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The All-Consuming Fire

Two political bombshells in one day, and the implications could not be more far reaching. The first is that Don Nickels of Oklahoma is eager to supplant Trent Lott for majority leader. Of course, if Lott were to resign or be removed, Nickels would be the most likely candidate along with Bill Frist of Tennessee, and perhaps Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. But McConnell is worried that if Lott resigns in disgrace, he will punish the party in the best way he knows how: leave the Senate. Mississippi’s Democratic governor, Ronnie Musgrove, then appoints recently gerrymandered ex-congressman Ronnie Shows to split the Senate 50-50. Of course, remember Lott was the one to castigate Jim Jeffords’ departure in February. Apparently of course, the other senior partners in the GOP Senate want a sign from President Bush before continuing. Consider for Bush though that this is a no-win situation. Either he alienates his conservative base in the South that like men like Lott or alienate the Senate leadership for the two most important years of his presidency. You get the feeling that Bush would rather see the Supreme Court play kingmaker but this time it’s him.

Not to be outdone, Al Gore tells the nation on 60 minutes that it is over. He will not make a return overture for the presidency. So why is this important? Because now that Gore is out of the primary…the Hobbesian nightmare has begun between who knows how many people that will ultimately vie for the Democratic nomination. Remember too that Joe Lieberman has a cozy base of operations in Connecticut which like Dean and Kerry place him in very good position to day trip into New Hampshire. So of course, don’t be surprised that John Edwards, the Southerner already has plans for a firewall in South Carolina. It also casts doubts who would win in Iowa exactly. Polling data has suggested it would be Gephardt because of his proximity to the state. But the same data seemingly underpins Daschle’s chance. This doesn’t make much sense, since the Iowa electorate is bound to represent Daschle’s hometown of Aberdeen, South Dakota over Gephardt’s in Saint Louis, Missouri.

It appears that pundits proclaiming a "Pax Republica" in the historic November mid-term elections were a slight bit premature. Who could have thought that as bad as it looked before Senator Lott took the podium that fateful night in the Capitol that he would singlehandly swtich the momentum to the Democrats just as the point in which the GOP appeared ascendant. Within the course of but a couple weeks suddenly Mary Landrieu appears to be the Democrats' Genevieve to Karl Rove's Atilla. Bush just better hope the weapon inspectors find something incriminating, and fast.

posted by Thomas at 10:29 PM 0 comments