I Good You Bid Evening

There probably won't be any fireworks to celebrate Michelle Bachmann's departure from Congress. No one really cares, and those who do - people like me - wouldn't spend the money to see her off; there is this budget deficit at all.

So ends the career of one of the tea party's darlings, a woman who reached her political apex when she won the Iowa Straw Poll during the Republican primaries, only to finish sixth in the actual caucus. Among Michelle Bachmann's legislative accomplishments we count...

Bachmann's disappearance from public life will indeed be cause for celebration. Of course she's already lost the limelight to the likes of Ted Cruz who is arguably even worse than she is. Still her departure is significant because it does bode well for the future of America, which will be necessarily precipitated by the reversal of the Republican Party. If Bachmann is afraid that she can't win reelection, perhaps the political winds are shifting favorably.

Of course that doesn't rid us of Ted Cruz or the rest of the tea party nut jobs, but it's a start. And hopefully it will gain some traction. Just this weekend former Senate majority leader and Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole stated - on Fox News of all places! - that the Republican party should hang a "closed for repairs" sign on the door because they are short on positive ideas. Neither he nor Ronald Reagan would feel comfortable in the party today, Dole said.

Anyone who has followed American politics since 2009 knows what Dole is saying is true. As many reasons as there were to dislike President Bush, who would have thought that just five years after he left office, he'd be the model of sanity for a party gone awry. I am fond of saying that the Republican party is both morally and intellectually bankrupt, and clearly Bob Dole agrees. They have failed to put forth any positive ideas in the last few years - short of Paul Ryan who at least tried - and instead have made 37 attempts to repeal Obamacare. The party hopes that they can use Obamacare as a political weapon to repeat their 2010 electoral success. I'd argue that the Democrats have an easy counter-punch: if not Obamacare, then what? Perhaps rather than spending roughly 15% of your time trying to repeal the law, you could offer ideas to strengthen it. So far, no ideas have been put forward. Surprise!

For all the talk of Republicans remaking their image - immigration reform, more openness on social issues, not being the party of the super rich, etc - the party has thus far done little to shed the image of narrow-minded, non-cooperativeness that stigmatizes it. Where are the good ideas Bob Dole asks for? Why, when 90% of Americans supported universal background checks, was that bill undone by Senate Republicans?

The Republican party, much to my chagrin, but to the apparent delight of many of its fiercest adherents, is committing political suicide. As I've said time and time again - in fact I sound like a nag repeating it - I want a better Republican party, not an obsolete one. I want elected officials who believe in a relatively balanced budget, who understand regulation and excessive taxation can often be onerous, who believe in market-driven solutions to certain problems, and who believe firmly in the importance of supportive social fabric. All of these values and ideas are traditionally associated with the Republican party. That I can tell, the only one they are pursuing is a balanced budget and even that goal is coming at the worst possible time, in the throes of a recession and tepid recovery.

Republicans may be able to make election gains in the short-term by proffering fear, but in the long run, they are on the road of the dinosaurs. If I were picking their slogan for the next election it would be "No Country For Old Men." On their current path, twilight nears. I good you bid evening, Republicans. Days go by and your opportunity to show real leadership and real ideas fades slowly. It may take a truly epic self-destruction for the Republican party to rectify itself. But Michelle Bachmann is gone, so maybe I'm wrong.