I am slightly embarrassed to admit how much I enjoy watching Republicans get beat by their own. Family squabbles are vicious because family members know what buttons to push.
The first stage of Republican primary defeat is smiling acceptance. That lasts as long as the teevee cameras are filming on election night. “I got beat. It’s okay. Now we have to all come together.”
The next morning, blame sets in. “How could this have happened? It couldn’t have been me because I’m wonderful and I know I’m wonderful because Fox News says I am. I need to fire my campaign staff.”
That lasts for a joyful hissy fit of about 15 minutes.
The third stage is bitterness. As well as the fourth, fifth, and sixth stages.
Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the House majority leader, said Sunday that he saw a troublesome division within the Republican Party, as he discussed his stunning primary defeat, which many are assessing for possible evidence that the Tea Party is regaining steam among Republicans.
Though Mr. Cantor said in a separate interview, on CNN’s “State of the Union,” that the party’s internal struggles “pale in comparison” to its differences with Democrats, he said Republicans need to resolve their party’s own clash.
Of course, for Mr. Cantor, there was no clash until he was defeated and then it suddenly became a chasm.
He will become my favorite Republican character – Mr. Bitter. For that, I thank the idiot who beat him. And, Lord have mercy, that I have a feeling that Dave Brat is Sarah Palin without the brains.