Fractured Republicans
I have seen a lot of commentary on the left celebrating that the Republicans are increasingly fractured and expressing the idea that should the nomination process drag on without a winner, perhaps up until the convention, that it would be a big gain for the Democrats.
My feeling is that this is a mistaken analysis. While an early coronation of either Hillary or Obama (and I expect that after super tuesday we will know for sure which of them will be the nominee) would allow them to focus on the General Election, I don’t know how much good that will do them. A campaign against Guiliani would be very different from a campaign against Huckabee which would be very different from a campaign against McCain, Romny or Thompson. Basically, the Democratic nominee will have months in which they have nothing to say.
Meanwhile, all attention will be focused on the Republican race, giving the remaining candidates (and it could very well be all five mentioned above) chances to make the case for themselves and their policies. Based on the idea that their is no such thing as bad publicity, I can’t see how this could do anything but benefit the Republicans.
Now it is certainly true that the different candidates hail from different aspects of the Republican party, ranging from the evangelical Huckabee to the relatively socially liberal Giuliani. Romney epitomizes the business aspects of the Repulicans, McCain the strong military aspects, and Thompson perhaps is closest to the Reagan synthesis. These are certainly fault lines within the party, and should enough anger be generated in the process some of the base could be turned off. It seems more likely to me though that a lengthy process will lessen, rather then increase this anger. I can imagine many evangelicals (as one example) being more supportive of Giuliani (as probably the least liked by that group) if they felt that at least their voices were heard in the process and their guy was a competitor.
Beyond that though, despite the fractures their is still a lot of agreement within the Republican party. On a lot of issues they are on the same page, especially when compared to the Democrats.
Keeping media interest in the Republican race for the next few months seems to me to benefit the Republicans, not the Democrats.
Only counterpoint I would make is this:
Given that each of the Republican candidates seems to be targeting a certain segment of the party base, the question then becomes how they will present themselves when they win the nomination. If that nominee is portrayed, through either the media or the opposition, as just representing a small segment of the population (based on how the candidate played to one segment of the party), that could be a detriment to the Republican candidate.
Of course, I’m speaking from the viewpoint of somebody who doesn’t vote based on party loyalty, and while I know I’m not the only one who votes that way, I really can’t say exactly how many people out there are like that.