Gov. Phil Scott and his party are going in opposite directions in just about every way, and that’s bad news for both sides. And great news for the Democrats.

This campaign season ought to be a good time for the VTGOP. Scott is pushing hard on “affordability” and there’s every reason to think it will resonate with the voters. Many people are finding it harder and harder to make ends meet. Few think of themselves as comfortable.

And while Scott has a simple, compelling narrative, the Democrats are trying to address tough issues through the messy process of legislating. And yes, the Dems are looking for revenue to pay for the things they see as necessary. It’s not an easy case to make. If you want a depressing example of the Dems’ messaging problems, take a listen to the February 28 edition of Mark Johnson’s “802 News” podcast. He interviews several Democrats about the school funding situation, and they all say it’s complicated and will take time, probably years, to sort everything out. It was a bleak outlook on the verge of a Town Meeting Day where many Vermonters rejected school budgets with big tax hikes.

And all the while Scott is hammering on a single point. I’m not saying he’s right; I’m saying it’s politically effective. And it should pay dividends. The Dem/Prog supermajorities ought to be in mortal peril. Scott should be able to emerge from 2024 with a stronger hand.

But he probably won’t because the Republicans are completely unready for the moment. The party is underfunded, under-organized, and dominated by extremists. Case in point: recent events in Windsor County.

Windsor’s grassroots Trumpers have been trying for months to rid themselves of county committee chair John MacGovern, a very conservative fellow with decades of service to the party who happens to dislike presidential candidates who try to stage insurrections. They finally did the trick on Saturday, March 16 at a meeting called by MacGovern for the express purpose of getting himself the hell out of Dodge.

The assembled delegates voted unanimously to replace him with staunch Trumper Lynn Baldwin, fresh off her star turn as a plaintiff in a lawsuit against MacGovern, VTGOP chair Paul Dame, and the VTGOP itself.* A lawsuit which was embarrassingly unsuccessful and unnecessary, since MacGovern and Dame had no interest in blocking the election of a new county chair.

*The plaintiffs’ attorney, Deborah Bucknam, is a former Republican candidate for attorney general. Anybody remember Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment? “Thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican”? Guess not.

But it says something when a county chair thinks so little of her state party that she’s willing to take it to court. And despite winning control of the county committee, the upstarts remain unhappy. As the Valley News’ Jim Kenyon reports, they still haven’t dropped their lawsuit.

MacGovern told me that he and Dame had each received a “settlement offer,” from the plaintiffs’ attorney, Deborah Bucknam, a former vice chairwoman of the state GOP, on Wednesday. To make the lawsuit go away, they needed to sign a “confidential agreement,” MacGovern said.

“It was unacceptable, to say the least,” he told me. “The lawsuit is moot and any continuation is frivolous.”

The clown car image at the top of this column might seem excessive, but at least those clowns aren’t at war with themselves.

So a longtime loyal Republican has been sidelined by extremists in Windsor County. They already dominate many other GOP jurisdictions and the state committee. In the last two election cycles the Republican legislative ticket has been full of extremist types who lose the vast majority of the time. Would the Dem/Prog supermajorities exist if the Republicans were more interested in winning elections than demonstrating their fealty to Trump? I doubt it.

The supermajorities ought to be in peril this year, but they probably aren’t. At last week’s gubernatorial presser, I asked Scott about MacGovern’s departure and the state of the VTGOP. He bemoaned Trump’s influence on the party. “He’s using a philosophy of divide and conquer,” Scott said, refusing to even utter Trump’s name. “It’s not healthy for democracy in general, it’s not healthy for our state.”

I noted that he had largely divorced himself from party affairs but that the health of the party has an impact on his own ability to govern. His response: “I’ve advocated publicly for those who are, I don’t care if you’re Republican, independent, Democratic, if you’re fiscally minded, have common sense, willing to listen to different ideas, and just be reasonable, I would advocate for you to run for the Legislature because we need more diversity in that respect.”

“But the party is driving out those people,” I replied.

The governor expressed his belief that there were many who believe as he does, “but there’s a tarnish to the party because of the leader at the top.”

Ah yes, He Who Shall Not Be Named.

Vermont Public’s most unretired retiree Bob Kinzel asked if Scott would take a more active role in Republican affairs. The governor’s answer was carefully limited. He said he “may be active” in recruiting candidates with “more realism, more common sense.”

That’s, um, next to nothing, really. Phil Scott may not like it, but Phil Scott is the only person who can make a difference in the VTGOP. He’s the only Republican who wins statewide races. He’s the only one who can raise money, although he really doesn’t like doing it and barely tries even on his own behalf, much less for the cash-starved party organization. (The VTGOP hasn’t had a single paid staffer since Jeff Bartley left the executive directorship seven years ago.)

So he might do a little recruiting. And what a compelling sales pitch he has: Become a candidate! Deal with MAGA-dominated town and county committees who don’t want anything to do with you! They’re going to favor like-minded candidates over traditional Republican types like, say, John MacGovern. They have little to offer financially or organizationally. They have no clue about how to broaden the party’s appeal, which is a must if you want to win in Vermont. And don’t expect any help from a state party that lacks the resources to mount a coordinated campaign.

Does the governor expect practical business types to voluntarily wade into that mess? Probably not, which is why his commitment to the effort is so, um, noncommittal. For the Democrats, it’s all good. They’ll have a much easier time of it in November than they ought to, given the political climate. And the VTGOP will sink a little deeper into irrelevance.

Obligatory Dig at Vermont Media. I must once again bemoan the fact that none of our major outlets even pretend to cover party politics anymore. Kenyon is the only mainstream journalist who’s reported on the Windsor County mess, and he works for a paper that’s not even located in Vermont. The only other media organization that’s done anything with the story is the staunchly conservative Vermont Daily Chronicle. Not exactly objective, but somewhat useful in the absence of any other reportage. Can I interest Seven Days in reviving “Fair Game”? Please?

(Not for me, oh God no. What they ought to do is spurn retirement-age graybeards, hire the best young hotshot they can find, bring them to Vermont, and let them learn the state while retaining an outsider’s perspective. But I have no expectation that anyone at Seven Days would take my advice.)