Rachel: Mitt gets 1/3 and the other 2/3 are split between two completely different candidates. Hmmm

[Scuba]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/ns/msnbc_tv-rachel_maddow_show/#45879065


Rachel Maddow illustrates that the two-thirds of Republican voters who have consistently said "anybody but Romney" are now split between two candidates who couldn't be more different.

Ron Paul and Rick Santorum are both in favor of banning abortion. After that, their policies diverge greatly.

With guest Michael Steele, in another desperate attempt to make the Republicans look, well, not ridiculous. Spoiler alert: he failed, again.




Runs 14:30. No infotainment here, solid reporting and analysis.

[90-percent]

1. Steele

In Micheal's battle of wits with Rachel, it is clear he's completely unarmed.

-90% jimmy

[Laura PourMeADrink]

2. Yikes...she never let him make his points without over-talking him. nt

[justiceischeap]

5. I just watched it and though she "over-talked" him when he began his points

she did let him make them. Which was unfortunate for him because I saw clearly through that interview why he no longer heads the RNC.

[pampango]

3. Juan Cole: the 3 republican factions - wealthy 1%, religious absolutists, and libertarians.

http://www.juancole.com/2012/01/three-republican-bears-and-none-just-right.html

The Republican Party is a coalition of numerous groups, but the big three as things now stand are the wealthy 1%, the religious absolutists, and the suburban and prairie libertarians. The Iowa caucasus split between candidates representing each of the three. Romney is the darling of Wall Street among the colorful Republican field. Rick Santorum has emerged as the voice of religious absolutists, mostly evangelical Protestants but including Ultramontane Catholics like himself. (He beat out Michelle Bachmann for this honor in part because religious absolutists are patriarchal and wouldn’t want to be led by a woman.) And Ron Paul is the standard bearer of the libertarians.

Libertarians suspect Romney of believing in big government. Evangelicals see Romney, a Mormon, as a cultist who believes that Satan is the brother of Jesus. Wall Street fears Ron Paul’s fundamentalist Libertarianism, his antagonism to the Federal Reserve and to TARP and other bailouts.

Now that Rick Santorum has announced that his foreign policy plan is to bomb Iran, the more level-headed elements in New York’s financial community are surely scared to death of him, as are the libertarians who are weary of perpetual war (which always benefits big government). Romney has refused to be stampeded into pledging a bombing campaign on Isfahan if he is elected. America’s 1% may decide that they want a war on Iran; but rich people like to keep their options open.

Romney is not the front runner because he is, from a Republican point of view, “just right.” Ideologically at least, he is what the Victorians would have called a “wet.” He just is not an uber-conservative. He is the front runner because he has a well-heeled, disciplined, national organization of a sort that Rick Santorum signally lacks. He is the front runner because Santorum’s religious absolutism frightens country club Republicans and his warmongering frightens Libertarians, and, well, just the sane in general. He is the front runner because Ron Paul wants to do things like get out of South Korea and slash foreign aid, leaving long-time US allies vulnerable and defenseless. The Republican Party is the party of big business, and big business has interests in the Pacific Rim that would be poorly served by isolationism.

[Scuba]

4. Excellent. Thanks for posting. Juan's on the money, as usual. n/t