And without irony as well. Just read these guys.
Look, I realize that the Democrats are not going to do too well in the upcoming elections. It's the economy, essentially. But it looks to me as if the Republicans are going to win a partisan victory and not an ideological one. Aside from the usual bromides about excessive spending and taxes, the GOP is offering itself as a completely blank slate, with the seeming awareness that they would lose easily in a war of actual ideas. And it might not come to that in 2010. But in the long term, the GOP is still unpopular, and its big-ticket policy proposals--that'd be vouchers, privatizing social security, cutting Medicare, and warfare, seemingly--are unpopular with the public. And they know it. At the moment, opposing Obama is enough for their base. But if they actually are able to claim some power this year, I find it difficult to see how it turns out well for them. The hard-liners they are poised to elect are going to, you know, want to reopen stuff like Social Security privatization, and if John Boehner winds up getting a very narrow majority his options are going to be very constrained. Could actually lead to bipartisanship, if only to keep the Bachmann types from getting their way.
By way of comparison to the GOP's current situation, Ronald Reagan commanded broad popular support on taxes, crime, defense policy, and so on.
