No Accident (Updated) 0
Kos, on Republicans’ expressing desires to emulate the Democratic machine:
Remember, a party predicated on the notion that government sucks and can’t do anything right can’t possibly run an administration that doesn’t suck and can do anything right. Competent conservative governance would instantly invalidate conservatism’s core tenets. That’s why Bush named horse lawyers to FEMA, and why fourth-tier law school grads have infested every corner of the Justice Department. George W. Bush wasn’t an anomaly, he delivered the most effectively conservative administration in history.
(snip)
So now the Patrick Ruffinis on the Right argue that they need their own machine to replace their powerful existing one, as if shiny new websites will suddenly fix what ails them. In reality, their problem is that their ideology has failed. Conservatism has failed, in a very public way, and people now recoil from its siren song. That’s not a marketing problem. It’s as if people suddenly realized that what they were drinking wasn’t Coke, but New Coke. And hundreds of millions of dollars wasn’t going to fix that problem.
A note from the reality-based world: Democrats are not docile enough to have a machine, at least not on a national level. What Democrats had this year was a decision to be on the right, which means the left, side of history this time around and a candidate who is a good, decent, honorable person.
And the capable assistance of the Republican Party, which, once it gained power, showed us what Republicanism (as opposed to principled conservatism) is really all about.
ASZ has more.
Addendum, Later that Same Day (If I Ever Planned This Wouldn’t Happen):
Delaware Liberal has more, here and here.
