Of course he doesn't fear talk radio. The assholes on talk radio are overwhelmingly Republican (see Limbaugh, Rush). The worst that will happen to you on NPR is an uncomfortably direct question, although those are more rare each day.

Yeah, go for it. The Republican Latino vote might even go DOWN for Rubio. Right-wing Cubans make up a tiny fraction of a percent of Latino voters, and the rest of them all hate them. He'll win FL, and the rest of the Deep South, but nowhere else.

This is all party positioning and brand marketing. Seriously: if you read a lot of political coverage, you can see these media events coming a mile away. I expect to see Rush dating Ted Cruz next week.

I learned from Slog commenter "alguna rubia" that "rubio" means blond.

The man's very name is a misrepresentation of himself.

So he was against the dream act before he was for it? Fuck Rubio. The Hispanic vote ain't gonna fall for his 5th quarter pivot.

@3, yeah, I know a guy named "Smith" who doesn't know how to make a horseshoe either. And Magic Johnson's dad wasn't named "John".

The current Republican party is not a political party driven by political principles or espousing political policies. They have almost nothing to do with politics anymore.

The current Republican party is a cultural party devoted to defending the American monoculture from encroaching multi-culturalism. They are an organization brought together to rally around and support a mythology best expressed in the television situation comedies of the 1960's like Father Knows Best and Leave it to Beaver.

They are the self-appointed defenders of Sarah Palin's "real America" - the American mono-culture of small towns in rural areas where everyone (or nearly everyone) in the town shares the same heritage, the same foods, the same faith, and the same social norms. Like any monoculture they believe that their way is the one and only right way. Like any monoculture they respond reflexively and defensively to anything foreign to their established model.

The party found the votes they need to win elections with their Southern Strategy and but the social conservatives they enlisted to bulk up their numbers have since taken over the party. They are no longer thoughtful conservatives with a legitimate perspective on the role of government. Instead they have devolved into sloganeering yahoos who rely entirely on a myth-based perspective instead of a reality-based perspective. They will make allies with any demon who will offer support for their pro-gun, anti-choice, anti-gay, anti-intellectual, racist, sexist, classist, free market worldview.

I suppose there are still a few Republicans who have well-considered principle-based policy positions on the proper role of government and how government should function, but by and large the party membership demonstrate little interest in governing, policy, or principles. They just want to preserve their myth of small town America as it was before 1968.

@5, I knew it was a dumb comment even as I typed it, but the image of his twerp face just set me off (I'm only human).

Thanks for calling bullshit.

By all means let's have a second Republican partyand maybe a third. Seperate the tea bagging Bible thumpers from the Wall Street assholes.

Maybe some thing will finally get done when the wacky and the greedy each go their seperate ways.