First Conservative Blog

It has been said that when a ship is sinking, the rats are the first to leave.  Certainly seems appropriate in this instance.   Still, the question of why the champions of the new Democrat Party – especially the young and dynamic Gov. Ritter of Colorado – would choose to jump overboard now.  Actually, the answer to this isn’t surprising.  After setting the nation on a catastrophic course to financial ruin, rather than stick around to witness the impending disaster, Sens. Dodd and Conrad and Gov. Ritter manufactured a few ‘family reasons’ and have taken to their heels heading for retirement. 

Uncharacteristically, Republicans were level-headed about these high profile ‘skedaddling’ politicians. Understanding that although this might improve their chances to pick up seats, the GOP must figure out how to deal with the genuinely conservative Tea Party movement before any hope of major gains can be entertained.  Should the GOP embrace conservative principles again, the ‘Force’ of the Tea Party will be with them.  

For now though, it is almost too sweet to watch the media oligarchy prattle on about how difficult life must be for Dorgan and Dodd.  The grand achievement of Dodd’s tenure in office seems to be the massive corruption that lead to the collapse of the housing market and the obscene way in which the good Senator engineered massive executive payouts to AIG execs – particularly those from his home state.   Oh… and yes, the truly horrible Health Care take-over.  And Dorgan – well – could the lefties in ND possibly have come up with a more boring person to represent them in the Senate? 

Colorado is an interesting case study though.  Governor Ritter, once hailed as the architect for turning a red state blue seems to have quickly acquired the gift for reversing the trend.  Using Stimulus money to plug holes in the state budget seemed like a good idea last year.  It meant that Ritter didn’t have to lay off state workers and could balance the budget by enforcing a few unpaid furlough days.  But then the tax receipt projections for 2010 came in and the forecast was horrible.  For Democrats who love to spend to buy votes rather than solve problems, this was the worst possible news.  Programs will certainly have to be cut, state worker layoffs are inevitable and no Democrat wants to be responsible for that.  Under Colorado law, taxes may not be increased without direct electoral consent of the population.   So Ritter and the Democrat’s ship in Colorado is effectively ‘sunk.’

It is this situation that also makes the national political picture more interesting.  Dorgan at least understands basic addition and subtraction enough to know that the nation cannot sustain the financial course he had a hand in creating and pushing through Congress.  And with no more money to spend, what fun would it be to remain in the Senate?  As Maggie Thatcher remarked, the bad thing about Socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.  After spending out all of America’s grandchildren’s money, Dorgan can’t figure out how the Democrats can extort any more tax revenue.  So he figured it was time to get out of Washington and return to, well, if he returns to North Dakota, he will surprise everyone.

Curiously, at least Dodd’s surrender enables the lefties to keep one Senate seat they were sure to lose.  Again, the interesting case study focuses on Colorado, where Democrats, trying to avoid panic, are in the process of trying to convince Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to return and run for the office, as Democrats have no other strong statewide candidates.  Salazar however, is married to the uber liberal Obama administration now, which has made no secret of its desire to clamp down on Colorado’s energy industry at a time when energy jobs are badly needed.    In the end, Colorado Democrats will probably have to settle for a Denver or Boulder liberal who will have very little ability to win in a statewide race.

So as the first waves wash over the deck of the Democrat’s ship, the first of the rats are hitting the life rafts.  There will be more to follow.