The duel between “progressivism” — which is really just anti-Constitutionalism — and patriotic loyalty to the Republic as founded has been going on for a century. And the record of the “progressives” has been a disgrace, from Woodrow Wilson’s resegregation of the military, through FDR’s corrupt bargain with gangland that helped him secure the Democratic nomination in 1932 over Al Smith, through DNC member Bull Connor’s fire-hosing of civil-rights marchers. A political philosophy that masquerades as compassion and the alleviation of misery instead results in its prolongation, the better to create a permanent underclass of dependent voters (Tammany Hall developed the template more than a century ago), and the modern GOP establishment has signally failed to point that out. But through the miracle of media jiu-jitsu, all these enormities have been rolled off on the GOP, a neat trick that allows Democrats to effectively run against themselves and still blame it on the other guy.
via Crush Them – By Michael Walsh – The Corner – National Review Online.