Few things are capable of embarassing Bill Clinton. The overspending of Republicans certainly is not one of them. Bill Clinton's universal health care plan was defeated only because Republicans stood united against it. As a percentage, the nation's deficit is smaller than at ANY time during the 1990's... Thanks to those "token" tax cuts which are driving the economy's growth so fast Ben Bernanke wants to slow it down.
One great Republican once said of another great Republican that
His great mission was to accomplish two things: first, to save his country from dismemberment and ruin; and, second, to free his country from the great crime of slavery. To do one or the other, or both, he must have the earnest sympathy and the powerful cooperation of his loyal fellow-countrymen. Without this primary and essential condition to success his efforts must have been vain and utterly fruitless. Had he put the abolition of slavery before the salvation of the Union, he would have inevitably driven from him a powerful class of the American people and rendered resistance to rebellion impossible. Viewed from the genuine abolition ground, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull, and indifferent; but measuring him by the sentiment of his country, a sentiment he was bound as a statesman to consult, he was swift, zealous, radical, and determined.
This might just as easily be said of the Republican Party as a whole. One must always judge human institutions by their relevant alternatives. No political party is perfect just as no church is perfect just no economic or political system is perfect. The Constitution and Libertarian Parties are both isolationist in their foreign policies, the Libertarian Party supports open borders and the Constitution Party holds the Nader position on free trade. For all its faults, the Republican Party is well to the right of either when all of the positions of each are taken into consideration.
Speaking of Ralph Nader. his "influence" on the Democratic Party was mainly to make it lose, just as the Bull Moose Party of Roosevelt made the Republicans lose. As Rush Limbaugh has said, there's no such thing as winning by losing. That's why Ann Coulter is a Republican and thinks the idea of voting Constitution or Libertarian is self-defeating. "Trench warfare" is about facing reality and from there. She does this, and does it very well, and we should all learn from her. Anyone who has read her Treason or High Crimes understands that the Democrats are far more bad for the country than the Republicans are good for it. Clinton's negligence already weakened the United States by refusing to take Bin Ladin when he was offered up, cutting and running in Somalia, and any number of ways too long to go into. Anyone who thinks the two main Parties' differences are trivial is sadly mistaken--- and it is a vicious insult to Ann Coulter to mislabel her as one of those misguided, benighted souls.
Well written , an enjoyable read.