The Maverick Tribe

The Economist is the latest entity to predict an imminent leftward turn for the United States.  Jeez, I could have told you that.  The 60's and 70's were a time of liberal overreach.  LBJ gave us guns and butter, and new era of profligate government spending.  Richard Nixon, a Republican, created the EPA, engaged with communist China, and mentioned God less then your average Democrat of today.

 Ronald Reagan gave us two decades of conservatives winning the national debate and establishing the premises of public policy.  By assumption, government was too big and addressed social problems poorly.  By assumption, liberals were an elite, overly secular segment of the population trying to tell ordinary Americans how to live their lives.  By assumption, Democrats could not be trusted in matters of national defense, or in letting free markets work without government intervention.  Enter Bill Clinton, the New Democrat, the free trader, the triangulator.

We are entering a new era, in which many of these assumptions will change, thanks to the presidency of George W. Bush, a conservative in all the bad ways and in none of the good ways.  The failure of this largely ideological presidency will weigh heavily on the political psyches of the American majority.  Let's just hope the Democrats can assume leadership of this majority with screwing everything up.