Take a look at what motivates people to seek public office, and it’s easy to discern the advantage of being in the minority. You can blame bad government on the other guys. If office-holders were motivated by decency and good will, they would always be looking for ways to promote the public interest and good government, but these guys’ motives are purely venal. They want power, and they want wealth, and minority status interferes with the acquisition of neither. Office-holders attract money like garbage attracts flies, and successful politicians–people who know how to get votes–can live well off their donors no matter which party they claim. The donors can go either way or both ways.

If Democrats in this Congress ever dared to act efficaciously to advance the public interest–by voting as a party to end the occupation of Iraq, for instance–the flow of money into their personal treasuries would come to an abrupt stop. On the other hand, if they can keep their party divided and thus preserve the status quo, their benefactors won’t hold it against even those who vote for change. As long as there isn’t any change.

Our Democratic crooks were sitting pretty when they were the minority party. Now, there’s no excuse for the continuation of fascism, war, bigotry, graft, bribery, pollution, and government disinformation. Democrats are now exposed as the other Republicans, self-dealing racketeers posing as statesmen. They should be prosecuted, but we have to turn them out of office first. And the only way to do that is to repudiate them and the corrupt party they’ve shamed and disgraced.