Draft - finish this
New idea : the Republican party has no choice but to attack every institution with an ounce of credibility. This is, sadly, the result of letting radicals take over the party, and rewarding drama queens like Newt Gingrich (no offense to drama queens).

If I started several wars that helped bankrupt the federal budget, raided social security for the entire baby boom generation, and I fought regulation to the point of assisting wall street in bringing down our economy, and I didn't have any real candidates who could lead, I might attack constantly too.

Alcoholics and addicts have an interesting tactic when dealing with their lives. It's all too easy to fight about _______. Meaning everything. Anything except the real problem. The drinking or drugs. So they can be extremely belligerent.  It's easy, to the unaware, to get sucked into an argument that is ultimately a diversionary tactic.

So emboldened (confused?) has the radical right become that they even attack the idea of democracy - insisting now that we are supposed to be a republic. Sure it's a crafty move, one imbued with academic finesse, but it's just another way to tear down what we have struggled for 200 years to build.

It is the very fact we are a democracy that allows radical right to tear down our institutions - the ones that have helped lead us to some sort of balance. The govt, the news, and the schools.

Yes, it's an experiment. It is after all ONLY 200 years old. And when the sands of time wash over us in another 200 years it will look very different than it does today.

The question is simply this: can we give the problem we face a name? Is it radicalism that threatens the foundations of our government?

NPR - having decimated the government's credibility, the new target is our best journalism or source of information.

What other institutions are to be attacked in the war of ideology? Universities.

Starve the beast - stated strategy. Why isn't this more publically discussed?

John McCain - brow beaten into positions I don't think he believed in.

Ronald Reagin - idea: poor people are bad. But was he the last compassionate conservative?