Chuck Todd, Mike Murphy Discuss GOP's 'Circular Firing Squad' Over Sarah Palin (VIDEO)

The sniping between McCain staffers and Palin defenders has only gotten worse since Todd Purdum's lengthy Vanity Fair article slamming Sarah Palin came out. Now Politico's Jonathan Martin has come out with a piece in which the sniping has blown up into an all-out war inside the Republican party.

The piece is filled with on-the-record quotes from high-level and high-profile Republicans bashing each other, most prominently Bill Kristol going after McCain presidential campaign manager Steve Schmidt. Longtime McCain friend and adviser Mike Murphy went on "Hardball" tonight to discuss a segment the show billed as the GOP's 'Circular Firing Squad.

Murphy was fairly nonplussed, chalking it up to the "ghosts of a campaign that oughtta stay in the graveyard." He called these ghosts troubling," but "in the big picture I don't think this means a lot for the [Republican] party." However, with Democratic and progressive activists pushing the party to get more aggressive on passing their agenda, the last thing the GOP needs is for the news cycle to be dominated by nasty intra-party infighting from which everyone emerges looking bad.

Murphy also offered this outline for Palin's political future:

Three things are going to happen with Sarah Palin. She's either not going to run, and then she's not gonna matter much in national politics. Two, she is gonna run and do poorly, and then she'll matter a little but not a lot. Or three, she's gonna have the greatest comeback in American political history and get nominated. If the Sarah Palin that people perceive today is the one who's nominated in a few years I think we'd lose the election. But the very act of that kind of comeback that she would need to win the Republican nomination probably, again it's crystal ball stuff, might be a new and improved Sarah Palin. There's room to grow; she has a lot of natural talent. The problem is there's a lot of controversy... Right now most Americans don't perceive her as qualified to be President or someone they support.

Discuss in the comments which outcome you think is the most likely. Watch the interview below.

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Comments

[revhatchell]

09:53 PM on 07/04/2009

chuck! todd!

[GeorgeBright]

06:40 PM on 07/04/2009

Mike Murphy says "My advice for her would be (to) be a great governor right now - focus on that, play the long game"

So that's not gonna work out very well - do you have a Plan B?

[lukebenward]

03:52 PM on 07/03/2009

Could Chris Matthews PLEASE stop soliciting the advice from disgraced CRQQK Tom Delay. I mean, do you *really* want his angle?

[jonjon66]

10:01 AM on 07/03/2009

yo Chuck how long can you take Morning Joe?

yesterday Joe said on the air he wished Chip Reid was the MSNBC's White House correspond­ent.....as Chuck sat there waiting to speak.

Really embarrassi­ng being dissed my the show you likely have contractua­l obligation­s to appear on.

[Joel Widder]

09:03 PM on 07/03/2009

I watched the same thing and nearly fell out of my seat. At first I thought surely Joe is just being sarcastic - but it soon become clear that was not the case. I couldn't believe what I had just seen - and then I heard nothing more about it in other press accounts, etc so I started to think I had just misheard the whole thing. I wonder if there will be an act 2 on MJ next week?

[research]

12:07 PM on 07/02/2009

Why do "liberal" media outlets give the right wing so much air time?

I'm sure Kucinich and Dean have things to say of far greater importance­.

[Willow207]

12:40 PM on 07/02/2009

Because they aren't true liberal, only "faux" liberal grasping for advertisin­g dollars. Another word for those who sell their souls for money is....wh*@­es....

[research]

01:48 PM on 07/02/2009

Perhaps.

Look at the Antics of the conservati­ves!

Clear they are screaming "Look at me" "Don't look away".

The conservati­ves have learned to play the media.

They learned a lot of it from the 60's hippies, with their big publicity events.

[spambrando]

05:19 PM on 07/03/2009

Yeah, the only two who still make sense to me, as opposed to most of "blinders-­on" U.S. population afraid to make a less-than-­Hollywood type a real leader. I really don't give a rat's a$$ if Kucinich looks like an elf. I'm more concerned about his common sense factor.

[Marnieblue]

11:53 AM on 07/02/2009

If Sarah Palin were to become president, America would officially be the most ignorant country in the western world. If Americans vote her in this country deserves whatever it gets which won't be pretty.

[Taiyo]

01:13 PM on 07/02/2009

It will never happen . . . (she says as she fingers her prayer beads)

[QuidQuintessa]

11:34 PM on 07/04/2009

I think the fact that she has even gotten this far pretty well confirms that fact. We have abused our democracy and our every ideal by even admitting a character (what an ironic term to use) such as her to our national stage. I could wish that we be mercifully rid of her, but that would only be alleviatin­g the symptom while the illness rages on.

[WolfLady]

11:20 AM on 07/02/2009

Palin's "comeback" will happen if and when:

1) All the young people in the country become bigoted old white male fundies.

2) Blacks, Hispanics and gays decide they love being discrimina­ted against.

3) Stupidity becomes chic.

~WolfLady~

[PWM]

11:52 AM on 07/02/2009

LOL

[fairywhatnot]

11:58 AM on 07/02/2009

In your #2, you forgot to mention women wanting to be dominated and discrimina­ted against like in the eighteenth century.
Remember, as mayor of Wasilla, she made rape victims pay for their rape kits. She also does not want women to have any say or choice in what is going on with their bodies - if you become pregnant - even because of rape or incest - you will HAVE TO carry the baby to term.

[Fez]

10:47 AM on 07/02/2009

She has a "lot of natural talent?" This is a person who cannot put together a coherent thought, is so poorly educated that she thinks Africa is a country, can't manage her own white-tras­h family, and has a voice like fingernail­s on a chalkboard­. If she has any "natural talent" she's doing a heck of a good job disguising it.

[PWM]

11:53 AM on 07/02/2009

I suppose one could say a fly has lots of natural talent.

[Muttonchops]

12:06 PM on 07/02/2009

It's scary to think that a person like her could have come so close to being "just a heartbeat away" from the oval office. My God! What a nightmare that would have been.

[lauram]

10:42 AM on 07/02/2009

Why is post-partu­m depression considered a "defamatio­n" according to Kristol? It's something that happens to a LOT of women after they give birth. If they're smart, they seek treatment and get better. Why would a natural chemical reaction to hormone fluctuatio­ns be defaming? Put that in your pipe and smoke it Chuck Todd.

[Clearing-Brush]

10:28 AM on 07/02/2009

Blah blah blah Sarah Palin blah blah. Palin belongs in the tabloids not in the news, end of story. Stop giving this woman any more undeserved attention.

[CCverve]

11:21 AM on 07/02/2009

Couldn't agree more...

[CJWebber]

01:13 PM on 07/02/2009

Exactly. Her Big News page should be under Entertainm­ent.

[AnnfromCA]

10:27 AM on 07/02/2009

Who knows? As he says, it's crystal ball stuff.

[Shawn0965]

11:27 AM on 07/02/2009

Hows that head injury coming along....

[Freesia2]

10:19 AM on 07/02/2009

I don't know which outcome is more likely. That they ran her at all means that the GOP will do anything if they think they can pull a con on the American people just long enough to get some power. She was a mascot and nothing more.

Bottom line for me is that I don't care how much they clean her up. She could come out talking with the intellect of Einstein and Abraham Lincoln's love child (fat chance). She could present us a box where she's put all her schticky "you betcha's and gosh darn its" (as if anyone believes she actually speaks that way). She could float in like a swan and I just don't care. Not after those rallies...­. In politics, someone can reveal who they are by the choice they make under pressure. Hers was make up for a brain so empty that she couldn't even brave a real news interview (but by all means give her the country to run) by race baiting. By pitting American against America. For celebratin­g the lowest common denominato­r and the basest instincts. She elevated or inspired no one. She just race baited.

So run her, don't run her, run her out of town. It's all the same to me. But she's not only vapid, she's morally unfit for the White House. I can disagree on policy and live with it. I won't tolerate a gutter snipe. No one should.

[midwesthousewife]

10:39 AM on 07/02/2009

OUCH! And totally agree.

[Clearing-Brush]

11:17 AM on 07/02/2009

Sums it up for me. Thanks for the post.

[alienobserver]

10:03 AM on 07/02/2009

It is beyond me that you Americans give this non-entity the time of day - do you really see her as fit, in anyway, to even be in any kind of national politics??­?

[Freesia2]

10:28 AM on 07/02/2009

No. And I don't give her consider her fit. She's a media creation. She makes for easy copy and sound bites.

[cindyw]

10:40 AM on 07/02/2009

We elected George Bush, didn't we?

[PWM]

11:54 AM on 07/02/2009

He was the runner up in the most stupid American contest - Palin won that one.

[WANSU]

09:47 AM on 07/02/2009

Did any one of you see Joe (JM) dishing Chuc Todd by saying that Chip Reed at CBS who used to be at NBC would be much better reporter at the WH if he was still with NBC..when he wsa ready to interview Chuck is show. Please, find the tape and see it for yourself..­it was bad..Chuck was angry!!!!!­!!1

[rockyb26]

09:23 AM on 07/02/2009

i think i like chuck alot better in this format. he's alot more palatable when he's asking questions of the pundits and crunching numbers. he's awful as a white house correspond­ent and his interpreta­tion of what's going on in the WH is usually off base.

[Taiyo]

01:09 PM on 07/02/2009

Personally­, I wish he'd take over Chris Matthews' show permanentl­y. At least he lets his guests speak without interrupti­on.