Written by John Turner   

The question of why there are no serious Republican candidates for president is much discussed on TV lately. Almost every night on Hardball, Chris Matthews expresses wonderment that in a condition in which the Democrats are showing weakness, no credible Republican candidate steps forward.

It’s actually not a hard question. There is no such thing as a serious Republican nowadays. The party has so allied itself with a congeries of adolescent resentment no responsible political program can come out of it. All the Republicans can do is yammer about the Democrats, relying on the feeling among the people that things are not right. Since a majority of people are not well enough informed to know why contemporary conditions aren’t right, it’s easy enough to point fingers and cast blame. The Republicans have become so addicted to griping, they can’t imagine doing anything else. It seems to work for them at times, so why should they give it up?

The problem is, no effective national campaign can be built out of griping. Consequently, no national Republican leader can emerge. What could a Republican politician possibly say that would qualify as a sane program for national government? Any responsible stance would be ripped apart by the so-called base. The GOP has become so closely linked with old grouchy white guys, whose only political philosophy is that all government is crooked, and that the country is going to hell because of alien influences, it can’t mount a program that can even pretend to make sense.

The list of absurdities we’ve heard from Donald Trump, Sarah Palin Newt Gingrich, Michelle Bachmann, Mike Huckabee, Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney, Ron Paul, Rick Santorum and anyone else who has been mentioned as a possible Republican candidate is so gigantic it would be hilarious were it not so sad. The only thing the Republicans want is to banish the future and no matter how shrilly they gripe they’re not going to do it. Their genuine power brokers now are John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Mitch McConnell, and Paul Ryan, any one of whom would be more ridiculous as a presidential candidate than those who have so far put themselves forward.

Regardless of sporadic electoral successes spawned by general discontent, the Republicans are a party on the way down. It’s hard for me to imagine how they could possibly re-energize themselves. What could they say that would address the problems of the modern world?

Whether the Republicans like it or not, the demographic map of the country is changing. The percentage of the people who qualify as genuine white Anglo-Saxon Protestants is declining and will continue to decline. The Republicans have no entry to any sector of the population outside that formerly dominant group. The GOPers may not be able to believe that the nation can be directed by anyone other than white, elderly, grumpy guys from the Middle West (that faith was what sparked the birther nonsense). But just because they can’t believe it doesn’t mean it’s not true.

Remember when Mike Huckabee tried to get traction by saying their was something disturbingly unfamiliar about Barack Obama because he didn’t share the upbringing and experiences of the typical hick. I don’t think that did Huckabee much good. The interesting thing about it, though, was he believed it would, and it’s belief of that sort that so infects the Republican Party they are unlikely ever to cure themselves of it.

Over the past few days I’ve had several chance conversations with acquaintances I’ve met walking down the street or in grocery stores. The conversation invariably turned to politics, not usually at my urging. The consensus about what’s ailing the country was notable, especially since they were all policies Republicans support. The strangle-hold the big banks have on the nation usually came up first, followed by the shameful inequality in income, the waste of our resources on excessive military spending, the political refusal to take seriously the findings of science, the notion that we can solve our energy problems by just drilling for more oil, the idea that education should be devoted to job preparation and nothing else, the silliness of conspicuous consumption, and the obsession with big cars. I suppose one could say these were the problems brought up because of who I know, and there would be something in that. But I think more and more people are coming round to those points of view, and though the Republicans try to divert them with incessant falsehood, even their ace in the hole of lying is beginning to fail them. Maybe Lincoln was right about fooling all the people all the time.

If Chris Matthews wants to invite me on his show, I could explain why no “serious” Republican contenders are emerging. Of course, that’s not the sort of thing Chris and his fellow centrists like to hear. But what they like has little more relation to reality than what the Republicans believe. A shift is taking place in the United States. It is agonizingly slow and fitful, but I think it is underway. So don’t expect to see a new Eisenhower, or even a new Nixon, rising from the ranks of the GOP.