Quibbling, Squabbling and All-Out War

…of Nikitas3.com

The two American political parties certainly are famous for squabbling, often within their own ranks. One party always seems to genuinely relish when the other starts arguing with itself over policy. And often that type of internecine behavior leads to public disfavor and ultimately defeat at the polls.

It is well-known that many Republicans initially had big doubts about Ronald Reagan, particularly among the merchant classes and country-clubbers who felt that Reagan was too conservative on social issues. Meanwhile, many Democrats had misgivings about the allegedly centrist agenda of Bill Clinton without realizing that he really was an extremely liberal guy who knew how to play the public servant role while doing as much as he could to move the nation leftward by, among other things, gutting the military and loosing the environmentalists and trial lawyers on our economy.

Conservatives seem always to have in the backs of their minds that the Democrats are a unified and monolithic force that ultimately will doom them. And there is good reason to be apprehensive. Socialism simply is an incremental, big-government encroachment on the republican (small ‘r’) values that have sustained our nation since its founding.

But conservatives can be comforted that there have been several occasions on which they could legitimately have felt that their time assuredly was over, and it wasn’t. In the 1930s, disenchantment with free-market capitalism could have led Republicans to the conclusion that their ideals were doomed. But by 1952, the nation had a Republican military general in the Presidency, a Republican Congress, and a booming capitalist economy.

In 1974, in the wake of Richard Nixon’s resignation, conservatives might have felt equally dour about their future prospects. Yet in 1980 Ronald Reagan was swept into office on a tidal wave of revolt against the lackluster and vacillating leadership of Jimmy Carter.

Today conservatives see their cause under withering assault. George Bush’s foray into Iraq has turned remarkably unpopular – and for good reason. But otherwise Bush has been a steady and competent leader who, even in early 2008, is not even being called a lame duck by the usually negative media. The reason is simple: The squabbling, divided nature of the majority Democrats in both the House and Senate have made Americans question whether the liberals can maintain the order necessary to lead the nation.

Thus with the coming presidential election, the GOP can see glimmers of hope… some might say rays of sunshine. While the Republicans in the field certainly have quibbled amongst themselves — with Mitt Romney allegedly disliked by all; John McCain called too old for office by Huckabee supporter Chuck Norris; and Giuliani being deemed a one-note 9/11 candidate (which he distinctly is not) — the Democrats, on the other hand, appear to be engaged in all-out war, the type of behavior that periodically convulses liberals.

And this is a good thing. Because it should be clear to all that the Democrat party really is much akin to the Soviet politburo… united on the surface, but with deep distrust and machinations underneath. And that schism is growing daily between the Barack Obama wing of the party and Hillary Clinton’s more establishment flank.

Coming mostly out of the blue, Obama is young, brash and thoroughly untested. Therefore he can say and do things that a more seasoned candidate would not. He speaks well but does not say much. He will, for the most part, decline to offer any specifics on precisely what he plans to do for the nation.

In the meantime, Hillary’s freight train has hit some rough track. And her first liability is Bill Clinton, who, as he ages and finds himself more marginalized, is finally unable to conceal any longer his angry and combative side. The problem is that the Clintons feel entitled to the presidency, while Obama feels otherwise. And Obama’s youth and vigor are challenging the Clintons unexpectedly, just as Bill Clinton’s youth and vigor once challenged a monolithic Republican figure called George Herbert Walker Bush.

Any person running for President is going to be ambitious by nature, and Obama, who is hugely more ambitious than he lets on, is up against another very power-obsessed person in Billary. But Mr. Clinton’s achilles heel is his anger. He gets frustrated easily, and needs to tenaciously explain and re-explain and re-define himself over and over, because ultimately he lacks confidence, after exuding it for decades. This comes from his innate insecurity and his fear about the vapid nature of his current legacy. He desperately needs to reassert his power to reassert his soul.

The infighting within the Democrat party is intensifying, particularly over what are perceived to be Hillary’s disrespectful comments about Martin Luther King. Long a shoo-in bloc for the Democrats, blacks now are finding themselves in their own civil war, some seeing half-black Obama (his mother is white) as more representative of their cause than Billary, who, up until a few months ago would have been seen to be the full-on choice of black voters.

The flare-up between Obama and the Clintons is not going to go away anytime soon, and by the nature of its racial origins is ominous. Obama’s stunning primary victory in South Carolina is a cannon shot across the bow of the once-invincible Clintons. This could be a permanent rift and the end of an era, which should be unnerving to Democrats everywhere. There has bubbled up a surprising amount of bad blood between the camps in a surprisingly short period of time, and Obama may end up taking his case to the Democrat convention, denying Billary the coronation they so believe they deserve.

This domestic war should give heart to Republicans in 2008. With Iraq off the front page and the economy in focus, a composed, pro-growth, tax-cutting candidate like Giuliani or Romney may be able to talk some common sense into the American electorate as the Democrats take after one another in a war of words, throwing the match that has been called theirs to lose right into the laps of the GOP.