Then I know I'm in good company :-)
We're a neighborhood of mostly young retirees. Because we have so much time on our hands and are conservative, we talk politics a LOT.
I won't even go into the issues which have moved quite a few of us to the middle, but you probably know what they are. It's an unfortunate consequence of that classic overreaching I keep talking about as it is being expressed by a certain faction of the party. Instead of drawing people in, it's moving people out.
We needed those new folks who fled the left.
I listen to a lot of talk radio, christian talk radio. With rare exception, the party and probably to a point Mr. Rove marketed the President as a Christian man divinely guided by God and placed in the job by God himself. They put the President and the First Lady on a religious pedestal. They were people who had to look modeate, but they really believed as the more strident evangelicals. The christian right bought it, hook, line and sinker. Almost to a man, even the most ardent pro lifers abandoned one of their own (the constitution party candidate) for Mr. Bush. Not only was the election expected to be close, as it was, but I even heard some very ardent consitution party supporters admit that the President was the right Christian man who wouldn't disappoint them, becasue being a lame duck, he didn't have to worry about re-election again. Get him elected, and he would pay the Christians back for their support by advancing their agenda.
The President has had some setbacks recently. And the Schiavo incident further hurt him in the eyes of the pro life right when he didn't personally swoop in and rescue here or force Jeb to do it. His support for Delay was late and for a while luke warm. All this has caused the RR to feel pushed aside.
Let's face it. The jokes were a tad blue at best if one is honest about it. Especially the horse joke. But to the RR it was just another slap in the face.
Again, a big part of this is the sales job the election team sold to the RR. The RR is now having buyer's remorse.