It’s hard to say which one is worse. The nice thing about total lunatics is that they are easy to identify. Usually, this means the sane people pat them on the head and help them get the help they need. The Democrats decided to put them in charge.

Republicans did something just as dumb if less obvious. They voted for guys who said the right things and did nothing. Their passivity allowed the crazies to not only guide the conversation but take control of power.

Neither of these things happened quickly. Some dates back to the post WWII period and other parts are post Civil Rights. The acceleration started in the Nineties when bashing the US and all things traditional or decent became stylish. But the foundations were laid much earlier.

So, we’re doomed, may as well move to Mars, right? Er no, and I don’t just mean the lack of air on Mars. We’re not doomed. We just don’t get to be lazy anymore.

I suspect the acceleration in the Nineties was due to the lack of Cold War pressure. Well, surprise! The Cold War is back. Terrorism is so turn of the century. It’s also much less scary when all the bad stuff seems to be far away and no longer able to come here.

Nukes kinda change that. People who never thought twice about foreign policy are now perking up and paying attention. Good result but a bad way to get it.

Stop being afraid of World War Three. Don’t pretend it can’t happen but don’t see it under your bed at night, either. It’s like crossing the street – the danger of being hit by a bus is real but it’s also limited. Nuclear Armageddon is self limiting. It’s unlikely to happen. You can stop panicking now.

That is easier said than done so why not put that nervous energy to good use? You don’t need to watch the news 24/7/365. Frankly, you wouldn’t make it past Day Two before becoming a stark raving lunatic. But now is a good time to learn all that stuff they didn’t teach you in school – how to control this government of ours. Part of that is figuring out how to process the mountain of information that comes our way.

And we’re back to the crazies. The news media is full of total nonsense. Seriously, if you can’t tell boy from girl go back to elementary school and quit pulling the cute girl’s hair. Feelings aren’t facts. They aren’t bad things – they can help us sort a lot of nonsense that masquerades as fact – but they also convince us that an all ice cream diet is a good idea. Fudge ripple for the win! But the media would have you believe that just because someone feels something – or says they do – we should design all of public policy around that feeling for the few hours that they feel that way. Idiotic insanity.

But the diet is constant and many people have never heard the contrary – or even heard that it’s not a good idea to base the way our nation interacts with the world on what a group of people feel. Not until the panicdemic and Russia deciding that the West was insane enough to let them take over Ukraine did many people start questioning all the nonsense they’ve been fed. This is a slow process – recovery always is – but the light is dawning and with it, the insanity is exposed.

Politically, it is probably taking the Democrat Party down. That’s scary to people even my age – we’ve never seen a real party system shift before. But it’s also a normal political cycle – just a very long one. The world won’t end when the Democrat party collapses. A new, more stable and not as crazy party will replace it – everything will be fine if messy.

I don’t think that process can be stopped any longer. So let’s move on to the Republicans.

Part of why this particular party system didn’t collapse thirty years ago when we were expecting it was that both parties had started playing a nasty little game of ‘never fix a problem’. They would run on the issues, campaign hard about needing to reduce spending and stop illegal immigration (both parties have run on these platforms over the last thirty years) and when they got into office – crickets. They would immediately campaign for the next election and never actually fix the problem they were tasked with solving.

The Republicans took this to an art form. It’s why they have been running behind in polls for decades, but that’s another story. The Republicans stopped doing stuff. They talked – a lot – but nothing really seemed to get done. This is commonly blamed on the neoconservatives but the truth is, no one in the party was showing the necessary leadership to kick start the action. They let Democrats pass increasingly stupid stuff which incensed their base and gave them plenty of fodder to run on next election cycle.

This did not go unnoticed.

The only reason the Republicans aren’t going down with the Democrats right now is Donald Trump. He reinvigorated the populist base that had gravitated away from the Democrat insanity and come to an uneasy roost in the Republican party. The Republican leadership did what they do best – looked after their own backsides. This, too, did not go unnoticed.

The more astute among you, Dear Readers, will have noticed insane upticks in Republican performance on the polls in the last two weeks. This is the groundswell that we’ve been expecting. It’s the red wave. But don’t think it can only destroy the Democrats – it’s far and away more dangerous to the Republicans.

Because business as usual will no longer be tolerated. The public expects results. It can get them from the Republicans – or it can get them from the party that replaces the Republicans and they are NOT picky as to which one.

Here’s the part that usually shoots conservatives and moderates in the foot – twenty plus years of Republican ineptitude has left their base extremely cynical. That base will show up November 8th, make no mistake. But the danger is that it will then do nothing – because it is so cynical. Government is like a half wild horse – you have to keep an eye on it and a firm grip at all times. Cynicism bleeds into a type of nihilistic hopelessness – the idea that nothing will change. Well, if you do nothing, nothing will.

The horse won’t go until you kick it in the sides a bit. It won’t go where you want unless you steer it with those reins. It won’t get where you need it to go unless you drive it there – all the way.

The Republican Party is in bad shape. It needs a good hard kick. It’s going to have to be plow reined* at first. And we absolutely cannot let it have its head for even an instant. This horse is a pain in the backside to ride but to get the results we want, ride it we must.

Which we won’t do if we are convinced that nothing will change. That kind of hopelessness and helplessness is STUPID. Of course it won’t change if you don’t do anything about it! Of course it won’t be easy! But quit living in the last century – this is here and now. You can’t change the past, but you certainly can change the present.

Or at least try.

The last two years have been one insane change after another. I get why people are scared and I get why conservatives are so skeptical.

BUT ten years ago, I told my friends on an online forum that I didn’t think Roe had more than more than ten years max before it was overturned. None of them believed it was possible. They wanted to believe but the Republicans had made a career out of disappointing them. They were convinced that Roe would never be overturned. Nothing would change.

They were wrong. On June 24, 2022, Roe v Wade was finally overturned. Not because I was so smart (which I am not) or because of happenstance. No, it was because of the hard work of those who never gave up – who never gave in to the hopelessness – who never quit. The folks that didn’t let healthy skepticism become nihilistic cynicism.

The biggest danger to the conservative movement is its own cynicism. That cynicism is worst than the idiots that can’t define the word woman – because it breeds hopelessness and apathy in those who should know better.

Remember, when this all started many Democrats thought they were doing a good thing – all discrimination is bad, right? Evidently not, because they got to the point where they couldn’t discriminate between sane and insane.

Same thing for cynicism. Healthy skepticism is a good thing but nihilistic cynicism ends with sitting on the sidelines, watching the world burn and telling everyone you told them so. It’s every bit as stupid as thinking men in the women’s restroom is a civil right.

We’re watching the Democrats burn down their own house with their insanity. Seems to me we might wanna not repeat the mistake by burning down our own house with insane cynicism.

Not when we can keep the house, the barn and learn to ride that stupid horse.

*Plow reining refers to pulling the horse’s head in the direction you wish to go instead of laying the reins on the horse’s neck to indicate the direction. It’s done while horses are pulling plows, hence the name. It’s only done in riding when the horse is scared, ornery or stupid. Or in my pony’s case, stupidly ornery.