A Black Tuesday for Republicans

Super Tuesday came and went, but the fierce Republican fight for the nomination continues. That means more dirt, more fatigue and even more absurdities.

Super Tuesday was supposed to settle it: the decision as to which Republican would face Barack Obama in November in the race for the White House. But there was nothing super about this Tuesday as far the party was concerned. One candidate won here, another was victorious somewhere else, and the only outcome was that the mudslinging would continue. For conservatives, it was Black Tuesday.

In desperation, the Republican establishment cries out, “Stop it! Make up your minds!” Their actual words were probably more elegant, but they were no less loud for that. Clear a path for the only candidate who has a chance of beating Obama. The candidate that’s the choice of the average moderate American voter. Make way for Mitt Romney!

This mega-primary day on which 10 states voted for a candidate clearly shows just how deeply the Republican Party is divided. Moderate voters — those who think the economy is the major issue — are overwhelmingly in favor of pragmatic businessman Mitt Romney, and that’s why he has been considered the front-runner right from the start. But the devoutly religious and the members of the tea party movement, both becoming increasingly radicalized, support the anti-Romney: either the pious Rick Santorum or the arch-conservative Newt Gingrich.

If the delegates won by the anti-Romneys are added together, they nearly equal those delegates won by Romney. It’s Romney’s good fortune that his two main adversaries, encouraged by several electoral victories of their own, aren’t inclined to throw in the towel just yet. That’s why Romney remains the favorite even after Super Tuesday and despite the fact that half his own party can’t stand him.

While Obama can afford to appear totally relaxed now, his opponents’ self-destruction exercises will last only until April. Fueled by obscure support groups — the so-called super PACs — millions of additional dollars will be poured into tacky television commercials in which the candidates will try to annihilate one another and succeed mostly in alienating their intended audiences.

The content of these TV spots becomes ever more absurd. The candidates try to sell the public on the idea that they are more conservative than their competitors. In view of the slowly improving economy, they’ve had to strike out in other directions, with the result they’ve embarked on (no kidding) a campaign against birth control and contraception. It’s as if the 1950s had never ended.

John McCain recently called his party colleagues’ campaigns “a Greek tragedy.” This moderate senator knows from personal experience how difficult it is to defeat Obama. He didn’t reveal who it was he thought would be the tragic character in his literary reference.