a last minute rescue

Wow. In today's WaPo is an article about the Arizona GOP and its current problems - how McCain can't carry the rank and file.

The party is controlled at the district level by activists who detest McCain for his sponsorship, with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), of a comprehensive immigration bill that among other things would have provided illegal immigrants with a pathway to citizenship. They think McCain is a traitor to conservative causes and an advocate for amnesty for illegal immigrants.

"We do not consider him a conservative at all," says Rob Haney, a Republican Party chairman in McCain's home district. The candidate's bus, the Straight Talk Express, should be renamed, Haney says: "We call it the Forked Tongue Express around here. He'll lie about anything."

... Once home to Barry Goldwater, Arizona has a credible claim as the birthplace of modern American conservatism. But even Goldwater, late in life, found himself at odds with many conservatives in the state who laced the ideology with social issues that had nothing to do with low taxes and small government.

"I feel badly that, with a lot of these people, Barry Goldwater would be unwelcome," says Grant Woods, a moderate Republican and former Arizona attorney general. "I would hope for Arizona's future in the Republican Party is that it would continue to produce leaders of the caliber of Goldwater, of Sandra Day O'Connor, of John McCain; yet if this posture continues, from the state party, you won't see those leaders come from within the party anymore. Because no one in their right mind would deal with these people."

The most amazing thing is this quote:

Rusty Childress, founder of United for a Sovereign America, said he hopes a television personality will come to the rescue: "Our hope would be that you'd get Lou Dobbs jumping in at the last minute."

I didn't think anything could make the GOP group wackier. But Lou Dobbs?

Woof.