Posted on 05/16/2008 5:22:13 AM PDT by Zakeet
Fans of HBO's "The Wire" know fictional Baltimore Mayor Tommy Carcetti. The reformer spends his first days in office screeching through every public-works unit, railing about an abandoned car here, a leaking hydrant there.
Shocked city administrators ask their angry new boss: Where is the abandoned car? Which leaking hydrant? The mayor won't specify. In fear, they mobilize their forces to pick up all the abandoned cars, to fix all the hydrants. The beat-down citizens of Baltimore cheer. Mayor Carcetti smiles.
The state of the union is angry. Citizens are furious about gas prices and health-care costs, broken schools and property taxes. These are the leaky hydrants, the constant reminders that government hasn't done much for them lately. Their fury has bubbled as they've watched Washington obsess over itself – dealing out earmarks, paying off constituencies, launching probes into political enemies. Accomplishing zip.
This anger is the best way to describe today's political landscape. Ever since Republicans were routed in 2006, and more recently with their loss of three special elections, the party has been in a debate about what changed in the country and what to do in response. In the primaries, as Mike Huckabee pitched to evangelicals, Rudy Giuliani pitched to fiscal conservatives, and Mitt Romney pitched to anything that moved, some went so far as to declare the "death" of the Reagan coalition.
Encouraging this panicked discussion has been a new theory that the nation is experiencing a seismic political shift. A few short years ago, we were supposed to be on the verge of a lasting conservative majority. Scrap that. Now we're lurching toward a lasting "middle" majority. Voters are said to have embraced "centrism." (Whatever that is.) All hail "moderates." (Whoever they are.)
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Maybe voters are just mad as hell. At everyone. George W. Bush's approval ratings
have hit an all-time low at 31%, which is not good for Republicans. Then again, the
Democratic Congress's approval rating clocked in at 18% – the lowest in Gallup's history.
Cowardice is king.
‘Capitulate!’ is now the GOP battle cry.
How pathetic.
>> Encouraging this panicked discussion has been a new theory that the nation is experiencing a seismic political shift.
Dream on Strassel and don’t let the aftershock wake you up.
I know I am. I'm sick to death of having my future in the hands of a bunch of preening, posturing, power-hungry politicians.
Carolyn
Brit Hume asked Charles Krauthammer the other evening on Fox News what he thourght the result will be if Obama is president and both the house and senate have overwhelming Democrat majorities. His answer was that the Republicans would be back in control of both houses in two years. There is no "seismic shift", just a voting public that doesn't know what they want and who have a short attention span.
It could be that all incumbents, D and R, are in trouble. Not a bad thing, IMO.
Personally, I’m fed up with the lot of them. The Founders never envisioned life-long representatives in Congress. Now it’s the rule rather than the exception. Watching the strutting ass Biden pontificate yesterday was the personification of what’s wrong with Washington. It’s to the point where I am considering voting against any incumbent, regardless of party.
What is going wrong, basically, is that the mucky mucks of the Republican party have grown fat in office, and have sold out the conservative principles that brought many of them into power in the 80s and early 90s.
Bush is a nice guy. He means well. His vision of a democratic Iraq is noble. But he has not been at all effective in articulating the conservative vision to the country, or in keeping the Republican party attached to its conservative roots.
Right now, I grade his presidency at about a C-. Which is still a heck of a lot better grade than I would give the rest of the Republican establishment in Washington.
McCain reminds me very much of Bush the elder. Only nominally conservative, he has spent a life in government service, and he sees the Presidency primarily as the crowning achievement of and reward for that service. He does not have any particular vision; he does not want to be president in order to take the country in any particular direction. He certainly is not someone who himself is going to right the Republican ship, and turn it in the right direction.
McCain’s choice for vice president is very important. As much as the words “President Obama” scare me, McCain is probably going to lose, and even if by some miracle he won, he is certainly only a one term president.
Whoever he chooses for the vice presidency has the inside slot at being the “heir apparent” of the Republican party.
If he were to chose a young, solid, committed conservative, the Republican party might have some chance of righting itself and getting back on track in the near future. But if, as is far more likely, he chooses an older, bureaucratic statist insider (like himself), the chances are good that the Republicans are in for a spell of many years in the wilderness.
I would hate to watch the Democrats spend the last part of my life driving this country to hell. But,it seems increasingly likely that that is exactly what is in fact going to happen.
You think the voters are mad now, let them see what it is like with President Obama and a fillibuster proof dem congress. Let them take a trip down memory lane, better yet, let them relive the Carter years and suddenly they will look back at 2008 as the “good ole days.”
But that is how the democrats win. They have to convince everyone that everything is horrible. Hell, they cause what they complain about, rely on a favorable media to cover for them and ride into power. Once in power, they proceed to enact feel good crap legislation as a means to cover for the absolute damage they inflict.
McCain reminds me very much of Bush the elder. Only nominally conservative, he has spent a life in government service, and he sees the Presidency primarily as the crowning achievement of and reward for that service. He does not have any particular vision; he does not want to be president in order to take the country in any particular direction. He certainly is not someone who himself is going to right the Republican ship, and turn it in the right direction.
Bears repeating. Well said!
“Citizens are furious about gas prices and health-care costs, broken schools and property taxes.”
All of which are products of institutionalizing liberal thinking over the last decades.
The solution if there is one lies with term limits. Lets get back to the intent of the original founders. Read the Federalist Papers and then take action.
Congressman Billybob
I have challenged all FReepers to come up with a problem that we face today that ISN’T a result of “liberal” policy.
The only thing that I’ve gotten out of anyone is the state of American Indians on reservations, a topic I’m not versed enough in to discuss.
The torches and pitchforks may be what are required to get domestic drilling and nuclear power plants.
An Obama presidency with a filibuster proof democrat congress will be a political disaster for the Democrats.The Expectations of their support groups will be impossible to satisfy. The party will be ruined in two years.
They will just grab the money faster.
Getting rid of paid lobbyists will do much more to solve the problem.
amen brother
With half the population either paying no federal income tax at all or actually getting paid in the form of EI credits, don’t expect many of them to be looking for smaller government.
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