We had a lot of fun talking through the ways that the Republican Party is self-destructing through this election year.  But what about the Democrats?

The competitive system at the core of our Democratic Republic functions to the extent that the two major parties stake out different sides of important issues and duke them out through an election, when the people of the nation get to weigh in.  But what happens when one side is wallowing in irrelevance and the other side has little to say one way or another?  Citizens who might otherwise vote are confused, angry, or simply apathetic and stay home.  When one party loses its way, it’s up to the other one to capitalize on the moment and present its platform.

That is unlikely to happen as the Republicans square off against the Not-Republicans, aka Democrats.  The vagueness of Occupy Wall Street made into a platform, of sorts – and historically pretty much what the party has usually been without strong leadership.

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How bad can it get for Republicans?  The short answer is “much worse”.  The long answer is “much, much worse”.

There are many ways that the party of Reagan is screwing up right now, and any one of them would cause the Gipper to shake his head in shame.  Taken together, however, it is just about impossible to recognize the party itself – let alone a path to victory.

With nine months left until the election there is always a chance they’ll get it together, of course.  There’s also a good chance that we’re about to see nine months of unscripted slapstick passing itself off as “politics”.  Here is a list of what is going horribly wrong:

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