The Republican Party reached a new low yesterday, when House Republicans voted to hold IRS bureaucrat Lois Lerner in contempt of Congress for exercising her constitutional right not to testify against herself.
Crazy is the new normal for Republicans. Although they talk of the Constitution and the rule of law, they believe in neither. They believe in nothing but their own will to power, a will that is entirely destructive in effect, for they have no positive goals, other than to cut taxes and increase spending, neither of which is feasible at this time. And since they cannot build, they can only destroy.
The Republican Party once had a purpose, to defeat communism. Now it has lost its purpose and even its reason for existence. They rage they feel at their own uselessness they direct against the Democrats. Partisan aggressiveness that was once used for the sake of a higher end has become an end itself.
The only check on the party’s self-destructiveness is Wall Street. Republicans know that if they lose the Street’s confidence, it’s going to be 2008 all over again, and they don’t want that. But the Street, of course, doesn’t want to commit itself unreservedly to either party. The thought of being taken for granted by a bunch of penny-ante politicians is anathema to billionaires. Which leaves a lot of room for crazy.
