Ryan New GOP Party Chief, Whether He Wants or Knows It

Charles Krauthammer wants the GOP to rustle up a posse and haul in Paul Ryan to do his constitutional responsibilty to run for President, now that he's effortlessly become its de-facto leader.

A remarkable class of young up-and-comers includes Paul Ryan, Chris Christie, Marco Rubio, Nikki Haley. All impressive, all new to the national stage, all with bright futures. 2012, however, is too early — except possibly for Ryan, who last week became de facto leader of the Republican Party. For months, he will be going head-to-head with President Obama on the budget, which is a surrogate for the central issue of 2012: the proper role of government. If Ryan acquits himself well, by summer’s end he could emerge as a formidable anti-Obama.

One problem: Ryan has zero inclination to run. Wants to continue what he’s doing right now. Would have to be drafted. That would require persuasion. Can anyone rustle up a posse?

Chris Christie has an embarassing cap-and-trade blot in his copybook. Romney's elephant-in-the-parlor is RomneyCare in MA, Gingrich is a non-stop chatterbox who can't or won't shut up and has personal baggage that he doesn't shut up about.

Bachmann, Pawlenty, Daniels, Barbour are all doomed unless Obungler stumbles badly or falls under a bus. Palin & Huckabee are hopefully too smart and Trump too nauseating to really run. [Trump can convince himself of anything, though, as long as it aggrandizes his immense ego.]

How to detach Paul Ryan, the one truly competent possibility with an apparent superiority over Obungler across the board, from his professional pride in doing the budget job the way it needs to be done? If Cantor weren't Jewish, he'd be a candidate, but he's ruffled a few too many feathers. Still, somebody has got to cross that bridge and become the first non-Christian POTUS candidate.

Krauthammer is so superior to all other Post correspondents except occasionally David Ignatius and Anne Applebaum, that he's the only reason I still even look at that rag. CK is also superior to all and every NYT writer/correspondent as well[---not that that's saying much.