GOP cannot coast into 2010 elections

By Chris Adamo

The 2010 mid-term campaign season is now upon America, and none too soon. With two weeks still to go before his term reaches the one-year mark, the damage Barack Obama has inflicted on this nation is almost incomprehensible. Among those who recognize the degree to which the former greatness of the country is being obliterated, the congressional elections of this coming November represent the best hope of stopping the devastation.

The mood of Heartland America is grim but determined. Too many people fought, bled, froze, and died on the world's great battlefields in titanic struggles to uphold and preserve this great nation for it to be passively relinquished to the decrepit perversity of the political left. Liberals may sanctimoniously insist that they hold the "politically correct" high ground, and they may reinforce that claim with their dominance of the network news, academia, and the entertainment industry. But that does not grant them unbridled authority to lay the nation to waste through their agenda.

The liberal political establishment has nonetheless sought to do just that, in a headlong rush to move national norms and standards as far to the left as can possibly be achieved. Ever since Inauguration Day 2009, Marxist leftists are being deployed into key positions from which they are undermining great institutions, entangling once-private industries under the control and even the ownership of the out-of-control Federal Government, and amassing as much of the nation's wealth as they can seize.

Such relentless outrages against the constitutional fabric of this nation do not sit well with a great majority of its citizens, who have organized and are increasingly dedicated to the restoration of their country. Indifferent to the derision with which they are characterized by the self-anointed "ruling class," they willingly face such firestorms in repeated efforts to make known their absolute disapproval of the direction in which their country is being taken.

This enormous groundswell portends an impending calamity for the Democrat Party this coming fall, and Democrats with any foresight are already responding accordingly. Already, several key Senate Democrats, including Chris Dodd of Connecticut, Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, have announced their plans to retire, rather than seek reelection in difficult, uphill campaigns. Similar rumblings are being heard from the House of Representatives.

Congressman Parker Griffith of Alabama switched from Democrat to Republican, in an unprecedented move that changed his status from majority party to minority. Yet he can clearly see that the political fortunes of the Democrats are looking dismal as they press relentlessly onward with their socialist remake of America. And he wants no part of it.

All of these events signal a good turn of events for the GOP. However, such a sea change is still far from being a certainty. And despite America's anger over the devastation wrought on it by the Democrats, the most critical component of any Republican resurgence, a bold and concise program to repair and restore the shredded fabric of the nation, remains conspicuous by its total absence in any Republican electoral strategy.

Unfortunately, if the experiences of recent years are an indication, Republican "elitists" will once again revert to their standard plan of attempting to gain electoral advantage solely on the basis of how badly the Democrats are doing. This approach has not served them particularly well in the past. But in the current political climate, the backlash against it would be disastrous.

Americans, who on a daily basis are increasingly appalled at the wreckage being inflicted on their homeland by its own "leadership," are in no mood to accept mere window dressing on the problem. A political party that merely continues operations within the devastation can expect to be reviled by "We the People" to the same degree as the party that caused the destruction in the first place.

In the fall of 1994, America made just such a hard right turn away from the impending downward spiral promised by the ultra-liberal Clinton Administration. The Republican "takeover" of both houses of Congress was truly historic, and held the promise of a major course correction for the nation. Unfortunately, those at the epicenter of this event, such as Newt Gingrich, newly empowered as Republican Speaker of the House, squandered their window of opportunity in maddening and futile attempts to build consensus and commonality with their vanquished rivals.

Such collegiality may have seemed a lofty objective to Beltway insiders, but it was not the spoil of victory sought by those many Americans at the grassroots who had struggled to make the situation possible. From their perspective, this was a major triumph in an ongoing war for the future of their country. As it became apparent that the Republican Party would increasingly revert to "business as usual," the disillusioned public abandoned the party, culminating in the disastrous election cycles of 2006 and 2008.

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, despite his frequent lapses in judgment, has assessed the current situation with piercing accuracy. He warns that the Republicans may not make the gains necessary this fall to seize majority status in the Congress unless they return to the principles espoused by such luminaries as Ronald Reagan and forcefully engage the opposition.

It is far from sufficient for them to merely represent a milder alternative to the Democrats. Those who will gain the confidence and loyalty of the electorate must have a plan to undo the damage currently being done to the nation. They must be able to convince the people of their understanding of just how dire the current situation has become, and they must demonstrate their willingness to fight as if the very future of the nation is at stake, which it inarguably is.

© Chris Adamo