Whither the GOP Senate leadership?

Perhaps an alternate title could be "Wither the GOP Senate leadership".  They have an interesting mess on their hands.

First problem, or is it the Frist problem?  Majority Leader Frist is retiring in order to run for president full-time.  Who is his heir apparent?  Second problem is that Santorum is the GOP Conference chair - that is, the guy in charge of organizing leadership elections and committee assignments.  And Santorum is almost certainly toast this election.

And if the GOP loses its majority status, what happens?  

We may be in for a REALLY messy fight here.  I'll bring the popcorn!  Remember, Frist took power in an internal coup with the tacit support of President Bush (like the GOP would really fire Trent Lott for a lil' ol' racism flap. Please).  Those were the days when Bush had real power with Congress.  Now they mostly want to run AWAY from him, so closeness with Bush could be more hindrance than help for candidates.

And a LOT of powerful leadership stands to get whacked in this election.  If both Santorum and George Allen fall, it's a big vacuum.  Will McCain step into Frist's old shoes, or continue to hide behind the curtains and make pretend-maverick noises?  Will Brownback step up to speak for the poor, downtrodden, neglected fundamentalists, and if he does, will he get bounced back by Senators who think their party needs to appeal to more than 15% of the electorate?  Will Mitch McConnell manage to raise himself up from whip in an ordinary, orderly transfer of power?  And if he doesn't, will he lose his job too (and get replaced by some coup member)?  

And what about losing Chaffee, their token moderate?

This isn't something much discussed here on DKos, but it really matters.  I've said that one of the worst mistakes the GOP made was getting rid of our weak leader Daschle, who got replaced with the much more effective and dangerous Reid.  Are we possibly in for the same thing?  What if the GOP finds a good war leader for Senate minority status?