WHITHER (OR WITHER?) THE GOP? Bill Quick has been soliciting ideas for a third party. And lots of people — even Tom Delay — are saying they’ll stay home if the wrong guy gets nominated. Even Rush Limbaugh is saying he might not support the nominee.

Well, I’ve already said I’d vote for Hillary over Huckabee, but I’m not a Republican so that’s not as newsworthy. But the GOP folks seem pretty unhappy. Weirdly, a lot of people are unhappy that Fred Thompson isn’t running well, but not a lot of people seem to have, you know, actually voted for, or donated to, Fred.

A lot of that’s Thompson’s own fault — I mentioned before that in my dealings with the campaign they seemed utterly disorganized. And I just got a copy of Townhall magazine in the mail, and Bill O’Reilly is saying the same thing. Blowing things with the Glenn & Helen Show is one thing, but blowing off O’Reilly is another. Thompson’s good on policy, and I like him, but he’s run a lousy campaign so far. Still, Thompson aside you’re left with four Republicans of the less-than-conservative variety: McCain (good on the war, but what about immigration, campaign finance, etc.), Rudy (abortion, gun control, etc.), Romney (abortion, gun control, etc.) and Huckabee (“I’m from the government and I’m here to help!”). So you can see why people are unhappy.

Some people think it’s time to teach the party a lesson. Fine, but I thought 2006 was supposed to do that. Did they learn anything? Seems to me that things are about what they were when I put up my pre-mortem post that had Limbaugh exercised. (For that matter, did losing in 2000 and 2004 improve the Democrats? What, exactly, have they learned that led to the Hillary/Edwards/Obama offering? Are political parties capable of really learning?)

People will make up their minds closer to the date. Meanwhile, here’s a suggestion: If you care about saving the Republican Party, don’t blog about it. Get to work at the local and state level. Push your views, and find and promote candidates you like. Meanwhile, my earlier thoughts about culture and politics are still relevant. If you feel that way, then focus your energies there. But either way, don’t expect a candidate to be all you want. They seldom are, in my experience.

But note that neither political party is producing high-quality leadership, and that’s been the pattern for a while, even as we’ve lowered the bar on what counts as quality. That’s a systemic problem, and it’s bigger than what’s going on with either party, or any particular election.

UPDATE: “Isn’t it remarkable how quickly zero becomes normal?” Okay, different topic, but it fit.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Mark Martin emails:

I don’t know, Professor Reynolds. The whole “I’ll sit things out because no candidate fits my litmus test(s) 100%” seems infantile.

Particularly given the threat of Islamofascism and (perhaps even more importantly) the possibility of THREE Supreme Court appointments.

Maybe the folks who want to sit things out need to sit down and ask Hillary/Barack/John their plans for Iraq? For dealing with terrorism? For appointing Supreme Court justices?

And saying that McCain or Romney wouldn’t do much better isn’t a genuine answer, because it is not true. Pointing out squishy appointments in the past (Stevens by Gerald Ford) is a justification that seems forced to me.

Sitting out the election *assures* a Democratic victory in the Presidency, Senate, and House. And what it sounds like to me is “…so things will go awfully and then folks will come running back to REAL conservatism…”

And that is not a mature attitude. I’m nobody important, but it sounds precisely like my seven year old on the playground.

You gotta do what you gotta do. But figuring out what you gotta do — well, that’s not for sissies.

MORE: Reader Richard Rollo emails:

I chuckle at the idea of “teaching the Republicans a lesson.” When I was a Democrat, we thought we were teaching the Democrats a lesson but every year they would forget. Politicians are more like cats than dogs, and we all know that cats only learn what they decide to learn.

It’s all explained here.

STILL MORE: Reader Alex Bensky emails:

I don’t claim to represent anyone but myself. For what it’s worth I am a lifelong Democrat and not just as a political rooting interest. I was active in Teen Dems, Young Dems, on the county committee, etc. And in the Michigan primary I voted for the candidate I want to win in November, John McCain. I probably would vote for any likely Republican candidate except Huckabee.

I did so because in this election I’m a one-issue voter: national security. I don’t have any confidence in either of the likely Democratic candidates on this issue, and I even no confidence at all in their advisors, especially Obama’s.

As I watch the campaign I am often reminded of Elmer Davis’s remark that “the first requirement of any society is that it win its wars.” As a corollary, a society needs to recognize that it is in a war and want to win it.

True enough. As I predicted a while back, I think the fact that the war is going better has caused people to focus more on other issues, which is bad for the GOP.