Nobody Can Win the 2008 GOP Presidential Nomination

This post, written by GottaLaff, originally appeared on Cliff Schecter's Brave New Films Blog

That's right, nobody. There will be no Republican winner. Okay, there will be somehow, but check this out:

* First, Huckabee:

o So the latest polls have Mike Huckabee up an implausible nineteen points in Iowa and four points nationally. But he can't win, right? I mean, he's vulnerable on practically every non-social issue, he has a variety of skeletons in his closet, his policy team seems more or less nonexistent, he still doesn't have any money, and he has most of the GOP establishment united against him. He doesn't have a prayer - or maybe that's all he has.

Except, of course, that none of his rivals can win either. If you look at the field, every candidate seems to have near-disqualifying weaknesses (a point Larison has been making for months, I believe), which helps explain why nobody seems capable of getting above 30-35 percent in any national or state-level poll.

o McCain is still poison to a large chunk of the base and probably doesn't have enough money to capitalize even if he wins New Hampshire - and if he loses there, he's cooked.

o Mitt Romney is running on a record that would have made him a moderate Democrat in any state except hyper-liberal Massachussetts. [And there are those Mormon and Mitt-flop issues]

o Rudy Giuliani is running on a record that would have made him a moderate Democrat in any place except hyper-liberal New York City. [And this stuff]

o Fred Thompson is more ideologically appropriate, but he's lived down to his lackluster record as a politician by running a remarkably lousy and (perhaps unremarkably) lazy campaign.