About the Republican National Convention...

Since three readers have asked me this afternoon what I think about the Republican National Convention going on right now in Tampa... and about the crazy rules changes that the Romney camp seems to be hellbent on implementing... maybe that means I'm supposed to post something.

So here it is:

It wouldn't surprise me at all if the Republican party were to split apart after this election, and maybe even before then.

If so, I can't see how that would be anything but a good thing.

I've seen this coming for a long time. So have a lot of other observers. Those among the Republicans who genuinely desire less government, slashed taxes and cut spending believe - with no small amount of evidence supporting their claim - that they have been incrementally squeezed out of having influence within their own party. The "old boys network" of party elites can't have the grassroots gettin' too uppity, ya see. The rank and file have to be clamped down on. Punished, even. But I can't remember it ever being so blatant as it is become this week down Tampa way.

I'm not active in the Republican party. But I do know plenty of good folks who are (along with good people in the Democrat party). And a lot of them are getting mighty peeved at what the "GOP-e" are doing to their sincere efforts toward reducing the size of government.

The Republican bigwigs have become like an abusive spouse: the kind that beats the poor wife and then says "Where else are you gonna go bay-bee?" It's been that way for awhile now. And the Republican leaders are choosing to be ignorant of the fact that the ordinary citizens making up the party are getting up the nerve to at long last retaliate.

Like I said, I can't see how this could be a bad thing at all. If the Republicans split, it could give this country something it hasn't had in a long, long time...

A real honest-to-gosh second major party.