QOTD

The opening of John Hawkins' April 29th post on Right Wing News:

"I would rather have 30 Republicans in the Senate who really believe in principles of limited government, free markets, free people, than to have 60 that don't have a set of beliefs." -- Jim Demint

"(Arlen Specter) is what the party needed to be. They need to cultivate more Specters instead of deriding him as a RINO." -- Michael Smerconish

First of all, I love Jim DeMint. He's my favorite Republican on Capitol Hill. But, the idea that we'd be better off with 30 principled Republicans than 60 country club Republicans is nuts. That's because even if you have 30 perfect conservatives in the Senate, you may be right on every issue, but you will also lose every battle that matters for the future of this country.

As to Smerconish's comments, I think they're indicative of what's wrong with the David Frum, Ross Douthat, Meghan McCain, Peggy Noonan, Kathleen Parker, David Brooks wing of the party. Arlen Specter isn't a RINO and the GOP needs to emulate him? Not only is Arlen Specter to the left-of-center, he just left the Republican Party. How in the world can any sane Republican say that's what we need to be copying?

Right now, the Republican Party is psychologically out of whack.

Read the whole thing.