Plausibility Check: GOP Split in 1932?

The recent thread on Herbert Hoover's assassination got me thinking about the potential for a serious rift in the GOP caused by the Great Depression.

Without someone in the ideological center of the party (Hoover) to draw things together and run in what was essentially a no-win situation, I could see the Progressive and Conservative Wings falling out over the response to the Great Depression.

What do you guys think? Likely or not? Would someone rally the troops in the absence of Hoover? Or would 1932 be an effective re-run of 1912?

Who would end up leading each side of the party? Perhaps La-Follette Jr. on the Progressive side (probably not as President, VP probably). Who for the conservatives?

Would the conservatives win in any states? What about the Progressives. Obviously the GOP split makes Roosevelt's victory an even bigger landslide. Does the split continue into the 30's and 40's?
 
What will the GOP media barons say?

Would the conservatives win in any states? What about the Progressives. Obviously the GOP split makes Roosevelt's victory an even bigger landslide. Does the split continue into the 30's and 40's?
I can't speak to candidates, the history of internal GOP politics in the 30's is not my strongpoint (Ask me about the 40's) but in a republican system it's winner-take-all. Here "almost" only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and nuclear weapons:D No room for third parties. Our history with third parties is that they have a record that is furious, glorious, and brief:eek: As spoilers, that is. They tend to swirl around the White house, not be genuine movement of the people. When they are, they may last a decade or three (Like the Whigs, Know-Nothings, Populists, and Progressives) but eventually one of the two main parties, having been in opposition too long, decide to put away the Red (or Black) flags and move back closer to the center (paging Tony Blair).
When this happens, 3rd party support vanishes.

However, you bring up an interesting TL. The Roosevelt-Haters were almost as bad as the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy (the Clinton Wars). While the FDR Administration didn't have to deal with anything quite like the VRWC, there was the Hearst Empire, Henry Ford's media mouthpieces, and the Chicago Tribune. But in FDR's day, pretty much everyone realized the extreme bias of those three entities. So a two party split of the GOP means big trouble for them and much better days for FDR. What I don't know is this: Would Hearst, Henry Ford, and the Chicago Tribune join forces or move into the separate camps? I don't know enough about Hearst and his politics to answer this. I DO know the owners of the Chicago Tribune (Different owners today) were so pathological that, solely to embarass FDR, they committed multiple acts of out-and-out treason in WWII printing in blazing headlines our secret war plans and the fact that we had broken the enemies codes!:eek: The Germans and Japanese made considerable propaganda from those war plans. Thank God their arrogance kept them from believing we could break their "unbreakable" codes. I'd say the Trib and Henry Ford's mouthpiece newspapers will stay with the GOP. Hearst? If he had a choice? I just don't know...:confused:

PS. Why are you spending time with this when you should be sending your minions after Moose and Squirrel?
 
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