Could the GOP be deliberately throwing the 2012 presidential election?

Many times in recent years I find myself reading a news story and then checking the date to see if I had failed to notice that it was April 1. Such is the increasing absurdity of the world we live in, I guess. This happened to me most recently when I heard that Donald Trump would host a GOP debate. I can’t understand why the GOP contenders would demean themselves like this. And when I look at Mitt Romney, who is to the GOP what John Kerry was to the Democrats, only worse, and the parade of buffoons who have had their 15 minutes as the top alternative to Romney, I begin to wonder if the GOP is serious about winning the presidency in 2012. Maybe their masters in the financial and multinational corporate sectors would prefer to continue having an obstructionist Congress neutralizing a centrist Democrat president, and so will focus their efforts on keeping their hold on Congress and let Obama cruise to victory in 2012. (I’m a Democrat, by the way.)