Paul Krugman provides a short list of problems that threaten the continued existence the Republican Party as it is now constituted.
1. The party's real goal is to eliminate the welfare state, Social Security and Medicare. But these programs are too popular to attack directly.
2. The indirect attack is to first reduce taxes and revenue then to use the lack funds as an excuse to cut the programs.
3. The idea is to use other sources of strength, such as white resentment, national security, and working class dislike of change to establish power, then to use that power against the programs.
4. But these sources of strength are now liabilities. There are now more Hispanics than southern whites. Women's rights are stronger than anti-abortion and anti-gay support. And they failed to get Osama Bin Ladin.
Their goals are now so far out of reach that they have no effective strategy whatsoever.