GOP Tide in Full Ebb

Don’t look now, writes David Frum, but the party of Ronald Reagan is heading into “a horrible Republican defeat in 2008.”

And it’s not going to do any good to invoke the Gipper this time around. 

Ronald Reagan was elected at a time when every social indicator seemed to be moving in the wrong direction: crime up, abortion up, divorce up, welfare dependency up, test scores down.

 Reagan-era politics just isn’t going to cut it in the 21st century.

No doubt.  But let’s not get carried away by the gloom and doom.  It is right and proper for the Democrats to win in 2008.  It is time for a change.  The whole point of democratic politics is that you get to throw the rascals out.  Again and again.

Here’s a cheery thought.  After 1932 and the Great Depression it took 5 presidential terms before the voters upchucked the Democrats.  After 1960 it took 2 terms, after 1976 one term.  Then when Clinton was elected in 1992 it took half a term for the voters to upchuck the Democratic Congress.  Sensibly, Clinton governed like a Republican from then on.

It will be interesting to see how Democrats fare after 2008.  First of all, they’ll want to raise taxes to pay for all their programs.  Then there is the question of the war on terror.  Then there is the Social Security mess, the Medicare mess, the education mess, and the single parent mess (see above) for everyone except college graduates.

All in all, I’d say the Democrats deserve to win in 2008.

As H.L. Mencken said:  “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”