Though I disagree with most of what Kathleen Parker has had to say, this is a woman with cojones. During the campaign, she came out even stronger than Frum, Buckley et al. against Sarah Palin and all that she represented. Of course she was inundated with hate mail she reprinted in a subsequent column, like:
"I weep to see a------s like you telling us how grateful we should be to see this piece of s--- rule our great country.
.
Today, she goes even further, in a column entitled (not so subtly) Giving up on God, which begins "the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party."
She minces no words:
So it has been for the Grand Old Party since the 1980s or so, as it has become increasingly beholden to an element that used to be relegated to wooden crates on street corners.
Kathleen goes on: "The GOP has surrendered its high ground to its lowest brows."
I never believed I would read these words from a conservative like her:
Here's the deal, 'pubbies: Howard Dean was right.
It isn't that culture doesn't matter. It does. But preaching to the choir produces no converts. And shifting demographics suggest that the Republican Party -- and conservatism with it -- eventually will die out unless religion is returned to the privacy of one's heart where it belongs.
(My emphasis added.)
Yes, you read that right, Kathleen Parker writing "Howard Dean was Right."
I knew that the huge disapproval numbers against the Terry Schiavo bill signalled an opportunity for the death knell of the GOP wealth/fundie coalition.
One part of me wishes Dems could be as ballsy as Kathleen in going after the religions nuts (especially when "Obama as the anti-Christ" is featured in Newsweek). On the other hand, the message is much better coming from within the GOP, and Kathleen Parker deserves credit for doing it so vehemently.