On Super Tuesday, New Faction Emerges from GOP Division

As “Super Tuesday” is underway, the standing quartet of Republican presidential candidates has for the time being set aside their differences, uniting to distance themselves from the more moderate party members by creating its own “rage, religion, and righteousness” arm.    The "We Are the New Kakistocracy Republicans," a name chosen by Newt Gingrich and led by Rick Santorum, Ron Paul, Gingrich, and party frontrunner Mitt Romney, was crash-designed as a means of polishing its appeal to Tea Party supporters.   The group has vowed to push its agenda into areas that will thoroughly differentiate it from the frivolous sense of reason, decorum, and compromise that once guided the Republicans.

WANKR is comprised of the original 2012 challengers to President Obama and millions of their devoted followers.  Although Romney is the most likely to win the party’s nomination at the Republican Convention this August, Gingrich, Paul and Santorum are locked in a tremendous struggle for fourth place.   

Former candidates Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, and Herman Cain have expressed support for the group, which Perry called “Tea Party expresso [sic].”  Several supporters were seen at a Santorum appearance in Ohio on Monday wearing "I [Heart] WANKRs" buttons.  The group, whose members signed a pledge to honor themselves and their beliefs, recently opened headquarters in a former Linens ‘n Things store in Richmond, Virginia.

While the party is still in its infancy, it has been galvanized as a force by the recent vilification of Rush Limbaugh, the death of media firebrand Andrew Breitbart, and the reappearance of an unbowed Michele Bachmann on the Piers Morgan Show. 

WANKR’s sweeping, non-negotiable pledge has become the new party’s mantra.  The group’s press liaison Elrod Hubbard provided Pachinko with an outline of the “new party’s” core beliefs.

We hold that

·      God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, Ronald Reagan, that whosoever aligneth with him shall rewrite history.

·      Science and math are fallible; the opinion of the guy at the Rotary Club bar—that we can work with.

·      Anyone with an annual salary of $1.5 million is the 99%--just the high end of it.

·      A debate is five people talking shit about Barack Obama.  And Mitt Romney.

·      The most flattering outfit on a woman is submission.

·      A mind is a terrible thing to waste by filling it with education.

·      Newt’s Law: For every action there is an overwhelmingly incendiary and rhetorical reaction.

·      Nature abhors a drum circle.

·      God and nature are mutually exclusive. 

·      Sex should only occur between a married man and a woman or the woman’s friend or the guy in the next stall.

·      More people get hurt snowboarding than water boarding.

·      If you’re a woman and think about a baby, you’re obligated to have one.  

·      The “path to citizenship” is best travelled in a cattle car.

·      The right to life is absolute, but not the laws governing child support payments.

·      Just a thought—Newt and Callista swap hair, right?

·      Founding Father attribution trumps facts.

·      Speaking of Trump, can we make him head of the Department of Inquisition?

·      The death penalty is fair only if carried out within 72 hours of arrest.

·      If we select a Black running mate, we promise he won’t be uppity.

·      Gay people are God’s children except for the sexual orientation part.

·      Healthcare is something very personal that takes place between two consenting lobbyists.

·      You may call me a twat but don’t call me a liberal.

·      Black people have bootstraps too.  Use them.

As a fundraiser, the 2013 WANKR “Rebuilding America One Rollback at a Time” calendar is offered as a premium for every contribution over $100,000.  WANKR spokeswoman Enola Ballsaque says that it will feature all the candidates stripped to the waist and wearing tool belts, interspersed with “glamour photos” of Christine O’Donnell in Wicca body paint reading Ayn Rand, conservative icon (and fetish model) Phyllis Schlafly in a galvanized chemise, and Anne Coulter crushing a puppy.  Photos of Mitch McConnell applying lotion to Grover Norquist’s legs were leaked to TMZ last week.

“This is the party we have always dreamed of,” said WANKR supporter Gil Tavitz.  “We are making America into a country we can recognize again.”  Asked to clarify what such an America looks like, Tavitz paused.  “I’m not sure but I’ll know it when I see it,” he said.

More traditional Republicans are mortified at the sharp turn in their party’s ideology and rhetoric.  Mike Kleinow, a registered Republican since his first chance to vote in 1972, is resigned to the current state of malignant sniping, fact-strangling, and out-and-out craziness that has characterized this year’s primaries.  “It’s a cycle, I guess.  Cycles change.  People get tired of all the negativity.” 

Kleinow said he is hoping that things will recalibrate after President Obama is re-elected in November.  “I tell my friends I’m voting Green [Party] so they won’t hate me,” he said.  “We’ve gone from the party of Lincoln to the party of Caligula.”

Meanwhile, a new offshoot of the Democratic Party has been gathering momentum in recent years but no leader has emerged.   The group—People Unable to Secure Solidarity In Every Sense—is struggling to achieve consensus on a color for its logo.