Greg Bean Coda The happiest man in all Monmouth County It doesn't take a clairvoyant to figure out that Victor Scudiery, chairman of the Monmouth County Democratic Party, is one happy camper these days. Usually, a guy like Scudiery would have his hands full this time of year, trying to figure out how to beat the Republicans in the next election cycle. Beating Republi-cans isn't always a slam-dunk, and Democrats usually have to work hard at it. They aren't always successful. Scudiery, though, apparently won't have to lift a finger. Unless the GOP membership comes to its senses and quits acting like spoiled babies, all Scudiery will have to do is sit back and let the Mon-mouth County Republican Party finish destroying itself - a process its fractured and cantankerous membership has been fairly intent on fulfilling for the last few years - then take a swing through the battlefield to strip the corpses of valuables. If you happen to have GOP sympathies, the self-destruction of the Monmouth County Republican Party has been painful to witness. It's never pleasant to watch a family tear itself apart, or a society eat its own young. If you happen to have Democratic sympathies, however, the whole thing has been an incredible hoot. Some Democrats of my acquaintance have likened the collapse of the county party to a soap opera; others think it's more of a badly written sitcom. Personally, I believe a better analogy would be the old-timey tragedy "Medea" by Euripides - the play where that crazy lady kills her own kids to get even with her husband, Jason. As in "Medea," the collapse of the Monmouth County Republican Party is a story about a family rending its own flesh. It's a story of big egos, jealousy, ambition, plotting, betrayal, lies, unholy alliances, vengeance, criminal behavior and untreated insanity. It's even got its own chorus standing at the edge of the stage in the dark, commenting on the action. In this case, naturally, it's not a Greek Chorus, it's a Geek Chorus, composed of anonymous Republican bloggers who apparently aren't real players in the party, just wannabees keeping the pot at boil from a safe distance. Like the chorus in "Medea," the Geek Chorus is great at Monday morning quarterbacking, back-biting, criticizing and whining, but not so good at putting on a name tag, rolling up its sleeves and doing something constructive to make things better. And as in "Medea," the end of the story will likely involve blood, bodies and broken dreams. If you're Vic Scudiery, you've got to love a story like that, especially the part about the bodies. In the interest of full disclosure, I readily admit that I consider Adam Puharic, the relatively new chairman of the Monmouth County Republican Party, to be a personal friend (that might not be a plus for his reputation). I can't speak for him about whether he considers me a friend as well, but I hope he does. I think he's an idealistic, honest and hard-working man, even though I thought it was incredibly wrong-headed of him to take the job of county chairman last June. "Do you want me to come to your house and do an intervention?" I asked him at the time. "How could anyone hope to unify that bunch of disparate nincompoops?" Despite my best advice, he was determined to throw himself into the breach and, like Admiral Nelson, "turn his guns toward the enemy and fire away." I wished him well, but I didn't think it would be pretty, since the Monmouth County GOP - bitterly divided and stung to the core by the U.S. Attorney's Operation Bid Rig indictment of many sitting GOP politicians and hangers-on - was a horrendous mess. For 18 years, the GOP had been run by the ham-fisted William Dowd, who controlled the party much the same way Richard J. Daley controlled the warring tribes of Chicago, by making all the decisions and steamrollering the opposition. Finally, people got tired of Dowd and his back-room politics and a reform movement (a movement of which disgraced former Keyport Mayor John Merla was a founding member) swept him out. He was replaced by Freehold attorney Fred Neimann. The "reform" chairman declined to run for a second term, and was gone a year later after being second-guessed and criticized for allegedly using sneaky tactics to skirt pay-to-play laws and raise funds. Neimann was replaced by Puharic, who won the job by a large margin, but inherited a party with so many factions and divisions, so many cliques and so much in-fighting that during his inaugural speech he likened it to a "Balkanized state." There was a brief honeymoon, during which it looked like the tribes might actually play nice and work toward the common goal of electing Republicans, but that didn't last long. Before you could say Bob's Your Uncle, they were back to their old, nasty selves, complaining and sniping at each other from behind cover - egged on by the Geek Chorus, the back-benchers, the vociferous malcontents and the editorial writers at the Asbury Park Press, who (in a fit of bizarre hyperbole aimed at furthering the paper's own murky political agenda) likened Puharic's administration to the old Soviet Politburo. No joke, the Politburo. The Red Communist Politburo! Give me a break! Now, the wheels are coming off the cart in earnest. There are hard feelings, harsh words and the divisiveness is more brutal than ever. There's talk of Republicans jumping ship to the Democrats, or running as independents. There's talk of forcing primary races that will make it even easier for Victor Scudiery and crew to walk into the winners circle virtually unhindered. There's talk of unseating Puharic (if he won't cave in to those calling for his resignation) and replacing him with someone who can really - no kidding this time - bring the various factions of the party together and make the members work as a loyal unit, a team. They ought to be talking about hiring a medium to bring Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King or Mohandas Gandhi back from the Great Beyond to do that job, since it's obviously beyond any living human's capability. Either that, or asking the United Nations to send in a peace-keeping force. You know what? A peace-keeping force might actually work. As long as they come well armed. Gregory Bean is executive editor of Greater Media Newspapers. You can reach him at gbean@gmnews.com.