The 2008 election season is already shaping up to be one of the most closely contested in history. Neither party is likely to produce a clear nominee in the short term, and one or both might wind up in the first contested convention in the United States in decades. But while there is not yet any winners, there is a clear casualty — the idea of the “big tent” party may be dying under withering factional fighting in both parties.

Among Democrats, Hillary Clinton’s is living up to expectations for nasty, bare-knuckles warfare. Several of Clinton’s surrogates, including the hopeful First Spouse and ex-President, have repeatedly indulged in disparaging racially-tinged references about rival Barack Obama. Unless we are to believe that the political dynasty that is the Clinton machine has suddenly degenerated into lack of discipline that would be unprecedented for them, there is simply no way that the racial references have been accidental or merely twisted words.

The Clinton campaign has also repeatedly tried to play the “victim” and “woman in a man’s world” cards, casting literally every attempt to question or challenge the candidate as not only misguided, but also unfair and presumptively illegitimate. Literally nothing that Obama’s campaign could possibly say by way of criticism or disagreement with Clinton would ever be accepted by Clinton’s base of supporters as anything less than scurrilous. Clinton clearly expected a coronation and when it failed to develop, the Clinton campaign resorted immediately to the familiar “war room” mentality against political opponents. Unfortunately for Democrats, this time around the political opponents are within her own party.

The result for Democrats has been an unexpected but substantial and growing schism where two major foundational elements of the Democratic base — women and blacks — are being forced into unforgiving opposing camps. The result for the eventual nominee will be a fractured party with deep wounds that will not be easily healed.

Republicans have even worse problems, with an emerging factional split that is 3-way instead of 2. The heir apparent, John McCain, is actually anything but. His credentials as author of the Iraq “surge” appeal to those who prioritize a strong national defense, but social conservatives distrust him and anti-immigration radicals that abruptly hijacked the party agenda last year detest him. McCain’s backers are, however, unlikely to give up their socially moderate preferences to embrace anyone else, especially after getting burned by George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004.

Mitt Romney has cobbled together a position that is at least passable to anti-immigration forces and he is trusted by the fiscally conservative wing of the party, but social conservatives distrust his past inconsistency on abortion and gay marriage and many of them quietly detest his Mormon religious beliefs. If he loses, Romney’s supporters will believe that anti-Mormonism played a substantial role in his defeat and those with that impression may be unlikely to turn out for the eventual Republican nominee.

Mike Huckabee sings directly from the social conservative hymnbook with all the strengths and weaknesses that carries. Social conservatives within the party feel that he is at last their chance to move from a merely strong supporting role to directly control the party’s and the nation’s agenda. And Huckabee feeds this fantasy, calling for even the Constitution itself to be amended to cohere with “God’s standards”. But the cost has been his tacit embrace of anti-Mormonism, thus alienating a small but disproportionately powerful wing of the Republican base. And behind the gentle smile and the homespun self-deprecation, the “Huckasaint” has turned out to be one of the nastiest campaigners on record, including notorious efforts to simultaneously display an anti-Romney attack ad in Iowa while claiming credit for being above all of that and his earlier effort to put out a grotesque anti-Mormon stereotype under the question of a casual and faux-innocent side comment to a reporter. More recently, a Huckabee associated group has already started “push-polling” (doing polling calls that are in reality attack ads against an opponent) in South Carolina. The victims of Huckabee’s constant deceptions and shiv-in-the-back tactics are not likely to flock to his side if he prevails.

Busy with their internal conflicts, neither party is giving much heed to the factional splits they are developing within. But their lack of attention is ill-advised. The 2008 elections are not simply new iterations of the same old primary fights that have occurred in the past. These schisms have the potential to last much longer. And the potential consequences of broad-scale political demobilization among huge constituencies or large-scale reorganization of partisan coalitions could throw American politics into chaos unprecedented since at least the 1960s. And no one — especially not moderates — is well-positioned to benefit from the new multi-polar version of political polarization and hatred.