All within a week….the thinning ranks of Republican moderates or GOPers who had an independent streak.
First Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel says he won’t run for re-election. Then defeated Rhode Island former Senator Lincoln Chafee quits the GOP altogether.
And, now, Minnesota’s Rep. Jim Ramstad says he has had enough, too:
U.S. Rep. Jim Ramstad announced today that he is retiring from Congress next year and will not seek a 10th term. Ramstad has represented the Third District, made up of the southern, western and northern suburbs of Minneapolis, since he was first elected in 1990.
After 17-years of commuting to Washington as a congressman, Ramstad said he’s “burned out” in an interview before his official announcement.
“My passion for serving people remains as strong as ever,” said the Minnesota Republican, one of the last of what he called a “dying breed” of House moderates.
None of this could considered good news for the Republican Party. Even if in the next campaign the Democratic Presidential candidate is Senator Hillary Clinton and she faces withering attack (several conservative radio talk show hosts have said tying her to moveon.org and past Clinton scandals is a must and is going to happen so if she’s nominated a good part of the campaign will be warning Americans about the perils of a Hillary Presidency) what we now see what appears to be the beginning of an evacuation of the GOP structure by a long established segment of the party. Is this part of a new realignment?
The question becomes: what voters is the GOP going to get to replace or compensate for the loss of what seems to be GOP moderates or independent thinkers from the party? Are they going to replace them with? Hispanic voters?
Conservative blogger and blog radio talk show host Ed Morrissey writes, in part:
The 3rd District will likely need as many GOP voters as it can get, because it’s one of the remarkable minority of Congressional districts that remains competitive after decades of gerrymandering….
…Whether the GOP can hold the seat depends in large part who will win the nomination. It will probably take a moderate to be competitive, although that’s not quite as cut-and-dried as the analysts will argue. Minnetonka has a bit of a conservative streak, and it has enough wealth to help float a candidate who can articulate a conservative vision. Democrats will rightly see this as a good opportunity to help hold off a Republican effort to win back the majority, and they will sink plenty of cash in MN-03 to ensure a victory.
Three shoes have dropped.
Will there be more? Will there be enough shoes on the floor to open a used shoe store?
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.