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[Sidd Finch]

Originally Posted by ironweed

We're always right about that, but it makes no difference.

The problem is that the last two Democratic presidents clearly believe(d) that they had to play the grownup among squabbling children, and they always look to split the difference, thereby encouraging more and more radical starting positions (on both sides, but on the left it doesn't matter because there's no real left in American politics and Dems will go along with a Dem President looking to split the baby 99% of the time anyway).

The model doesn't work in reverse, because two of the last three Republican presidents (and most or all of the most motivated R incumbents in Congress since the extinction of the now-lost-in-the-mists-of-time "Rockefeller Republicans") saw themselves as crusaders with a holy writ to right wrongs and fuck up evildoers, and you don't compromise with the devil.

There is more than a whiff of armageddon-o-philia among the Rs, and it gets stronger every year. I think enough of them have now been reading enough Ayn Rand and cheesy paperback thrillers that there's real support in their ranks for letting the US hit the wall. After all, if the USA is godless, gay, full of immigrants and basically a stalking horse for a socialist world government complete with black helicopters, why wouldn't you want to hit the reset button by smashing everything up?

Fun weekend, huh?