Blowback

I understand all the arguments that the Bushistas are not trying to sway the 'public' with their pushback against the rising chorus of voices (from the left and NOW the right) that we were mislead, manipulated, and lied to in the run-up to the War, but are merely trying to 'energize the base'. The public is firmly convinced that it was all a pack of lies; the base is not convinced, but perhaps wavering, so the effort is to solidify them, not the rest of us.

It still seems to me that this will backfire on them, perhaps spectacularly (say what you will about the Bushistas, win or lose, they go for the spectacular.) Every poll seems to indicate that Republican women are done with these guys, and these efforts seem doomed to push them even farther away (Republican men are, apparently, trapped in the McKinley era and must be deemed unsalvageable by the mainstream)

The only thing that redeems the entire effort is the (assumedly unintentional) humor factor. As when Bush was reeling off Saddam's bad qualities, pre-war, the only person I see described in Cheney's irate descriptions of his critics is Cheney.