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Late Tuesday night, the pundits on TV began
jabbering incomprehensibly along the lines of, "What does it
mean?"
The American people -- or, at the very least, a sufficient
plurality of them -- decided that they want another four years of
clumsy policy failures and vengeful "progressivism," as Democrats
nowadays describe their agenda for wrecking what remains of our
constitutional republic. Even before the unmitigated political
disaster of November 6, 2012, a date that will live in infamy, the
prospects of salvaging the United States were not particularly
hopeful. Now, however, we are permanently and irretrievably
screwed.
Let's not mince words, eh? It was one thing, obviously, for the
electorate to choose Barack Obama in 2008, when Bush-era "brand
damage" was still a fresh irritant in the wounds of a war-weary
nation. Four years ago, Obama was untested and enshrouded in the
glowing mantle of Hope. No intelligent person could possibly
believe that "Lightworker" crap anymore, but then again, it's been
a long time since any intelligent person believed anything a
Democrat said. The cretins and dimwits have become an effective
governing majority, and the question for conservatives at this
point is perhaps not, "What does it mean?" but rather, "Why should
we bother ourselves resisting it any longer?"
Alas, as always, the duty of the Right is to manfully endure, to
survive the defeat and stubbornly oppose the vaunting foe, and so
this brutal shock, this electoral catastrophe, must be absorbed and
digested. At some point next week or next month or next year, then,
we shall recover our morale and plot some new stratagem for the
future. In the immediate aftermath of Tuesday's debacle, however,
it is difficult to see any glimmer of light amid the encroaching
gloom. Surely, there are many Americans who now sympathize with
that New York infantryman who, in the bleak winter of 1862, when
the Union's Army of the Potomac was under the incompetent command
of Gen. Ambrose Burnside, wrote home in forlorn complaint: "Mother,
do not wonder that my loyalty is growing weak.… I am sick and tired
of the disaster and the fools that bring disaster upon us."
The search for scapegoats always attends political defeat, and
Republicans have no shortage of candidates for the role, beginning
with Todd Akin, whose ill-considered remarks about "legitimate
rape" during an August interview set off a nationwide demand that
he quit as the GOP nominee against Sen. Claire McCaskill in
Missouri. Akin went down to ignominious defeat Tuesday, as did
Indiana's Richard Mourdock, who upset Republican Sen. Richard Lugar
in the primary but then imploded after making Akin-esque comments
about rape and abortion. Perhaps pro-life groups should sponsor a
training session for political candidates, teaching them how to
answer "gotcha" questions without either ceding anything to the
abortion lobby or offending voters with off-the-cuff comments about
rape. But Akin and Mourdock were just two names on a long list of
bloodbaths for GOP Senate candidates, a massacre that also defeated
Republican candidates in Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin, Maine,
Massachusetts and elsewhere.
The list of fools who have brought this disaster upon us
certainly also will include New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, the
gelatinous clown who (a) hogged up a prime time spot at the
Republican convention to sing his own praises; (b) embraced Obama
as the hero of Hurricane Sandy; and (c) then refused to appear at
campaign events in support of Romney's presidential campaign. Good
luck with the remainder of your political future, governor. It is
unlikely Republicans shall soon forget your perfidious
betrayal.
Well, then, what shall we say of Mitt Romney himself? He did not
run a bad campaign. He excited the party's conservative base with
his choice of Rep. Paul Ryan as his running mate, and Romney's
stunning victory in the first presidential debate Oct. 3 ignited a
surge of momentum that seemed destined to carry him all the way to
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I fondly recall the night after the
debate when, in Fisherville, Virginia, a crowd twice the size of
the town turned out to cheer
Romney
and Ryan at a jubilant rally. A few minutes before 1 a.m. this
morning, the TV networks called Obama the winner in Virginia, a
result that seemed impossible a month ago. The margin of Romney's
defeat in Virginia -- as in the other major battleground states of
Florida and Ohio -- was quite slender, but it was a defeat
nonetheless.
Romney's campaign staff furiously challenged the fact of their
defeat, so that the loser's concession speech was postponed until
the wee hours of the morning. One can scarcely blame them for
refusing to admit such a grim reality, but the reality could not be
escaped. When Romney finally took the stage in Boston, he
graciously said, "I pray that the president will be successful in
guiding our nation." Prayers notwithstanding, the only success the
current president is likely to have is in guiding our nation
straight toward a destination that proverbially waits at the end of
a road paved with good intentions.
What is left to hope for? That the American people will soon
regret their choice? That another four years of economic stagnation
and escalating debt will cure them of their insane appetite for
charismatic liberals? If four years of endless failure have not rid
them of this madness, the disease may well be terminal. Perhaps
others will still see some cause for hope, and in another few weeks
my friends may persuade me to see it, too. But today I will hear no
such talk, and I doubt I'll be in a better mood tomorrow. At the
moment, I am convinced America is doomed beyond all hope of
redemption, and any talk of the future fills me with dread and
horror.
