The American Spectator

Cook admits that these figures measure the attitudes of adults, not voters. However, he doubts that there is a differential of more than 10 points between adults and voters. He limits his interpretation of this data to the view “that whatever inherent advantages the GOP had in Electoral College math might be gone.”

Writing before the actual vote on the anti-surge resolutions in the Senate and House, Cook opined that, absent clear progress by June, “the president will lose many Republican lawmakers who have stuck with him so far.”

Maybe. Maybe not. As the recent party-line vote on the surge indicates, the GOP seems to be moving in the opposite direction. Even at this early stage, one would have anticipated more diversity in the GOP ranks on a subject as controversial as a war not going well. But the political will of the President, his supporters in Congress, and the neoconservative and conservative base seems to be countering any such trend within the party.

The GOP has raised the ante and is letting it all ride on the war in Iraq.

The question remains whether such unanimity will be found praiseworthy by the general electorate in 2008. If the trend lines in party identification and the preferences of independents are to be believed, the GOP may have to rely on the fecklessness of its Democratic opponents, as much as on its own internal cohesiveness, to have a chance at victory in two years.