Mike Lofgren spent 30 years on Capitol Hill working for Republicans before publicly leaving the party last week. Responding to Lofgren's denunciation of the Grand Old Party as a "cult," Andrew Sullivan agrees

that the GOP, deep down, is behaving as a religious movement, not as a political party, and a radical religious movement at that. Lofgren sees the "Prosperity Gospel" as a divine blessing for personal enrichment and minimal taxation (yes, that kind of Gospel is compatible with Rand, just not compatible with the actual Gospels); for military power (with a major emphasis on the punitive, interventionist God of the Old Testament); and for radical change and contempt for existing institutions (as a product of End-Times thinking, intensified after 9/11).

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And so this political deadlock conceals a religious war at its heart. Why after all should one abandon or compromise sacred truths? And for those whose Christianity can only be sustained by denial of modern complexity, of scientific knowledge, and of what scholarly studies of the Bible's origins have revealed, this fusion of political and spiritual lives into one seamless sensibility and culture, is irresistible. And public reminders of modernity - that, say, many Americans do not celebrate Christmas, that gay people have human needs, that America will soon be a majority-minority country and China will overtake the US in GDP by mid-century - are terribly threatening.

I have written several times on this topic, but one must be careful with generalizations. To be sure, tea party and Fox News propaganda aim squarely at distinct cultural identities: think of Bill O'Reilly's "war on Christmas." But there's no single religion at the heart of tea party or Republican cultural values. For example, I have seen lots of speculation as to whether America is ready to elect a Latter Day Saint, Mitt Romney, president.

The "more spiritual than political" Glenn Beck rallies have sought to syncretize doctrinal differences into the kind of mushy, right wing unitarianism. The new Republican Party is marked by Michele Bachmann leaving her anti-papist church as well as Rick Perry's prayer meetings. I agree with Sullivan that all this marks the downfall of evangelicalism in America, as the book of Rand has been inserted between Romans and Revelations. But I'm not sure you can describe the religion of the new right in a monolithic way.

Instead, it may actually be more instructive to regard the Republican party as a brand, and the tea party as a new, competing brand from within the same corporation. Think of New Coke. For this purpose, I'll turn things over to Patrick Hanlon for a minute; he's a branding guru. "Branding" is the business of making products succeed in markets, which is far more complicated than just advertising. As Hanlon explains, brands are actually belief systems. More after the jump...

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As if Rand Paul's flippant "No one will miss a hill or two" comment wasn't egregious enough, his latest PR effort on behalf of the coal industry is even worse. In an interview with Details magazine, he makes some of the dumbest and most offensive statements I've heard yet about mountaintop removal.

See, here's what Rand Paul thinks. Seriously.

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We could have saved a lot of trouble if Obama started out this way, but better late than never, I suppose. The Republicans have already done such a stellar job selling the misperceptions, it might be too late:

This time, the President is going to be specific. Next week, President Obama is going to give Democrats a health care plan they can begin to sell.

He plans to list specific goals that any health insurance reform plan that arrives at his desk must achieve, according to Democratic strategists familiar with the plan. Some of these "goals" have already been agreed to, including new anti-discrimination restrictions on insurance companies. Others will be new, including the level of subsidies he expects to give the uninsured so they can buy into the system.

Obama will also specify a "pay for" mechanism he prefers, and will specify an income level below which he does not want to see taxed.

He will insist upon a mechanism to cut costs and increase competition among insurance companies -- and perhaps will even specify a percentage rate -- and he will say that his preferred mechanism remains a government-subsidized public health insurance option, but he will remain agnostic about whether the plan must include a robust public option. Officials won't say whether the president intends to endorse a specific "trigger" mechanism if the competition mechanism fails, but they say he will make it clear that the final bill must contain language that increases competition.

Though officials would not provide the numbers Obama plans to use, they say that the goal is to give his side -- Democrats -- a true presidential plan that they can sell. That includes the rebranding of several consensus initiatives, like the insurance reforms, as his own. The effect of this sales job, if it works, will be to associate the president with parts of the reform bills that are almost certainly likely to pass -- assuming the Senate doesn't bog down.

The White House hopes the specifics will be specific enough to gradually soothe the concerns of the Democratic caucus. The budget reconciliation process remains a cudgel -- it's still the weapon of last resort, and President Obama has told his advisers that he does not want to ask Congress to use the mechanism until it becomes necessary, politically -- that is, until the public understands that the popular elements of reform will not pass without using it.

The GOP Rebranding effort meets the sacked caption guys from Monty Python and The Holy Grail. Open thread below.

A month ago, congressional Republicans quietly announced that they were crafting a comeback plan, which would get the party back on track. It would include new attacks on Dems, a new GOP policy agenda, and a series of new bills. The whole package was going to be awesome.

And now, the comeback plan is off to a troubled start, because the party doesn’t know where it wants to go.

Boehner’s idea had been that the GOP could lift itself off the mat by borrowing from private-sector marketing concepts. Among those who have consulted in the effort were corporate brand experts such as Richard Costello, the man behind GE’s famous “We Bring Good Things to Life” campaign.

But modern business techniques have stalled amid old-fashioned political disputes. Lawmakers who think the party needs to embrace a more moderate image on issues like health care and the environment are at odd with conservatives, who believe the way back to victory is to reclaim the GOP’s traditional reputation for taking a hard line on spending.

Corporate advertising and “rebranding” experts aren’t going to help the Republican Party right now. The problem isn’t that the party has great ideas that it’s having trouble selling; the problem is the party has no ideas, has consistently backed a disastrous war, and is led by the least popular president of the modern political era.

Private-sector marketing concepts are usually built around accentuating positives. What’s the GOP good at? Smearing people? Feigning outrage? Using bumper-sticker slogans?