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I’ve written extensively about the coming split in the Republican Party. This week, tacitly acknowledging his role in the Republican Party of 2009, Rush Limbaugh on Wednesday resigned as ‘titular head of the Republican Party’ in which he snidely passed the baton to Former Secretary of State Colin Powell. Per Media Matters:

Mr. Limbaugh’s attacks are a result of a recent verbal scuffle with Mr. Powell, when Powell declared “the Republican Party is in deep trouble”, indicating Limbaugh was to blame, claiming he “diminishes the party” and influences “a kind of nastiness that we would be better to do without” in public discourse in a speech given to executives in early May.

The melee reached fever pitch on Wednesday, when Mr. Limbaugh returned fire for the speech Mr. Powell had given the previous evening in Boston. In it he declared his intention of redefining conservatism for a new generation of Republicans:

POWELL: “Rush Limbaugh says, ‘Get out of the Republican Party.’ Dick Cheney says, ‘He’s already out.’ I may be out of their version of the Republican Party, but there’s another version of the Republican Party waiting to emerge once again," Powell told the crowd.

In response, Mr. Limbaugh said:

LIMBAUGH: The only thing emerging here is Colin Powell’s ego. Colin Powell represents the stale, the old, the worn-out GOP that never won anything.

As if to lend credence to Rush’s growing leadership stature within the party, and to make the split with Mr. Powell explicit, on Thursday Karl Rove echoed Dick Cheney’s adulation of Rush Limbaugh as the ideological leader of the Republican Party.

Watch it:

Still, Mr. Powell has many ideological peers inside the Republican Party that have shown a willingness to coalesce support for him in public, most notably former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge.

Here is Mr. Ridge claiming Mr. Limbaugh is “too shrill” and uses language that “offends very many” in an interview on CNN’s State of the Union with John King:

While it may be too early to judge the impact of these first open skirmishes in public opinion, it is apparent that battle lines are being drawn along ideological lines.