Gwen Ifill on 'Newshour with Jim Lehrer' tonight interviewed two Republican figures to explore the current divisions in the GOP. Her questions boiled down to 'Who is speaking for your party: Rush Limbaugh or Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele? (Steele yesterday disavowed Limbaugh as a voice for the Party, saying tha he was "an entertainer, incendiary, yes, ugly, yes - but an entertainer." Today he apologized to Limbaugh.)

The two Republicans tonight were a former Representative and Grover Norquist, more conservaative a Republican than whom you will not find.

But Norquist said an astonishing thing that expleains to me a great deal about the Republican party and Republicans in general. It may even adequately explain the Mudcat's handful of Republican Conservatives.

Having been asked by Ifill what the Republican Party shoud do first to mend its tattered presence, Norquist said: Well, being free from the last 8 years and no longer having to defend the indefensible..."

Does being Republican these days literally require you to lay your honesty -your very honor - aside?