Calling Their Bluff?

For six years Democrats agitated against economic freedom and prosperity, railed against the War On Terror, and castigated President George W. Bush and everything he stands for. They vowed that once they got back into power they would roll back everything to where it was when Bill Clinton waddled off into the sunset to the nearest discount bordello. Plus every Republican would be arrested, piled into railroad cars, and shipped off to the Alaska gulag.

Three months ago the Donks finally got what they wanted. A month ago they actually took back the reins of power. And already the voters that cashiered the GOP are already roiling with discontent:

Three months after a power shifting election, a majority of Americans still disapproves of Congress - a sign of public impatience with the new Democratic majority even among party loyalists.

Oooh, sounds good for the good guys, doesn't it? Only back in the saddle for a month and already the country wants to throw the tinfoil hatters back out again.

Well, not quite:

Still, an Associated Press-Ipsos poll conducted this week shows that Congress' public image has improved slowly but steadily since the November elections when Iraq, corruption and partisan fighting drove congressional approval ratings below those of President Bush.

According to the poll, 65% of those surveyed disapprove of the way the President is handling his job, slightly up from his disapproval ratings last month. As for Congress, 58% disapproved of the work of lawmakers, a slight decrease from last month and a 14 percentage-point decrease from congressional disapproval last October.

So the public - to the degree that anything put out by the ASSociated Press can be taken seriously, which isn't much - hates the Democrats, but they still hate the Republicans significantly more. I suppose that's what you'll always get in a two-party system in an age as cynical as this one. Though I recall that Newt Gingrich and the GOP had much better ratings at this point twelve years ago. It took them a full year to wear out their honeymoon period; Crazy Nancy and Dirty Harry have already lost their post-election glow.

It is the why behind that rapid fade that is profoundly discouraging:

Even a majority of Democrats - 52% - disapprove of the work of Congress, indicating a desire for quicker action from the new Democratic management....

"They are caught in a Catch-22, because Iraq is the thing that's on most people's minds and it has to be dealt with, and it leaves very little time and energy to do anything else," said Diane Bania of Clifton, NJ, who described herself as somewhat liberal and leaning Democrat.

Added Eleanore Putman, 86, of Deltona, FL: "The Democrats, right now, don't seem to be progressing well. They don't agree on much. I'm disappointed they don't immediately stop the troops from going to Iraq that Bush wants. I can't conceive that they would just sit there and talk." [emphases added]

There are a few observations to be made from the above quotes. For one, if the AP talked to any "somewhat conservative and leaning Republican" "adults," they didn't see fit to include their comments in this story. That's probably because any such "adults" are still hiding under their beds cowering from the "new congressional management." For another, the Donk base is as ignorant of the workings of our constitutional republic as it's ever been. Old lady Putman seems to have forgotten that the presidency didn't change hands back in November and therefore the President is still directing the war based on the authority the 107th Congress gave him to do so. The Dems do not have the institutional authority to "immediately stop the troops from going to Iraq," other than a straightforward de-funding of the war, and even that has to wind its way through the budget process.

I find it astonishing that the American Fifth Column has so little faith in the neoBolsheviks they finally succeeded in re-empowering. By sometime this summer the war funding will be cut off, the helicopters will be bugging out from the rooftops of the Baghdad "green zone" and its Afghan equivalent, and Iraqi democracy will promptly collapse before the no-longer-opposed Iranian/al Qaeda onslaught. Bush and Cheney can then be impeached, and with a little Senate RINO help perhaps even removed, and by the time Hillary is taking the oath of office, the suitcase nukes, dirty bombs, and nerve gas attacks will be sweeping across the fruited plain, and the Left's iron grip on their jihadi-poisoned realm will be complete.

All it takes a little patience:

Representative John Larson of Connecticut, a member of the House Democratic leadership, said he understood the public's frustration, particularly after seeing prompt action in the House on domestic legislation, but not on Iraq.

"The average American is saying, why can't they just end this," he said. "The overall process, by its very structural nature, moves slowly. What the public is going to look for is persistence."

Some of the public, anyway. What the rest of us are looking for is the same brand of pure, obnoxious, unadulterated obstructionism from the GOP that was inflicted on them for the previous dozen years by the DisLoyalists. We want the "new congressional management" to be cut off at the knees and screwed before they can even get started. We want to drive the other side into such paroxysms of rage that their heads explode from the inside out. We want to see the Republican remnant rediscover the considerable drawing power of being a bunch of bastards. It's been a long time since we've experienced that kind of satisfaction, of which this was a small down-payment.

A bit of persistance in the role of opposition might just prevent our losing the war, mend fences with the estranged GOP base, and even turn things around for 2008.

But that's still not the way to bet.