The "Next Reagan"?

Bruce Walker has a piece up on American Thinker about who he thinks the GOP should choose as its nominee in 2012.

If Republicans could, surely they would nominate Ronald Reagan for president in 2012. As it appears increasingly likely that Republicans -- conservative Republicans -- will control Congress after the 2012 elections, the only missing element in the political equation is a strong, conservative president like Ronald Reagan. In the mix of possible candidates for 2012, there are some potentially promising people.

Sarah Palin, rightly beloved by nearly all conservatives for her honesty, her advocacy, and her spunk, will figure into any list of candidates. Mitt Romney, who decently withdrew from the race before he lost in 2008, ought to be on the short list as well. Mike Huckabee will be some conservatives' favorite as well. Tim Pawlenty has decided that America really needs him to be president, and other Republicans will too.

Already we see that Mr. Walker isn't up on the current situation. Romney just took himself out of the running by endorsing John McCain against J.D. Hayworth (Palin had no choice in this and Republican voters are smart enough to understand that).

Huckabee was removed from serious consideration late last year when another of the violent felons whose prison sentence Huckabee commuted while governor of Arkansas murdered police officers in California. The incident reminded the electorate once again of how profligate Huckabee was in granting clemency, pardons and commutations to men who should never under any circumstances been allowed out of prison. Huckabee did this more than all the governors of the states surrounding Arkansas combined and the murdered cops in CA are not the only innocent people to pay the ultimate price for Huckabee's insane desire to empty the prisons of societies most dangerous and violent bottom-feeders.

As for Tim Pawlenty remember when there was all that press speculation about McCain choosing Pawlenty as his running mate back in 2008? Remember how the consensus opinion in the GOP was that if McCain picked another RINO like himself it would doom what little chance he might have of winning? Pawlenty is still the same man now that he was then and if McCain's humiliating defeat to a know-nothing, done-nothing empty suit like B. Hussein Obama as well as the recent conservative ascendancy seen in everything from the Tea Party movement to the GOP's seizure of the "Ted Kennedy" seat in the Senate teaches us nothing else it is that the "era of McCain" is over (if it ever "was" in the first place)

With deepest respect for Sarah, none of these candidates is another Reagan. Many people have decided that we simply will not find another Reagan for a long time. I think otherwise. During the 2008 nomination season, I wrote several articles proposing a Republican not yet in the race as the Next Reagan. The stars were not aligned right then for him, but all that may be different in 2012. What do we want in our Next Reagan?

First, we want someone whose conservatism is beyond question -- someone who campaigned hard for Doug Hoffman, for example, even while the RNC was supporting the RINO. Second, we want someone of absolute integrity -- someone who is willing to stand all alone if he thinks he is right. Third, we want someone who does not "need" politics -- someone who was a great success in life before entering politics. Fourth, we want someone disassociated from the failures of Obama and also of Bush -- someone who grasped America's disgust with Washington long before the Beltway insiders. Fifth, we want a "grownup" -- someone who is in every sense of the word mature, sober, and serious. Sixth, we want a great communicator -- someone, like Reagan, who works well in every medium of communication. Seventh, we want someone who is universally perceived as a good man -- just like Reagan. One Republican in 2008 met all those criteria, and in 2012, he stands out at least as clearly as anyone as our Next Reagan: Fred Thompson.

First of all everything he says about Mr. Thompson is true, but with the exception of the masculine gender pronouns (he, him, man) it is also true of Mrs. Palin.

Some might quibble about whether Mrs. Palin was a "great success" in life before she entered politics but I challenge anyone to read her autobiography and not be impressed with her life prior to her entrance into politics.

(1) When conservatives began to despair of any true conservative in 2008, gradually, many began deducing that Thompson was the only one who fit the bill. Across the board, in a very thoughtful way, Fred Thompson represents conservative values. When Doug Hoffman ran for Congress, Thompson went to upstate New York to help.

What Mr. Walker says about the way conservative voters felt in 2008 is true. I was there after all. Anyone who was a reader of this blog back then knows how enthusiastically I supported Fred Thompson. And it is also true that Fred followed Sarah Palin's led and supported Doug Hoffman.

(2) No one questions Thompson's integrity. His career was founded on a willingness to fearlessly confront corruption in Tennessee. As a young Republican Senate staffer, Thompson boldly opposed the crimes of Nixon. And as pundits have noted, there are many Senate votes of 99 to 1 in which Fred was that single "no."

It is true that Mr. Thompson was first brought to the public's attention as a young attorney in Tennessee when he brought down a corrupt Democrat governor and that he played a part in the Watergate affair. His voting record in the Senate is very very good. If fact the only problem any conservative might have with it would be those few occasions when he allowed himself to be persuaded by his "good friend" John McCain.

Of course Sarah Palin also built her career on fighting corruption and in her case she had the courage and integrity to take on corruption within her own party.

And this brings us back to that "integrity thing". You see as much as I admire Fred Thompson we do have to admit that there is a stain upon his integrity. You see we found out after the fact that when Fred was holding himself out as a candidate for the presidency he was never serious about it. He was actually angling for an invitation to be someone's vice presidential pick. When he began doing well in the polls he had to make some attempt to seriously campaign but it was clear that his heart was never in it. That fact was never more clearly revealed than in the fact that his single best performance of the campaign was the speech in which he withdrew from the race. And to cap it off his performance on the campaign trail was so lackluster that he would up taking himself out of the running as anyone's VP choice.

(3) Thompson, a star of film and television and a retired senator, does not "need" political power. He is famous, rich, and popular without it. He has a beautiful, loving wife and delightful children. His only reason for seeking the presidency would be his love of America.

Again, everything said about Mr. Thompson here is also and equally true about Governor Palin. Her book sales have made her wealthy and she is able to command large speaking fees. Her online presence and contract with Fox News give her a forum for her views and she has more requests from political candidates who want her to campaign for them than she can possibly assent to. Her family is close and loving and offers her as much joy and fulfillment as Mr. Thompson's could possible offer him. Sarah Palin believes that political power and high office are not things that one seeks out of ambition but are duties that one is called to fulfill.

(4) Thompson gave up his Senate seat soon after Bush began as president. He has not held elective office since 2002. He left Washington in disgust for its machinations, Republican as well as Democrat.

Sarah Palin did not leave Juneau because of her disgust with "its machinations, Republican as wall as Democrat". She rolled up her sleeves and cleaned up the corruption. She left office only after accomplishing everything she had set out to do.

(5) Thompson, like Reagan, is not young. He would be just about as old on inauguration day in 2013 as Reagan when he was sworn into office. Thompson, like Reagan, grew up poor in a small town and worked many jobs and lived in the real world. Thompson is learned in the best sense of the word: He knows exactly why be believes what he believes, but he is also an excellent listener. He is a grownup.

Compare Sarah Palin's upbringing in rural Alaska, where if you didn't hunt you didn't eat, to Mr. Thompson's. Look at some of the jobs she has held. Waitress, journalist - both print and television, commercial fisherman (a business that she and her husband continue to own and operate).

Now compare Mr. Thompson's appearance today to Ronald Reagan's appearance in 1980. Ronald Reagan was an elderly man but he looked vigorous and healthy. The lines on Reagan's face made him look distinguished and wise. Fred Thompson on the other hand simply looks old, even decrepit. It isn't fair. It isn't right. But it is true that in the television age appearance matters to a very great degree. It is true that by 2012 the public might be angry enough at Obama to vote for a man who has aged poorly and looks much older than his actual years, but why take the chance on someone who has already proven himself to be a poor candidate?

(6) Thompson is not only a star of film and television, but Paul Harvey chose Thompson to stand in on his radio show -- a great compliment to Thompson's voice. He has spent decades in all areas of communication and mastered them well.

True, but none of that did him any good in the 2008 primaries. Think about it people. Fred Thompson couldn't even beat JOHN MCCAIN in an election in which most of the people voting were conservative Republicans! That has got to tell you something! In fact let's make it a rule. If you couldn't even beat JOHN MCCAIN is a Republican primary then you shouldn't be allowed to enter ever again.

(7) No one, including his ex-wife, has a bad word to say about Thompson. The left can criticize him only as being "too old, too conservative, and too dumb." This, recall, is precisely what they said about Reagan.

Again, how is this different from Sarah? The left says that she is stupid. The left called Reagan an "amiable dunce". They said that Reagan was a dangerous extremest who would start WWIII with the Soviet Union. They say that Sarah is a warmonger who can't wait to nuke Iran.

If you go back to the beginning of Mr. Walker's essay he says that Romney, Pawlenty, Palin and Huckabee are not the "next Reagan" but that Fred Thompson is. Read Mr. Walker's entire piece over at AT without my comments and then answer this.

In what way does Mr. Walker think that Reagan and Thompson are similar?

They are both men, Republicans, both were once actors, both grew up poor in small towns and both are honest men.

What does Mr. Walker have to say about policy?

Basically nothing. In Mr. Walkers view to be the "next Reagan" one must only have a superficial surface resemblance to Reagan. You have to have grown up in a small town, been an actor and be an old man.

Now I don't think that Mr. Walker is indifferent to policy and I don't think that he is overly concerned with a candidate's personal story. It's just that Mr. Walker loves Fred Thompson.

Mr. Walker is so in love with Fred Thompson that he is blind to both Mr. Thompson's deficiencies as a candidate and to Governor Palin's strengths. That blindness causes Mr. Walker to miss both how much Sarah Palin's personal story tracks with Ronald Reagan's and, for that matter with Fred Thompson's, and how poorly Mr. Thompson campaigned in 2008.

Does Mr. Walker really believe that four more years of age will make Fred Thompson a more attractive and energetic candidate in 2012?

Miss Ann is Talking

That means that YOU are listening!

OBAMA'S OWNED -- YOU CAN BANK ON IT
by Ann Coulter
February 10, 2010

The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal are bristling with the news that Republicans have decided now is the time to suck up to Wall Street. As the saying goes, there is no truer friend than a Wall Street arbitrageur -- they are the salt-of-the-earth, the most loyal men who ever drew a breath!

What are Republicans thinking? While not every money-manipulator on Wall Street deserves to be treated like a heroin dealer, lots do. Could the Republicans be a little more discriminating in picking up the Democrats' old friends?

The Democrats are acting as if they want to punish everyone in the financial services industry, including the innocent, while the Republicans seem to want to protect everyone on Wall Street, including the guilty.

How about just punishing the guilty? The Democrats can't do that because the list of Wall Street's biggest offenders may turn out to be eerily similar to the list of Obama's biggest campaign contributors.

Employees from Goldman Sachs gave more to the Obama campaign than any other organization except the University of California -- with Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase quickly following in sixth and seventh place.

Whatever Obama has in mind for punishing the financial industry, I promise you, he won't punish his friends. After JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon took a $17 million bonus this week, and Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein got a $9 million bonus, Obama said he didn't begrudge them their bonuses, saying, "I know both those guys."

Obama seems to be hoping that his vague bluster about "obscene profits" will lure Republicans into embracing Wall Street welfare recipients -- thereby losing Americans forever.

Never bet against Republicans being outwitted.

Risk-taking and speculation are good. But the Democrats' crony capitalism is the worst of both worlds: risk-taking without any real risk for the risk-takers. It's like gambling with your rich daddy's money, except we're the rich daddy.

Obama, like the rest of his party, is an ideologue who doesn't understand or particularly like the free market. He fundamentally believes in the efficacy of the welfare state, whether the beneficiary is a layabout single mother or a rich Wall Street banker.

As Peter Schweizer describes in his magnificent book "Architects of Ruin," the Democrats have been bailing out investment houses from their bad bets since the Clinton administration. The bankers got all the profits when their risky bonds were paying -- and then gave massive donations to their Democratic benefactors. But once the bets went bad, it was the taxpayers' problem.

Heavily leveraged securities packages put together by Goldman Sachs and others were the HIV virus that killed the American economy. And the reason investment firms piled leverage on leverage on leverage was that they knew the government would bail them out if their house of cards collapsed.

On one hand, Goldman put together toxic securities packages for their clients, but on the other hand, Goldman knew the mortgage securities being sold on the market were crap, so they also took out lots of insurance with AIG on crappy products being traded on the market.

It would be as if, anticipating a major earthquake, Goldman bought massive insurance policies on every house on the San Andreas fault line.

There's nothing wrong with taking risks and making bets, provided that if you bet wrong or if you bankrupt your betting partner with wild gambles: You lose.

The problem was that Goldman and AIG, among many others, knew they wouldn't lose. Twenty years of Democratic bailouts have led them to understand that when their bets go bad, the taxpayer will save them.

Which is exactly what happened.

When the earthquake hit toxic securities, the insurer, AIG, couldn't pay up. Normally, that would result in the insurer going bankrupt, an orderly proceeding in bankruptcy court to distribute AIG's assets, and Goldman recovering only a portion of the insurance payout on the crappy products.

But instead of AIG going bankrupt and Goldman taking a hit, the U.S. taxpayer made good on AIG's securities insurance. In a deal arranged by former Goldman CEO and current Obama BFF, Hank Paulson, Goldman ended up being paid -- by you -- an astonishing 100 cents on the dollar.

So Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein's boast that his firm didn't want TARP money and has paid it all back is completely irrelevant. Goldman took billions of dollars -- that's millions with a "b" -- of the AIG bailout money. How about paying that back?

It took The New York Times a year and a half to figure out Goldman's jackpot winnings from the AIG bailout -- $12.9 billion, according to the Times -- so the first thing Republicans ought to do is hold hearings to determine who benefited from the Democrats' crony capitalism, and not take their bluster as fact.

The next step should be to get all the bailout money back.

When the government steps in to save the very financial institutions that poisoned the nation's financial system with contaminated securities and derivatives -- all while the bankers get to keep the fees and bonuses on their bad bets -- we are not talking about a free market.

We're talking about regular Americans being forced to foot the bill for the gambling habits of left-wing multimillionaires by buying the malefactors more chips every time they lose.

Republicans should defend any investment houses that never benefited from a government bailout. But anyone who took huge gambles, lost and got bailed out with taxpayer money should be tortured and then shot, miraculously brought back to life, tortured some more, then shot a few more times.

COPYRIGHT 2010 ANN COULTER
DISTRIBUTED BY UNIVERSAL UCLICK
1130 Walnut, Kansas City, MO 64106

Let's repeat that last paragraph for emphasis:

Republicans should defend any investment houses that never benefited from a government bailout. But anyone who took huge gambles, lost and got bailed out with taxpayer money should be tortured and then shot, miraculously brought back to life, tortured some more, then shot a few more times.

I like it when a beautiful woman speaks my language!

The truth is that in the business community small business is a stronghold of the Republican party while Big business swings heavily toward the Democrats.

There are several reasons for this but the largest is that big businesses know that they can afford to hire the phalanxes of lawyers and accountants, consultants and lobbyists that are necessary to understand, comply with and when necessary influence big government tax and regulatory policy.

While small business is very often unable to afford to do the same.

The biggest fear that big business has is that some small businessman will figure out a better and/or cheaper way to provide the same product or service that the big business is providing and take away the big business's market share. Big business executives (Evil Corporate Fat Cats, to Democrats) know that they can often prevent competition before it becomes a threat to their profits (Filthy Bloated Profits and Excessive Bonuses, to Democrats) by shackling small businessmen with an increased tax and regulatory burden.

It often works out exactly that way for the Fat Cats. Sometimes the Evil Corporate Merchants of Greed (tm) can even get the big government Democrats to give them an outright monopoly like many insurance companies enjoy in the sale of health insurance.

By not allowing health insurance to be sold across state lines government grants virtual monopolies to certain insurance companies in many areas. This allows these companies to bully doctors and hospitals on the amount of reimbursement and allows them to charge rates to customers unaffected by competition.

It is not an accident that insurance company executives, like Wall Street executives, donate a great deal more money to Democrats than Republicans.

If I had more time this morning I could go on to describe how Democrats refusal to allow new drilling for oil causes massive amounts of money to flow into the coffers of Big Oil, but that will have to wait for another day.

We're damaging their calm

Over the past few days I have read a number of references to the notes that Sarah Palin had written on her hand during her speech and Q&A session at the Nashville Tea Party conference.

Comments like, "Sarah Palin reads notes from her hand, woo woo. Sarah Palin reads notes from her hand, woo woo", which was posted on YouTube to this:

So, you think Sarah Palin is embarrassed by the crib-notes-on-the-palm incident?

You're kidding, right?

Which was written by Alex Baldwin on the Huffington Post.

Then there was the observation by someone that Mrs. Palin used note cares for her speech, then went on to inform us that note cards are the analog version of a teleprompter.

Someone, I think it was a Marine Corps (this is pronounced kôr, in case the president is reading) general said that when you see that you have kicked the enemy in a sensitive spot you should keep on kicking them there.

Clearly Barack Obama's extreme difficulty speaking coherently without a teleprompter is a sensitive spot for the left.

The fact is that when you cut him off from the 'prompter without a massive amount of preparation he starts stuttering, stammering and eventually gibbering about things like visiting all the 57 states in the Union.

In other words he sounds like a man with considerably less intelligence than George W Bush (who couldn't pronounce "nuclear" but who also never talked about "breathalizing inhalators").

The attempt to characterize Palin's note cards as simply the low tech version of Obama's teleprompter falls flat because the two things are not the same.

If Palin had taken the stage with her speech already typed up on 81/2 x 11 paper and had read it word for word that would be the analog version of a teleprompter.

But what Palin did was jot down a few words on 3 x 5 index cards on order to remind herself of the major points she wanted to make and the order she wanted to make them in. Then she depended upon her knowledge of the issues that she was speaking about and the ability to think logically and organize her thoughts then speak her thoughts clearly in order to give her speech.

On the other hand what Obama does is have his speech written for him by someone else then fed to him word for word on a teleprompter so all he has to do is read each word then pronounce it with his undeniable gift for sounding good (as long as he doesn't have to engage his mind and involve it in the speaking process).

In other words Barack Obama's great talent in life is to be a loudspeaker made out of meat.

No wonder the left finds this to be such a sore spot.

Like the man said, we've kicked them in a soft spot so we should keep kicking.

Murtha is dead

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - U.S. Rep. John Murtha, an influential critic of the Iraq War whose congressional career was shadowed by questions about his ethics, died Monday. He was 77.

The Pennsylvania Democrat had been suffering complications from gallbladder surgery. He died at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, Va., spokesman Matthew Mazonkey said.

To everyone other than his close family and friends Jack Murtha will be remembered for three things. One, his career in the United States Marine Corps (pronounced core, like an apple core, in case the president is reading this). Two, his time in the House of Representatives. Three his opposition to the war in Iraq with particular emphasis upon his statements about a group of Marines who were accused of a war crime at a place called Haditha.

Murtha pre-judged these men pronouncing them guilty of war crimes both on the floor of the House and in interviews with the press. Murtha implied that his information on the men's guilt came from highly placed contacts within the Pentagon but it turned out that his only source was an article in Time magazine.

As things stand now all but one of the Haditha Marines have been cleared of all charges.

Since I was never a Marine I will leave it to Fits, who blogs at Shooting the Messenger to comment upon Mr. Murtha as an ex Marine:

John Murtha was 77. One of the very few "ex" Marines. He gave up all rights to that honor when he sold his.

To the man he used to be: Rest in peace.

As for Murtha's general opposition to the war I will note that it seemed very conveniently timed to help his career. Murtha's comments on the Haditha Marines must always be remembered in the context that his accusations were false and that till his dying day he refused to apologize for them.

As for Murtha's House career in general I will note that he will be remembered as the Master of Earmarks and the King of Pork. In other words he was just the kind of politician that gives politics a bad name.

On balance Murtha will have to be remembered as a man who did more harm than good in the world and a man who did that harm by choice rather than by accident.

Sarah at the Tea Party

This is 40 minutes long, but worth the time.

WTF

KING, N.C. -- Authorities lifted a curfew and alcohol restrictions in King on Sunday, but said a state of emergency declaration remained in effect until Monday.

Authorities said the state of emergency declaration would continue until Monday 9 a.m., barring any unforeseen circumstances or severe changes.

Effective Sunday afternoon, alcohol restrictions and a curfew were lifted. All other remaining restrictions would continue until Monday, said Paula May, King police chief.

Other restrictions include a ban on the sale or purchase of any type of firearm, ammunition, explosive or any possession of such items off a person's own premises.

Also on Sunday, the emergency shelter established by the American red Cross at West Stokes High School was closed."

We appreciate the support and cooperation of everyone with our efforts to keep the citizens of King safe," May said.

The state of emergency was declared Friday due to severe weather.

The sad thing is that King, NC is located not far from Mt. Airy, the inspiration for Mayberry. I really don't see Andy and Barny tossing people in jail for toting a pistol in a snowstorm.

One down, how many to go?

Rick Moran writes about some good news from across the pond:

There may be no other country where the religion of global warming inundated society so thoroughly as in Great Britain. All major political parties endorsed it and the solutions to climate change. It was preached from the pulpit, endorsed by almost every celebrity, hammered him in PSA's on TV all day long.

The media played right along, led by the venerable BBC who not only promoted global warming doctrine, but savaged any skeptics that dared disagree with the dominant theology.

Now, after a couple of months of climategate revelations, the tide appears to be turning. A new poll out shows decidedly more people skeptical of climate change.

From the BBC:

The number of British people who are sceptical about climate change is rising, a poll for BBC News suggests.

The Populus poll of 1,001 adults found 25% did not think global warming was happening, a rise of 8% since a similar poll was conducted in November.

The percentage of respondents who said climate change was a reality had fallen from 83% in November to 75% this month.

And only 26% of those asked believed climate change was happening and "now established as largely man-made".

The findings are based on interviews carried out on 3-4 February.

In November 2009, a similar poll by Populus - commissioned by the Times newspaper - showed that 41% agreed that climate change was happening and it was largely the result of human activities.

Despite active measures by the BBC and the liberal Guardian newspaper to suppress climategate revelations, other media outlets like the Telegraph, the Daily Mail, and the TimesOnline have picked up the slack and have run story after story about the fraud, the bad science, and the shameful actions of scientists in trying to suppress opposing viewpoints.

It shows that when people get all the information, they can make up their own minds.

Some of it appears to be getting through.

I am fond of quoting H.L. Mencken's wisdom:

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."

I have noted that the hobgoblin of man-made global warming was the best boogieman the left had ever invented to frighten the general population into surrendering their liberty and their wealth to an all powerful government

I have also noted that the left would never let go of man-caused global warming until another hobgoblin of equal or greater potential was already fabricated and waiting int he wings to make his debut on center stage.

What I didn't take into account is that some brave insider would provide the key to bringing down the entire global warming house of cards in the form of purloined e-mail archives.

Of course any number of whistle blowers would not have been able to shine the light of truth on this monstrous hoax without the existence of the alternate media.

With the old media and the government both complicit in the creation and maintenance of the hoax, and both unwilling to see the fraud unravel, they would have combined to cause any embarrassing revelations about "hiding the decline" vanish down Orwell's memory hole as recently as 20 years ago.

But today the internet transmits the news around the globe at light-speed and talk radio carries discussion of the issues into the homes, cars and offices of millions and it is no longer possible for the cabal of government, academia and the media to restrict the flow of information to the average citizen.

The nation of India has already officially jumped off the global warming bandwagon. Expect China to do so in the near future. Old Europe will follow after that.

This will leave the United States as the last holdout of the major industrialized nations. We will be left standing amid a collection of Third World despotisms who regard global warming as nothing more than a lever with which to pry open the wallets of the American taxpayer.

America will hold out longer than any other major nation because the left in the US is stronger than it is anywhere else.

In Old Europe the voice of what Americans call conservatism is almost silent and has been so for decades. The European left is not used to having to fight to have its policy ideas accepted and enacted into law. This leaves them ill equipped to resist on those rare occasions when the general public wakes up and demands a serious change.

In America the left has to fight the conservative movement for every inch of territory it gains and it does not win nearly every battle. This constant combat makes our left far more resilient than their European counterparts and equips them to hold out against the truth for far longer.

However the global warming edifice will fall in the US as it is in Europe. As the song says "you can twist perceptions but reality won't budge".

The fact that the left doesn't have a convenient replacement hobgoblin for global warming will be a problem for them so we can expect them to be hard at work prepping a new boogieman even now.

What will it be? Global cooling fell flat as did ozone depletion. The millions of people murdered by the left's ban on DDT are thrusting their way into the mainstream awareness as are the millions of children blinded by the left's hysterical rejection of genetically modified foods. So I would imagine that the tool of environmentalism has just about lost its usefulness as a means of gaining control.

The secular "state as god" movement of Marxism has lost its appeal due to the spectacular failures of the Soviet Union and communist China as they shed an ocean of blood and achieved only poverty and despair to show for it.

In the early days of the 20th century the left found a home in the Christian religion. The original "progressive" movement embraced a post-millennial eschatology that let them believe that enlightened (that is progressive) government would bring about the prophesied Golden Age.

That view did not survive the trenches and poison gas of WWI and the gas chambers of the Holocaust.

So if the left is denied a hiding place in religion, environmentalism, economics and politics what segment of our culture will the infest and subvert next.

Your guess is as good as mine.