On the other hand, I recognize that there are strong political and cultural forces keeping the parties toward the middle. Neither party wants to lose a long-term advantage by getting too far away from the middle. McConnell is very astute to emphasis this point. Likewise, neither party wants to create too much of a divide and let the growth of a third party take off. I’ve always insisted that in their shared hate for the center, the fringe elements of both parties actually have more in common with each other than they do with the moderates. But there is such a long-term mistrust that it would take a heck of person to unite them.

Unlike the OP, I don’t think the Republican party will become more insular. There may be some of that going on, but historically whatever party is in the minority comes around sooner or later.

That said that the GOP was taking over the middle which was forcing the Dems to the fringe and a permanent minority.

I saw no evidence of either of those things happening. Mr. Laird may have mistaken conservative rhetoric for conservative governance, which differ significantly and almost always have. Reagan’s a perfect example of success in this regard, and Bush 43 an example of failure.

The Dems have been moving to the center since Mondale was destroyed by Reagan and they realized past policies and they ideologies that created them were not viable, which is why they ignore their fringe element rather than allowing them to rule the party like the Republicans. In fact, the Dems got better, e.g., Clinton years.

Currently, the GOP refuses to admit conservatism is a failure and instead of benchmarking past policy practices to find a new way, are instead enjoying a circular firing squad attempting to wean out any and all non social conservatives.

What’s left in the Senate and the House are two primary examples – Sen. Shelby as a spokesperson for Senate Republicans on economic matters? He couldn’t pass a high school economics course; the GOP used to be filled with people who were economic experts, now they’re experts on the Southern Baptist church’s political agenda.

And I am not promoting a “permanent Democratic majority” at all. I would rather see the Republicans recover from their recent stupidities and become a vibrant party again, rather than becoming even more insular and fringe.

I am a moderate Republican who left the party the evening the GOP convention formally nominated McCain’s pick for VP, that being Gov. Palin of course (I was hoping the party would refuse to nominate her even though McCain picked her, they have that power). My quitting was after eight years of embarrassment and the realization that the party refused to reform and was instead committed an ideology proven to fail.

While the current results are clear regarding the GOP not just becoming more conservative as you note, but also becoming less of a national party than one of a Southern party; I disagree INCUMBENT moderate Republicans are and will be threatened by their own party. It’s the Democrats taking them down given those areas are most likely not solidly red and the people have had enough of the GOP.

From ‘94 through ‘04 when Gingrich and DeLay were running the House and how campaign funds were allocated for their members, Republicans believed that gerrymandering alone would continue to give them a majority in the House. They were therefore able to threaten incumbent moderates that if they didn’t vote a certain way, funds from the national party would be diverted either to other districts, or maybe to conservative opponents in the primaries. Those days have changed however.

In the last two elections, it was not the GOP who threatened the moderates, but the voters who to some extent were voting against the GOP in general, even if their incumbent was considered an OK representative. In 2006 Bush was adamant that the party support Republican Senators perceived as liberal or moderate, and the party continued this pattern in 2008 in terms of campaign financing allocations.

So while it will be interesting watching moderate Republican voting patterns in the next Congress where I too hope they frequently side with the Dems, I can’t envision threats of funding cut-offs in the primaries being a repurcussion given how the GOP has to now respect the fact that Dems are increasingly encroaching on even solidly-red districts or in the case of Senate campaigns, red states.