Oh baby baby.
While I see Rob's point, puh-leeze.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) lashed out at fellow Republicans Tuesday for a "capitulation ... of dramatic proportions" to Democrats and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) in the lame-duck Congress.
And what Communism have we been compelled to endure...?
Republican senators have broken with the party's leaders on several key votes in order to advance some of President Obama's top policies during the lame-duck. GOP members defected to pass a repeal of "Don't ask, don't tell" and have done likewise to secure likely ratification for the START Treaty. Some Republicans might allow a health bill for 9/11 first responders to move forward, while three Republicans voted to end debate on the DREAM Act, an ultimately unsuccessful immigration bill.
The comedy is that these are all rather tame, ideologically -- indeed, the arguments against any of them are, even to be generous-minded, crap.
I agree that it's a mistake to pretend that policy outcomes depend for their successful implementation upon the willpower of particular political actors. But that doesn't mean one ought to take much joy in the success of the competing hypothesis, namely, that our system is so wildly compromised that sensible policies can only ever by implemented in radically abnormal political circumstances.
This would indeed be the corollary of the "we're fucked" hypothesis, which states that the only thing the federal government can do anymore is start stupid wars and destroy the economy.