In the March edition of Liberty, I compared the Republican margin in the Senate, the one that denied the Democrats a supermajority, to the 18th-century British military formation – the famous Thin Red Line. Unfortunately, the Republican line fell at its first test, the badly named Stimulus Bill. The rout was as complete as it was inglorious.
The Democratic strategy came right from Rahm Emanuel’s playbook. He preached that an economic crisis was “an opportunity to do things you could not do before … You never want a serious crisis to go to waste.” Led by Obama and Pelosi, the Democratic hordes took up the war cry of “Catastrophe,” the Republican line wavered and fell, and the conquerors rode roughshod over the American people. A pork-ridden, ideologically suspect, and economically flawed bill was foisted on us. We and our children will pay with a longer than necessary recession, higher taxes, and quite possibly a lower standard of living for a long time. Such is the price of defeat.
After the Bush administration’s malfeasance and the McCain campaign’s ineptitude, it was clear enough that there wasn’t much left of the Grand Old Party. I don’t want to get overly nostalgic here; I’m not a Republican. But what happened to the party of Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and dare I say it, even Newt Gingrich? At least the GOP was once a champion of small government and a bulwark against the worst excesses of the Democratic Party. Now, even that is gone. Sic transit gloria.