Surrender, Dorothies!

It seems to me that the "good news" Republicans were having poured into their ears earlier this year about the mid-term elections is quickly turning into Gonzago's poison.

 

Item 1 - Unemployment claims at lowest level in months.

 

Item 2 - Republicans fold like cheap suitcase.

 

Item 3 - Rising star says no way.

 

Item 4 - Arizona law is splitting party.

 

Item 5 - "Drill, baby, drill" backfires-- literally!

 

Of these five items, item number one is most important, followed by item 2. The other three pretty much are current blips on the radar but have potential impact down the road.

 

The key to a Democratic hold on Congress is jobs, pure and simple. When people work, they're happy. When they're forced out of work, they're mad. When they are forced out of work and look down the road and see no prospects, they're terrified.

 

Republican election strategy since 1994 and the Contract On...I mean, "With" America, has been to prey on the terrorising of Americans. The more fear, the more likely Americans will vote Republican. Their strategy has been divide, conquer, and destabilize, but never govern. 

 

The logic is warped, of course. Americans always do better under Democratic presidents. Even in this current recession, American workers have found a haven with Obama that they did not have with Bush. Republicans have run this country with a curious attitude of enriching those that have, a sentiment that should have gone out with the overthrow of the various European colonial empires. Once upon a time, government was for the protection of power for the elite. No longer.

 

Couple the fear over lost jobs with the classist anger over the financial bailouts Bush impressed upon the country and Obama continued, and you see a boiling over of anger, which the Democrats have worked hard to focus on the GOPartisans.

 

Has it been successful? It seems so, but there's plenty of time before November and politics is the art of the possible. It's feasible that the Republicans can come up with a successful midterm strategy that somehow dents this armor that seems to be forming around the Democrats.

 

Surely, however, the Democrats will not lose as badly as many hand-rubbing gleeful rightwingers had forecast even in March when healthcare reform was on the ropes. A few seats? Probably. Lose the Senate majority? Not very likely at this point. Lose the House majority? Hell, no.

 

What the Democrats will have to face come January 2011 is a more radicalized Republican minority, one with more Teabagger support and a more militant agenda.

 

To quote a moron: Bring it on.