A front page letter to the editor in the ultra-conservative Washington Times today claims: "Bush 'sank' GOP in Virginia". Delegate Dave Albo is quoted with the following: "We know that George Bush is just killing us... His popularity just brought the ticket down. There's no other way to explain it." Waldo has a bit to say on the topic as well.Conservative partisans will certainly take comfort in this. If conservatives can simply portray Tuesday's Democratic victories as just the fault of George W. Bush, they reason that really conservatives have no reason to fret. It's just Bush's fault. Conservatives can just keep on going about their reactionary anti-revenue, anti-rights, anti-unity, anti-privacy, fear mongering politics as usual path. Move along. There's nothing to see here. Blaming Bush has been such a nice comfy teddy bear for the left all these years, why shouldn't the right get a chance? Ahh... the sweet comfort of denial.
Let us not forget that George W. Bush is the fulfillment of the highest aspirations of the reactionary conservative movement. Economic conservatives, social conservatives, reactionary judicial conservatives, imperialist foreign policy conservatives all found their true fulfillment of their ambitions in policies, actions, and era of George W. Bush.
The free-lunch economic conservatives could never have dreamed of anyone to better represent their interests; tax slashing, huge corporate welfare, regulation reduction, regressive taxation, protectionist trade with tax breaks for driving wages lower, reduced consumer protections, reduced worker rights and protections, stagnant wages, and a free ride in the press, anti-rights judges appointed up and down the line all the way to the Supreme Court, an assault on the estate tax. The list goes on and on. The "we're gonna take it with us" crowd could never and will never see a better champion for their highest dreams of an hereditary aristocracy than George W. Bush.
Social conservatives have fought for ages to repeal the rights of individuals, to foist religious dogma on the American people, and to drive reason out of the public discourse. George W. Bush has achieved more for social conservatives than any president since reconstruction. His packed courts continue to reduce the rights of individuals by favoring corporate interests. His faith-based initiatives have cut off funding for social programs and non-profit advocacy groups, while channeling billions into the hands of right-wing religious organizations. His "abstinence only" sex education policies have increased sexually transmitted diseases amongst youths who experiment with sex despite their pledges and have no education in safe sex. His constitutional amendment movement to ban gay marriage has motivated a generation of homophobes to reduce the rights of Americans and raised the specter that the American constitution can and should be used to reduce the rights of Americans. Finally, Bush has packed the courts with reactionary judges who question and threaten the rights of women to make choices concerning their reproductive lives. Even birth control is on the chopping block and under threat across the nation. These are just a few examples of how George W. Bush is the fulfillment of the social conservative movement.
In their review of the Virginia election, conservatives of all stripes will seek to blame the loss on Bush, while distancing themselves from him at the same time. Conservatives hope that Bush is just a lone, sinking ship. Unfortunately, Bush himself is the tide, and his failure is the failure of the movement he was created to embody.