"What is a Republican Party without bankers, financiers, hedgies, bond traders, fund managers, investment polymaths, Goldman alum, and Treasury groupies and the attendant billionaires, high-net-worthies and masters of disasters?"

Broke and bleak.

Also remember the Bankers threatened MARTIAL law in case the House or the Senate didnt pass the Bailout bill. Another reason to kill the Bankers.

"What is a Republican Party without bankers, financiers, hedgies, bond traders, fund managers, investment polymaths, Goldman alum, and Treasury groupies and the attendant billionaires, high-net-worthies and masters of disasters?"

A party with a backbone?

John,

The purge has begun. Roy Blunt is stepping down as #2 Republican in house. Cantor to replace him per CNN. Remember '76. As I have learned from your show, and your book, the Country Club is not the force of the party. The power of the party rest in the immigrant class.

Alas, the purges remain only metaphoric. They will all, absent silver bullets, be back like the undead.

Stalinist concepts without Stalinist measures seldom work. That's what Stalin knew.

Departures not in a box merely recycle the trash.

John

One item I would like to see. How many of the 111 double no re reelected? I hope all running but what is the numbers on that. It might be a good eveluation of the mess.

Who, I want to know, suffered electoral repudiation for his vote for the bailout package? Where was the outrage that was supposed to turf out the people who voted for the package? Did the Democrats who engineered the congressional action pay a price? No. Did they get more support because so many people were lining up to get the bailout? Sure looks like it. Republican mismanagement may have been a contributory cause of the meltdown, but the Democrats were heavily implicated, but they have not paid the price for their duplicity and incompetence. Indeed, they have presented themselves as the party to save Main Street and they have been rewarded for their manipulation of the crisis. This scenario is crazy-making.

You're kidding, right ? grabbing ones ankles is neither a pleasant thought nor an effective way to live.

Since Whigs and Know Nothings have been taken, how about Classical Liberals? Better yet, Losers.

John can you ask Malcolm on Sunday what Rahm Emmanuel's positions are in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and how much influence he will have in shaping policy in that region.

Consider this:

What is the wisdom of building resort homes on coastlines that are naturally prone to flood or be blasted by winds and strewn about in pieces? Is it worth building structures to hold back rising oceans in a storm swell to protect an ill conceived location for a city? Is is worth rebuilding that city when all the precautions that were taken to protect that city resulted in failures to protect that city?

We can’t always be detached. As far as I’m concerned, I think there should be a line between prudence and ignorance just as well as a line between common sense and reality. It’s not prudent or common sensible to build much of anything in an area that is known to be repeatedly and predictably devastated by nature’s nature. It is reality that man is ignorant an defiant of reality.

I’m not saying that this TARP is right or wrong. I do believe it will be alright for everyone and that there wasn’t any choice than to act decisively. The reality is there is always a storm in the making and it is not in man’s power to resist being defiant of the forces crashing around him.

Intricate information flows up from the bottom to the top. All in the food chain are trying their best to not be eaten. One mistake or one unreliable communication can mean isolation and exile. This is the failure of government. It has no common sense and is completely over reaching in provisions.

We can rebuild this city; we can build a wall that will hold back the sea!They all seem to want too much

Certainly, the GOP already experienced a bloody purge Tuesday night.

It would do everyone well to remember that yet another purge occurred in 2006, with the defeat of 13 incumbent Republican Congressional candidates, then under investigation or indictment. Not to mention the resignation of Tom DeLay. Or the conviction of Scooter Libby. Or the other blood spilled that year in Congress.

Of course, that purge was initiated from the outside, and not from a Stalin within the Republican hierarchy--but the point should be that, from retirement, indictments, resignations and other forms of attrition--the party looks nothing like it did during the high tide of the 1994 Congressional landslide.

Armey, Gingrich, DeLay, Nussle, Walker and Paxon are long gone. Of the originators of the Contract with America, only Boehner remains in Congress.

While the idea of purging the party further of traitors such as Paulson and Cox are especially appealing right now, I think such moves are as superfluous as assassinating Trotsky after he'd fled to Mexico.

History shows that Stalin went too far with his purges, and almost succumbed to Germany's Operation: Barbarossa as a result.

The Republican party now faces its own Operation: Barackarossa, and while I realize depression, self-recriminations and blame games can be therapeutic after a heartbreaking defeat, I don't think there's any time for it right now.

And, besides, I think it's easy to lose sight of the fact that the Republican Party was given its only chance at renewed life on Tuesday night.

It dodged a pretty big bullet. A shear miracle, it was.

Yes, it seems like just the opposite occurred, I know. But I think there's a pretty good case to be made that the GOP would have been more completely destroyed had McCain somehow pulled out a thin victory.

1) The Trustees report that Medicare has ceased to pay for itself, beginning this year.

2) The Trustees, once again, have explained that Social Security will also go broke--the deadline, and I do mean DEAD-line, is 2011--this will be reflected in Obama's second budget to Congress.

3) The $ trillions in Congressional IOU's to these trust funds will need to be paid back, starting immediately.

Even Laffer's curve can't save us from tax increases now.

4) McCain, had he won, would still have faced a Dem media no longer cloaking itself with objectivity, and very ambitious and powerful (though unpopular) left wing leaders in both houses.

5) An 8 quarter recession is already upon us. Paulson never said the Buy-Up-Bail-Out would stop a recession, it was designed to merely stem the bleeding.

Being happy and fat Americans, we all expected Wall Street to take heart and end its breath taking slides--but this too was never the intention of Paulson's proposal. He said it wasn't a cure, but we all expected it to be a cure, anyway.

There was nothing in a McCain platform that was designed to deal with any of these crises. As hard as it may be for us Republicans to admit, there are MANY proposals by the Dems on the table--though few found their ways into the campaign spotlight--and it's true they're still reluctant to pull the trigger on any of them...yet.

But pull the trigger they must, and pull the trigger they will.

The fact remains, they are preparing to deal with these problems, and the GOP's, incongruously, ignored them completely.

This is how we are left with a scheme to seize millions of 401k accounts to put them into the SSA. This is how we are left with a punitive tax on $200,000 incomes and above. This is how we are in such sad shape that a 25% cut in the military budget may be just the beginning.

The Republicans have been losing ever since they purged everything out of their platform but "We cut taxes, and we're strong on national security."

The problem, of course, is the Republicans are too good at both, and completely incompetent at anything else.

John McCain, of all people, was quite correct in opposing those last Bush tax cuts because, as he said, they didn't include spending reductions. Imagine how much better the economy would have fared through this downturn had we done both back then!

What's called for is not more purges, but a construction of principles, much like those outlined in the Contract with America. Or, at this late juncture, perhaps more like those outlined in the Declaration of Independence.

5 or 10 or 15 points that the entire party is committed to; That everyone can and must sign their names under proudly. Not just national security and reasonable taxes--those two issues alone don't solve a damn thing.

The budget has to be brought under control. Initiatives have to be asserted for easing the Government away from the Bread & Circuses business. Health care costs need to be reigned in by any means short of taking control of the industry. The UN is a lost cause, and needs to be replaced with a smaller organization that fulfills its originally chartered goals. Congressional term limits need to be kept on the table--arguments against them have worn too thin in my lifetime to retain any shred of validity. And, most importantly, free enterprise needs a wall erected against government encroachment--reasonable regulations need to be kept in place, and a way must be established to keep business and government from forming partnerships, and limiting their ability to shape each others' policies.

It isn't the traitors among us who did us in. Even Pogo understood this way back when in his swamp.

According to the consensus of the brightest minds in the world... there was no choice.

But, I have learned through this that some people would choose to ignore the problems and risk a total collapse of the system just because they believe that mean conspirators with their design on world dominion have finally made their play.

I think the world's reaction speaks for itself and so does the scene of our President standing in duress trying to explain it all amid the noises of him manhandling the podium in his tenseness.

I think I'll go with the experts on this.

Limiting healthcare costs would require, among other things, getting the trial lawyers and the big drug companies out of bed with Congress. Let's speak plainly: What lifetime are we talking about where these spineless Congressmen of ours will actually say, "Nevermind, we don't need your money, we have principles to uphold"? I just don't see it. Not only do we need a new platform, but we need a new breed of men and women to carry it out.

Kilroy,

Wouldn't matter in a free market, even if what you say is true, because a smaller, more aggressive insurer could come along and sell a cheaper policy based in part on this anticipated interest float (which they would now be able to afford, under your theory) and eventually the price would have to come down, interest float or no interest float.

And we do have a very competitive marketplace for group health, especially in California. But with bills going into the legislature each year to have either State-run or Federal-run health insurance, would you want to invest a significant portion of your revenues into developing the California market, if you were an insurer?

I am an actuary and value group health insurance and retiree medical liabilities for a living. Been doing it for 30 years now. And let me tell you something: if you honestly believe that it's the insurance companies that keep the price of healthcare high, you are badly misinformed, to put it mildly. Insurance companies just pass the hat, take a profit (big or small), cover what they have to cover, pay what they have to pay, and call that the premium. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that if the primary component of the premium is the underlying cost of providing healthcare, then you can't permanently hold down healthcare costs by limiting insurance company profits. They are just retailers of healthcare. You have to hold down the wholesale input costs to have a long-term effect. This as I said gets back to drug companies, defensive medicine, lawsuits, malpractice, etc.

It's unfortunate that the Hollywood and media portrayal of the big evil insurance company as the primary cause of high healthcare costs(and I do not work for or with any insurance company, in case you're wondering) has duped so many otherwise intelligent people.

I do agree with your final statement, however, that you can't legislate greed out of people's hearts. You can, however, have a legal system that facilitates free market forces, which, in the medium and long run, are the consumer's only true safeguard against unfairly high prices. That's what I'm calling for. To give just one small example, people were importing drugs back from Canada because they were so much cheaper, and the drug companies got Congress to put the kabosh on it. This was simply a case where if Congress had done nothing the market would have worked things out. The need is for less legislation, not more.

Look at it this way:

The Republican rank and file are bummed because they failed to execute due diligence on their own party. As a result fiscal responsibility, moral leadership, and government dedicated to preserving individual opportunity were all abandoned by their leaders.

But the Democrats are actually in even worse shape.

Their leaders, instead of ensuring that they could continue farming populist divides and manufactured victim groups for personal wealth and power have gone and elected themselves a genuine communist. With a plan.

Watch closely as the Democrat plantation undergoes a renovation that would make Norm Abrams blanch. And then watch as Change really begins to happen.

Now how's that for some shite?

Limiting healthcare costs would require the free market to work. For example, my wife asked the orthodontist how much it would cost. The receptionist said it depends on how you pay for it (IE cash, insurance, etc)... That says it all.

I wouldn't know where to look for a psephologist. Are they required to register online if they move into your neighborhood? : )

The loss of money men from the Republican party is a symptom of a much deeper and dismaying trend. It's no fluke that the young dotcom billionaires and the scions of older monied houses have plumped increasingly for the Democratic party. The trend was identified by Huntington 4 years ago in his book, Who Are We. It produced a howl of outrage from the left which dismissed the book as the fearful, racist, and jingoistic ravings of an old man. But he has a point that continues to grow in relevance:

Dead Souls: The Denationalization of the American Elite
By: Samuel P. Huntington

Debates over national identity are a pervasive characteristic of our time. In part, they raise rhetorical questions, but they also have profound implications for American society and American policy at home and abroad. Different perceptions--especially between the citizenry and the more cosmopolitan elites--of what constitutes national identity generate different national interests and policy priorities.

The views of the general public on issues of national identity differ significantly from those of many elites. The public, overall, is concerned with physical security but also with societal security, which involves the sustainability--within acceptable conditions for evolution--of existing patterns of language, culture, association, religion and national identity. For many elites, these concerns are secondary to participating in the global economy, supporting international trade and migration, strengthening international institutions, promoting American values abroad, and encouraging minority identities and cultures at home. The central distinction between the public and elites is not isolationism versus internationalism, but nationalism versus cosmopolitanism.

Dead Souls
In August 1804, Walter Scott finished writing The Lay of the Last Minstrel. Therein, he asked whether

"Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said:
'This is my own, my native Land?'
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned
As home his footsteps he hath turned, . . .
From wandering on a foreign strand?"

A contemporary answer to Scott's question is: Yes, the number of dead souls is small but growing among America's business, professional, intellectual and academic elites. Possessing in Scott's words, "titles, power and pelf", they also have decreasing ties with the American nation. Coming back to America from a foreign strand, they are not likely to be overwhelmed with deep feelings of commitment to their "native land." Their attitudes and behavior contrast with the overwhelming patriotism and nationalistic identification of the rest of the American public. A major gap is growing in America between the dead or dying souls among its elites and its "Thank God for America" public. This gap was temporarily obscured by the patriotic rallying after September 11. In the absence of repeated comparable attacks, however, the pervasive and fundamental forces of economic globalization make it likely that the denationalizing of elites will continue.

Globalization involves a huge expansion in the international interactions among individuals, corporations, governments, NGOs and other entities; growth in number and size of multinational corporations investing, producing and marketing globally; and the multiplication of international organizations, regimes and regulations. The impact of these developments differs among groups and among countries. The involvement of individuals in globalizing processes varies almost directly with their socio-economic status. Elites have more and deeper transnational interests, commitments and identities than non-elites. American elites, government agencies, businesses and other organizations have been far more important in the globalization process than those of other countries. Hence there is reason for their commitments to national identities and national interests to be relatively weaker.

These developments resemble on a global basis what happened in the United States after the Civil War. As industrialization moved ahead, businesses could no longer succeed if their operations were confined to a particular locality or state. They had to go national in order to get the capital, workers and markets they needed. Ambitious individuals had to become geographically, organizationally and, to some extent, occupationally mobile, and pursue their careers on a national rather than a local basis. The growth of national corporations and other national associations promoted national viewpoints, national interests and national power. National laws and standards took precedence over state ones. National consciousness and national identity became preeminent over state and regional identities. The rise of transnationalism, although in its early stages, is somewhat similar.

Transnational ideas and people fall into three categories: universalist, economic and moralist. The universalist approach is, in effect, American nationalism and exceptionalism taken to the extreme. In this view, America is exceptional not because it is a unique nation but because it has become the "universal nation." It has merged with the world through the coming to America of people from other societies and through the widespread acceptance of American popular culture and values by other societies. The distinction between America and the world is disappearing because of the triumph of American power and the appeal of American society and culture. The economic approach focuses on economic globalization as a transcendent force breaking down national boundaries, merging national economies into a single global whole, and rapidly eroding the authority and functions of national governments. This view is prevalent among executives of multinational corporations, large NGOs, and comparable organizations operating on a global basis and among individuals with skills, usually of a highly technical nature, for which there is a global demand and who are thus able to pursue careers moving from country to country. The moralistic approach decries patriotism and nationalism as evil forces and argues that international law, institutions, regimes and norms are morally superior to those of individual nations. Commitment to humanity must supersede commitment to nation. This view is found among intellectuals, academics and journalists. Economic transnationalism is rooted in the bourgeoisie, moralistic transnationalism in the intelligentsia.

I acknowledge the confusion between points (3) Limit healthcare costs and (6) Defend Free Enterprise. And I agree with Mr. McNutt's solution of "easing market forces back into the Health Care industry." That is defending a Free Enterprise. But how that Limits healthcare is confusing to me. Mr. Fillinger provides the answer: have a "legal system that facilitates free market forces."

I learn so much from this web site.