Conservative Columnist Douthat Tries To Put Best Face On Cantor Loss... And Fails

"Whom The Gods Would Desroy, They First Make Mad."

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DOUTHAT: After Eric Cantor. "Cantor was not really a policy innovator....But he did seem to understand, more than some of his colleagues, that what the G.O.P. ultimately needs from its leadership is a synthesis to unite the warring factions, not a Final Victory for one side or the other — and that a new agenda for the party might be part of that necessary synthesis. So if the message of his defeat, last night, is that such a synthesis simply can’t be achieved — that 'if you try to play both sides of the intra-party divide you will lose,' as some Republicans suggested to the Washington Post’s Bob Costa — then it was a very bad night for conservatism’s future" Ross Douthat in The New York Times.