GOP Leadership
Michael Steele, the contentious chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC), is, in all technicality, the official leader of the Republican Party nationally. Rep. John Boehner and Sen. Mitch McConnell are the highest ranking congressional Republicans, and Sen. John McCain is the party’s most recent presidential nominee. However, Republican leadership has been attributed to everyone from Rush Limbaugh to Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck to Mitt Romney.
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The future of the GOP is an incredibly uncertain one, as current obstructionist tactics are unlikely to propel Republicans through either the 2010 midterms or the 2012 presidential, and the question of who will emerge as a Republican Party leader and candidate going into the 2012 election will be highly discussed. Potential candidates, including Romney, Palin, Mike Huckabee, and Tim Pawlenty, have all already been considered by the media as a new Republican leader, but none have really taken ownership of the party.
Romney, a more moderate conservative, would have a hard time achieving the GOP nomination if the tea party objects to his slightly more right-of-center beliefs, and the same goes for Pawlenty, although he appears to be becoming consistently more conservative. Palin, on the other hand, would have a contrasting problem. Her controversial actions and far-right beliefs would make her nearly impossible to market as a mainstream candidate, even to very conservative Republican voters.
Currently, no Republican in national office has complete leadership over the party. It is in Republican’s best interests to enter the 2012 elections united under one candidate. The inclusion of a tea party candidate or a struggle during nomination between traditional Republicans and the tea party will give massive advantage to the Democratic Party.
In order for Republicans to be united in 2012, a leader needs to emerge. Whether this leader is Palin, Romney, or even Beck doesn’t matter, as long as Republicans are in complete support of this leader. Otherwise, as Keith Olbermann said on his show Monday in a Special Comment, they will go from being “the party of no… to the party of no relevancy.”
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