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Rachel Maddow talks to Steve Benen about the Republican infighting going on in the New York 23rd District's special election. As Steve noted yesterday:

Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman in New York's 23rd continues to pick up endorsements from leading right-wing figures. Yesterday, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) bucked his party and threw his support to Hoffman. Reps. Tom Cole of Oklahoma and Dana Rohrabacher of California did the same thing.

Transcript from MSNBC.

MADDOW: This is Betsy Markey. She‘s the Democratic member of Congress representing Colorado‘s fourth district. Betsy Markey got elected to that seat last November when she defeated a three-term, very far-right Republican incumbent named Marilyn Musgrave.

Even Colorado‘s—even as Colorado was thought of as a pretty safe Republican territory, the incumbent Republican, Ms. Musgrave, just got clobbered by the Democrat in this race. She lost by 12 points, wasn‘t even close.

This race is ringing a bell for you maybe because it‘s the only House race from the last election that we were still covering a week after the election was over, because not only did Marilyn Musgrave make news for being a conservative Republican who got trounced in what was supposed to be a safe seat, on this show at least, Ms. Musgrave also made news because even a week after she lost, she still hadn‘t conceded the race, nor had she called to congratulate Betsy Markey who beat her.

We called Betsy Markey‘s office today and confirm that even now, almost a year after that election, Republican Marilyn Musgrave still hasn‘t conceded the race. It‘s possible she still thinks she‘s in Congress.

Well, today, in “The New York Times,” we learned that one of the things Marilyn Musgrave is up to now is campaigning in a New York congressional race that‘s attracted a whole host of ambitious conservatives to rail against the locally-chosen Republican in the race in favor of a more conservative candidate.

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Poor Marilyn Musgrave. She's been sent off to the wilderness with the rest of the GOP -- but she's not done embarrassing herself or her party. According to Politico, the former Republican Rep. has now joined forces with a right wing, anti-choice organization called The Susan B. Anthony List and she's out to reclaim seats for Republican candidates by attacking what she calls "the worst liberals in Congress."

She recently sent out a tersely worded, stunning four-page (four-page!) missive reeking of bitterness, with underlined sentences, paragraphs in bold and even a postscript from the letterhead of “Congressman Marilyn Musgrave” announcing her latest campaign: the Votes Have Consequences grass-roots project that aims to “expose pro-abortion politicians.”

She mentions several times that people have spent a vast amount of money (“roughly $18 million”) to eject her from her seat. She quotes the Bible: “The truth shall set you free.” She then asks people to donate any denomination of money ($25 to $5,000) so that they can “spread the truth about [liberals’] destructive agendas, drag down their approval ratings, force them to publicly defend socialism, authoritarian gun-grabbing, gay marriage, infanticide and everything else they vote for in Washington, and, ultimately, on Nov. 2, 2010, we will take their jobs away from them.” Read on...

Obviously, Musgrave lands on the Cheney/Limbaugh side of the GOP, but the article also touches on the growing civil war raging within the dying political party:

She even sneaks in a dig at the RNC. She adds in the letter that she wants to “attack liberal candidates who deserve to be attacked and to defend conservatives when the Republican National Committee is nowhere to be found.”

Some Republicans are in a really severe state of denial about the ass-kicking they just received Great Repudiation. To wit, Colorado's Marilyn Musgrave:

Bitterness generated by the bruising battle between Betsy Markey and Marilyn Musgrave apparently lingers days after voters decided the winner of the 4th Congressional District.

Incumbent Republican Musgrave, who lost to Democrat Markey by a 56 to 44 percent margin Tuesday, has yet to call and congratulate Markey on her win.

Musgrave also hasn't conceded the race, said Markey spokesman Ben Marter. "She has yet to admit defeat," he said. "It's a little bizarre."

Calls to Musgrave's campaign and congressional office went unanswered Friday.

Ah yes, we remember Musgrave well: She was one of the co-sponsors of a Federal Marriage Amendment, and once declared that gay marriage "is the most important issue that we face today."

Musgrave's residence on Planet Bizarro appears to be permanent.