With the Huckster's convincing win in Iowa, it's clear that the Republican party is in complete disarray. Identity politics, once the domain of the Democrats, dictated last night's outcome for the Republicans while Barack Obama's trouncing of the once-inevitable Hillary Clinton seemed driven more by ideology.
If the evangelical Christians in the Republican party succeed in forcing Mike Huckabee down the GOP's throat, the Democrats are sure to win the White House in November. I'm still not sure that will happen, but equally bad for the GOP will be the division between the evangelical and more secular wings of the party.
On the Democrats' side, the outcome seems less about race, religion or gender (one figure showed Hillary only got 30% of womens' vote) than about ideological change. No matter how far Obama goes in this race, it's clear that a wall came down last night. I completely disagree with Obama's politics, but I don't question the man's honesty and sincerity, and Obama's convincing win -- without identity politics -- is a watershed event.
As for Fred Thompson...I'd hoped for a more convincing third place finish. But since I was seriously fearing a fourth place finish, I'll take it. What bugs me most is that I really think a lot of evangelicals' votes went to Huck when they otherwise may have gone to Fred, and I think their values would probably be better served by Fred than by the Clintonesque Huck.
Fred says he's staying in the race, so I'll scrape up some more money to send to his campaign.
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