In conversations like these you can feel the old Republican coalition splitting at its seams. Whatever was the matter with Kansas no longer is. The nurse is a Christian populist—angry about the wages nurses make, resentful of Romney pouring his millions into an election. She has almost nothing in common with the party’s Wall Street establishment (other than their mutual suspicion of what she calls "social medicine"). The coalition that Reagan built outlasted its natural life by a generation—just like the New Deal coalition of urban ethnics, blacks, and Southerners did. It's hard to see how the Republicans will avoid the fate of the post-1968 Democratic Party: a decade or two of interest-group politics, litmus tests, infighting, and nostalgic appeals to dead Presidents and defunct movements. Pat Robertson will go the way of Lane Kirkland; Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney will follow in the footsteps of George McGovern and Walter Mondale.

In 1980 and 1981 the ideological and economic conflicts within the Republican coalition had not yet emerged. Instead, the main forces behind that coalition—a unified business community, a nascent Christian right, a well-financed conservative movement that has been gathering political and intellectual momentum for a decade, and a growing number of white voters who no longer supported Democratic welfare policies—provided Reagan with a strong base of support. His administration could therefore have its way, particularly in lowering taxes, raising military spending, and cutting benefits for the poor. Three main factors created a favorable climate for Reagan's budget and tax cut legislation. The steeply graduated income tax rates that inflation was pushing onto working- and middle-class incomes; rising regressive Social Security taxes; and increasingly heavy state and local tax burdens.

In 1980 and 1981, then, it seemed that the combined economic, class, and social interests supporting Reagan could become the core of a new majority party. During the last few years, however, these elements have lost their cohesion, and the Republican drive to expand its base has, in fact, had the effect of dividing its supporters. The Administration's 1986 tax reform proposal, for example, clearly had an implicit political purpose: by lowering all tax rates, eliminating many tax breaks, and shifting a significant share of the tax burden from individuals to corporations, the tax plan was intended by party strategists to give a populist boost to Republican hopes of realigning the parties. Instead of being perceived as the instrument of the rich and of corporate America, the GOP would appear as the defender of the common man.

Another Republican alliance coming under strain is that between the country-club Republicans who have controlled the party organizations in most states, and the increasingly restless conservative Christian political community. This alliance has been of prime importance to the GOP: between 1976 and 1984, white fundamentalist Christians accounted for a shift of at least eight million votes to Republican candidates, according to The New York Times–CBS polls. No other single group in those years did more to create a strong Republican coalition.

Conservative Christian political leaders, including Pat Robertson, have, however, become increasingly intent on gaining direct political power. They are sponsoring campaigns to take over numerous state and local Republican party organizations, and running their own candidates in GOP primaries. For example, in Indiana in 1986, fundamentalist Christian candidates defeated candidates backed by the party for Republican nominations in two congressional districts, severely embarrassing one of the strongest state Republican parties in the country. Similarly, fights between Christian groups and party regulars occurred in Republican congressional contests in South Carolina and Tennessee. In three out of four of these districts, the Republican would normally have been favored to win. In fact, Democrats won all four districts. Republican party regulars, dismayed by such activities, are having increasing difficulty maintaining control over nominations. (my emphasis)

But I think for the Republican Party, the prospect of victory eventually may solve some of these divisions. I mean, clearly, each one of these primary candidates represents a particular piece of the Reagan coalition. Nobody has it all. My sense is, however, when we get closer to having a Democrat - suppose Hillary wins February 5, and they know who that opponent is, that that desire to win may somehow heal, if not the soul, the desire to look like the soul is healed.

MS. NORRIS: I mean, they [the Republicans] actually will talk openly about bringing Barack Obama down a few notches because they want to run against Hillary.

MR. MEACHAM: Because it's a known known, to give Secretary - former Secretary Rumsfeld his due. Hillary Clinton, they know what to do. Barack Obama, how do you run against the first African American nominee? It explodes all conventional campaign dogma in ways that completely will surprise and pleasantly and unpleasantly perhaps as they go forward. And I that that that's the - one of the things that's so scary about Obama to Republicans is they don't how to run against him. (my emphasis)

It is funny to watch -- and, ladies and gentlemen, a final observation here. Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton -- have you noticed, it's Obama versus the Clintons? Two against one. Obama campaigning against both of the Clintons. I wonder how well Mrs. Clinton would hold up if the shoe was on the other foot. That is, if she had to run against an ex-president and a senator. I think she'd cry and complain about the unfairness. For all of her BS about being a victim and piling on, Obama is holding his own against both of them, doing more than his share of the "spadework," maybe even gaining ground at the moment, using not only the spade, ladies and gentlemen. But when he finishes with the spade in the garden of corruption planted by the Clintons, he turns to the hoe. And so the spadework and his expertise, using a hoe. He's faring well. (my emphasis)