Recommence circular firing squad

So today Reince Priebus released the report on post-mortem on how the GOP lost the 2012 election. I thought it was a surprisingly realistic first step for the GOP, who haven't been exactly clear on the objective world for the past two years.

Some ideas I agree with:

• Don't piss off women so much. They're not just vessels for babies... now that they have the vote.. and jobs.. and that damned independent streak. They have less time for news (due to tons of other responsibilities), but word does get around if a party doesn't care whether women get contraception or not. Lots of women pay attention to that.
• Be welcoming to minorities. This will be harder because the GOP is the epitome of a white men's country club. Sure, there's room for a few more tokens to get up on stage and milk the party for support. But how many minorities are eager to sign up after watching the disrespect leveled at Obama and Holder and Sotomayor. Even white males who step out of bounds are hunted down like (as) RINOs. This is not a tolerant party. Good luck on winning skittish minority voters.
• Pass immigration reform. This could be a no-win situation for the GOP. Latinos aren't voting for Republicans in large numbers because the GOP are nasty to immigrants, who are largely Latino. But if there's a path to citizenship, that will mean more lower-wage and minority voters, who tend to vote Democratic. Tough dilemma--do you take the risk and try to turn it around? Or do you hold tight to principles and circle the drain?
• Shorter primary with fewer debates. Those debates did show the country a lot, including that audiences could be stacked, or they may be just a bunch of random yahoos. But it certainly was a pander-fest. A shorter campaign would help a little, but the bigger problem is pandering to the shrill conservative media. I don't think there were many suggestions about that.

The response from parts of the conservative spectrum were much uglier than my reaction. Limbaugh says "I’m sorry, but we’re not disrespectful to anybody." HAHAHAHA. Rush is personally disrespectful to the vast majority of humanity, so let's just say that he's so acclimated to disrespect that he doesn't smell it anymore.

It looks to me as though Priebus's outreach to the Ron Paul liberty wing is falling flat. You really need to read the hair-raising comments here. They include throwing someone under a lawnmower, stabbings, kissing back sides, and a few Jew comments too. But definitely, there is no way the Paul wing is going support fewer caucuses, another Priebus proposal. The base at HotAir isn't happy either, with the general sentiment being that it's another way for the establishment to muzzle the base.

I won't tell the GOP what to do. They aren't my party, and I've learned from experience that you can't manage anyone else's life from the outside. I hope they make decisions that are beneficial for them and for the country as a whole, whatever those decisions will be. So, best of luck, GOP. Try not to screw it up.

How the hell do I fix this?

Image: go.bloomberg.com

Extras. An insider at The Weekly Standard has written a moderate-length analysis of the GOP problem with a suggested, but unlikely, solution. A shorter version here to whet your interest.

The HotAir bloggers support the gist of the post-mortem. The commenters want to hang the traitors to GOP principles.

Erick Erickson at RedState: 'Meh. It just wasn't our year.' This response confuses me because it's completely anti-analytical.