We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Moderates

Actually, we're concerned right now with lib-Dem extremism (which has always been hinted at) if the Dems' hubris gets boosted and they and interest groups and think tanks in Washington get too ambitious now that the Dems will be running Congress. (I'm not sure today, but they may still be able to get sixty seats in the Senate.)

Plenty of us who are moderate aren't mushy about it. False accusations of extremism about such lack of mushiness only clouds what should be clear.

The GOP is definitely dysfunctional. They don't need One Leader (which is a source of concern about the Obama campaign and the personality cult). What they do need is coherence and to begin representing a true alternative to the Democrats (and ideally to the tired welfare-state model that began in the 1930s, and which involves excess by Washington whose ceasing has been long sought by moderates as well as by conservatives).

What DLS said. Washington is more of a problem than a solution. The problem with socialism is that it only works, and then fitfully, in countries with tiny populations [less than 15 million] with a non-diverse citizenry. I lived in Britain and France and found that even these highly-developed statist economies were far less efficient than the messy capitalism every leftist hates in the USA. Authoritarian bureaucracies are what the poli-sci textbooks call it, and the desk jockey petty functionaries produce little and cost much more than they are worth.

Dave in Boca --

" Britain and France "

You no doubt have heard of the alarming news from GM as well as Ford. Here:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122606964550108...

On the radio today in Detroit, someone was expressing the valid concern that many Dems and libs might want Washington not only to simply give Detroit bailouts, but to effectively nationalize these companies, using the example of British Leyland. (Think also of other nationalized British industries, like power production, and commercials explaining how to shave safely when the power has failed...)

Relying on the markets is not proving to be successful either.

Back to the original post, people like Tony Perkins and Grover Norquist do not possess the pragmatism or flexibility for solving complex problems.

Even when the US is in such dire straits, these gentlemen are overly concerned with purging the party of the ideologically impure. Pretty soon the Northeast will have no GOP representation as moderates continue to lose elections in droves. The Republican party is headed back to its roots in the Goldwater years, when it resided as a permanent but vocal minority.