And now for some really depressing news from Madison

You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you!
God damn you all to hell!
- Planet of the Apes, 1968

I eschewed the above quote for something a little more family-friendly for my column this week in the Waukesha Freeman (even under The Obama you can afford the fifty cents).

Spending Tuesday evening among the Republicans gathered at the Country Springs Hotel, I had an old song written by Freddie Mercury running through my head. "Another party’s over / and I’m left here cold sober / my baby left me for somebody new." Tuesday night was definitely a night for Republicans to be singing "My Melancholy Blues."

Somebody new. In Madison, that meant the Democrats. Voters have decided to leave the Republicans to take a walk on the liberal side (apologies to Lou Reed) and are about to experience the host of plagues I described at length, from higher taxes on everything to the dismantling of school choice. But I put the blame where it belongs.

But we can blame Republicans in part for all that is about to happen. If they had passed a constitutional amendment to limit state spending four years ago when they had the chance, much of the Democratic agenda would be impossible now. More importantly, because Republicans threw away their brand identity four years ago by not passing "TABOR" as a constitutional amendment, voters had no reason to believe there was a difference between Democrats and Republicans.

Voters are about to learn differently. But will Republicans?

Bastards.

Post-Obamalyptic thoughts

You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you!
God damn you all to hell!
- Planet of the Apes, 1968

One, let's start by acknowledging the voters were wrong on Tuesday. We live in a republic with regular elections. These things will happen from time to time.

Of course, if I was, say, a right-wing version of Wisconsin State Journal, I'd call for an end to elections. But silly me, I actually like elections, even when they pick the wrong people. It's the Neo-Conservative in me.

Let's start at the top. Barry O'Bama is the most Irish a President has been since freakin' JFK. With a name like that and the luck he had during the election, he's more Irish than a Leprechaun. C'mon. Who would'a thunk that entire financial markets would conspire to go into the dumpster just when Senator McCain was building momentum? And that McCain would actually take the bait, ride his White Horse to Washington, and get tagged for bailing out corporate fat cats and doing it incompetently?

It takes the Right Stuff to be so wrong.

But it's not like McCain was exactly cruising to victory when the markets crashed. As Byron York pointed out in National Review, the odds of electing any Republican as president this year were pretty poor. And of course, no mere mortal Republican has ever faced an Irish pagan deity before like Barry O'Bama. When they're sacrificing goats to the guy in far away Kenya, what chance does a guy like McCain have?

Was McCain the best choice for Republicans? Hardly. Former Senator Fred Thompson could have at least articulated a conservative message. Former Governor Romney could have made an economic case for conservativism. Former Governor Huckabee could have made an interesting populist candidate, although I think the party would just as soon evolve without him. Giuliani would have made a great Attorney General for somebody... as long as judicial selections were handled by the White House Counsel office.

But McCain won the primary campaign by default and shortly afterwards his national constituency, the press corps, joined the Kenyan goat-sacrificers in O'Bama worship.

So now we plot for 2012 and a second chance at Barry O'Bama. Fortunately the bench is starting to show some surprising strength. In addition to Governor Palin we have the return of former Governor Romney, and current Louisiana Governor Jindal. Notice something? Conservatives could back any of them. What a change four years will make.

To everyone who voted for the Democrats in the Assembly last night