presidential election. All I can say is wow--how far the mighty have fallen!

Then again, perhaps we shouldn't be surprised at the potential destruction of the GOP. A good chunk of the blame for the GOP's demise can be attributed to the failed policies of George W. Bush. This is a president who sent this country, and the Republican Party, into a failed war in Iraq, gave enormous tax cuts to the ubber-rich, removed environmental regulations in favor of corporate profit, enabled war profiteers to take huge profits from American taxpayers in return for shoddy service, tried to politicize the Justice Department with the U.S. attorney firings, attempted to disenfranchise minority voters for the benefit of the Republican Party, outed a CIA undercover agent in retaliation for criticism of the U.S. invasion of Iraq--the list just goes on. The GOP had forgotten that when they gained power, they represented the entire country--not just the half of the American people who voted them into office. Compromise is finding the middle ground on ideas and legislation that will benefit the entire country--not ramming your extremist ideology down your opponents' throats.

The Republican Party has given this country eight years of Bush junk, and now the GOP is reaping what they have sown. The question now is how much damage will the Republican Party inflict on this country before the November elections.