Taking Things For Granted? Depends on Your Perspective!

Chris Muir nails it in today's cartoon. The current dissatisfaction voiced by many on the right wing of the Republican party is no doubt justified, if all that concerns you is ideological purity. Republican leaders have, indeed, repudiated much of the Reaganite agenda. But there is a good reason for doing so. The Reaganites were crusaders, coming from the outside, assaulting positions of power. That was a role that granted them great emotional satisfaction. But now the Republicans have been in power for some time and, as any Marvel Maniac knows, "with great power comes great responsibility." Effective government requires compromise. It requires flexibility. Many times you have to settle for half a loaf in order to get anything. Responsible government requires doing what works, not what ideology demands. The twentieth century has furnished us with a plethora of example of the horrors that ensue when ideologists refuse to compromise their faith.

Dubya has time and again acted responsibly in times of great crisis, and in doing so has incurred the wrath of the ideological purists. So, too, the party's congressional leadership. As Muir points out they, in the process, may have from time to time taken their "base" for granted, but they never have turned their backs on the world.