“Removing the snake from the garden with a stick was a rejection of the snake, but should not be seen as particularly an endorsement of the stick — except as the closest available tool with which to eject the snake,” writes Tony Blankley.
The stick, of course, is the GOP. Blankley, who as Newt Gingrich’s spokesman saw up close the Republican triumph of 1994 (with nothing like the number of seats they captured Tuesday!), puts forward a possibility that is deeply troubling to those of us who are temperamentally conservative: the breakup of our two party system. Talk about the transformation of America!
Commentators haven’t a clue:
The very fact that most of the commentators are comfortably discussing how nothing useful is likely to get done in the next two years may be heard as both shocking and pathetic. Americans are sitting up nights worried about almost every aspect of their lives, while TV know-it-alls glibly talk of neither party even trying to get anything fixed….
The best chance for the GOP is to actually start proposing in the budget resolution real, honest, non-tax-increase-based solutions to the excessive costs of entitlements. No gimmicks. No budget rouses. No stupid policy tricks. Just honestly dealing with that central threat to our economic future may vouchsafe the public’s trust in a reborn GOP. Let the Senate or the president reject it if they wish.
I was encouraged by the solemn tone of Speaker-presumptive John Boehner’s remarks Tuesday night, and it’s undeniable that a lot of the new men and women coming to town mean business. But, as the Examiner points out, they aren’t the only members of the GOP gearing up to fight:
The insurgent conservative Republicans and Tea Party candidates elected Tuesday are obviously a pugnacious and determined bunch, but they’re not the only ones fixing for a battle over the direction of the party. The Republican Beltway establishment and the K Street wing of the GOP are ready to fight any effort to end pork-barrel spending and kill corporate welfare.
Like the commentators who drone on about gridlock, these people don’t get it. The voters, who after all must foot the bills for Washington’s excesses, do. They will eject the GOP and the two-party system itself if the K Street Republicans keep the spending coming.