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This is a ruse, a con, and in brief, an attempt to hustle the voters. GOP leadership is trying to "Bob Dole" us. They have, in effect, met in the smoke-filled back room of a private club and decided amongst themselves who they want in 2008. Their problem is how to deceive the voters into believing that said pick is of the voters' choosing.

That's not only how the GOP "Bob Dole"'d us, it's also how they "George W. Bush"'d us in 2000. Remember? He was practically coronated before he ever got to New Hampshire.

Truth is, there's only been one time in recent memory that the power brokers did not already get their RINO lined up before the election and that was 1980. In 1976, the power-brokers tried to elect Gerald Ford but Ronald Reagan almost won the nomination. They realized too late that Reagan's crossover appeal could have beaten Carter but there was no way they could jettison a sitting president of their own party.

Reagan scared the RINO crowd that believed all that "nuclear cowboy" and "dunce" crap that the liberals wanted them to believe (interesting how they said all the same things about W. also). They made a deal with Reagan that he'd be the nominee if he promised to add an establishment RINO to the ticket, hence George H.W. Bush became the running mate - to try to "control" Reagan.

Since Barry Goldwater (another "nuclear cowboy") scared the ivoty tower crowd, the GOP money wing has tried to get behind one RINO and make them the "inevitable" nominee. It happened with Nixon (1968), Ford (1976), George H.W. Bush (1988), Dole (1996) and George W. Bush (2000). So it should shock nobody that they would do so again.

The Democrats, for all the things about them that disgust us, are far more willing to let the rank and file choose their nominee the democratic way than Republicans ever had. It cost them too - in 1968, 1972 and 1988 when the party was divided and never recovered. I'd add 2004 to that list but Kerry's meteoric rise in Iowa seemed pre-ordained from the top rather than raised up from the masses.

If the Republican money brokers have gotten behind Giuliani as their RINO for 2008, all I can say is "thank God it's not McCain".

” That's not only how the GOP "Bob Dole"'d us, it's also how they "George W. Bush"'d us in 2000. Remember? He was practically coronated before he ever got to New Hampshire. “

The George Bush’s coronation was evident from the beginning (year 2000). I am glad you noticed that too.

I am still angry about the underhanded play that was forced on us. George Bush certainly promised those kingmakers a lot in return for putting him in the White House. Just look at the mess we are in.

The rest of your post is all true. Thank you. I hadn’t realized that others had seen through this running façade.

(interesting how they said all the same things about W. also)

Actually, they didn't. They simply said he was dumb. And they still do.

And Bush's willful fracturing of the Party coalition... all over his demented quest for Open Borders and Illegal Amnesty, while unilaterally disarming and slashing Defense Strategic Procurement in the middle of a war, and constant China Appeasement while abetting its vast armaments buildup... certainly puts the issue into real contention...albeit from the opposite end of the spectrum.

And as far as smears goes...its more interesting to me how the "W" crowd and his direct upper echelons...have smeared Pat Buchanan (Nazi) and Alan Keyes (selfish).

Yet W has gone way out of his way to protect the Clintons...and their agents (Hamburglar, etc)... from the fruits of their criminality. Some sort of knee-jerk objection to the "politics of personal destruction"? Funny he doesn't practice that same deference with conservatives...