I still remember when Rush Limbaugh came on the scene. I can’t remember the exact year, I think it was in the mid to late 80’s possibly the early 90’s. I, like many other dupes, started listening to him as I drove around in my car until I realized how vile he was and how the people that called his show were the kind of people who go out of their way to tell you what they think you want to hear and are eager to believe someone who caters to their weeknesses. Limbaugh was a good enough liar to suck millions of Americans in. It took me until the so-called “Contract for America” and the republican “revolution” of 1994 which brought people like Newt Gingrich, Dick Armey, and Tom Delay into the forefront of the US house of representatives, to realize that Limbaugh and as time passed people like Sean Hannity and others were part of a conspiracy to take a stranglehold on all facets of the US Government. Our founding fathers had designed the constitution in a way that purposely made it almost impossible for one party to control all aspects of the government. The fear was tyranny of the majority – the exact reason we have a representative democracy and not a pure democracy. The republican plan was brilliant and they came very close to pulling it off.

The first part of the plan was a very subtle “merger” of the airwaves. They started with Limbaugh, who had virtually no competition when his tenure began, and their presence expanded on the radio, then slowly on television as the cable networks emerged during the 90’s. Bill Clinton went along with media consolidation that has led to the supposed “liberal media” that is almost completely controlled by corporate interests with close ties to the republican party. Once they had the house in 1994 they were on their way with phase two of the plan to take over congress (I call this phase two, because I’m not including the White House in these plans. I firmly believe they felt having control of the White House would be a “given” once the entire plan was put into place). They created a strong majority in the house, but found it more difficult in the senate where the necessity to have 60 votes to cut off debate on issues was still a roadblock. However, they still, by the time Clinton was out of office and GW Bush was in the White House, were close to achieving their goal of a perpetual republican “majority.”

The republicans had control of both houses of congress, and they were one vote away from having control of the Supreme Court (they still are if you’re thinking that Obama has this election won and you don’t need to vote) for at least a generation. With people like Karl Rove, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Dick Cheney, and David Addington alongside GW at the helm they managed to turn the Justice department into a partisan advocate of whatever position they chose to take. It looked like a done deal, I’m sure from their perspective, in the early years of the Bush II administration. After 9/11, which in reality was a horrible failure on the part of Bush and his surrogates, the president’s popularity soared. I believe his approval rating jumped up close to 90% after the invasion of Afganistan. I’m sure he thought that he wasn’t going to “blow it” like his father, but that is where everything started to unravel.

As the old saying goes “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutey.” Well, the result of all this power and the temptation that goes along with huge sums of money exchanging hands with buddies involved in the “war business” was a flood of corruption uncovered by a few people who put honor above party. The undoing of Duke Cunningham, Rep. Foley and the page scandal, Delay and his involvement (with others) in the Abramoff scandal along with an indictment for laundering money in Texas politics, leaders of the republican anti-gay movement having encounters suggesting they weren’t “practicing what they preached,” and the bumbling war in Iraq brought many Americans to take a second look at the republican party. People stopped talking about Clinton lying about sex and started talking about the consequences of lying us into war.

Bush/Cheney et al miscalculated the American willingness to give up our prized liberties for their fixation on the “war on terror.” Americans are appalled that our leaders have sanctioned the type of torture that led us to put people before war crimes tribunals after World War II and other wars. They felt the sense of hypocracy that our leaders were saying one thing out of their mouths and doing exactly the opposite in their actions. The American public is still on the side of Franklin Roosevelt who chastised people like George Bush’s grandfather for profiting from the second World War. The idea that companies like Halliburton, Bechtel, and others, all with direct connections to the White House would not only be profiting off of huge no-bid contracts in Iraq but that they would be unable to account for billions of dollars while we couldn’t even afford health care for America’s children eventually got the attention of enough people to threaten the whole plan.

And finally, George Bush’s stubborness to admit a mistake (actually, I believe he finally has admitted it, at least to himself) with people like John McCain standing firmly at his side as over 1000 American troops have given their lives for the “surge” which may in the long run lead to a short-term stability in Iraq at the expense of our standing in the world and our economy has led to a mobilization that is on the verge of turning the republican “revolution” upside down. I almost felt a sense of pity watching John McCain in the final debate with Senator Obama trying to defend an empty policy with an hour and a half of empty rhetoric. I imagine that as time goes by and people watch the debate with “instant replay” and dissect some of the absurd comments McCain made, his performance will become progressively less impressive. I listened to a couple republican “pundits” right after the debate and they were uplifted because McCain was “aggressive.” The problem was with what he was saying which is very hard to “fathom” immediately following something like this. At one point I remember McCain saying that American troops should be able to go right into the classrooms of America’s public schools upon completing their service to the country as teachers without the burden of going back to school to obtain proper credentials. As a public school teacher, I can’t tell you how ridiculous that comment was. It showed an amazing lack of knowledge about what is involved in teaching children.

So the great plan of the republicans that have been in the background since the days of Ronald Reagan to hijack the American political process almost made it to fruition. I personally believe their mistake was thinking that the White House wasn’t the key. They put Reagan in and he was a better actor in the White House than he was on the “silver screen.” He gave a great speech and either he was in the beginning stages of Alzheimers or he was just willing to look the other way while his surrogates (who have been Bush I’s and Bush II’s surrogates) ran rampant in South and Central America and elsewhere in the world with little regard for congress or the constitution – their only regard is profit. I believe they think of both the congress and the constitution as annoying impediments to their agenda. Clinton was willing to go along with enough of their plan to make his eight years constructive to their ultimate goal, and George W Bush had the right personality to be a good “front man.” The problem was that just as he had done on almost every endeavor he had attempted prior to his stint in the White House Bush had bungled pretty much everything he had done. He continued this phenomenom with the war, with his lack of diplomatic ability, his misuse of the English language in press congerences and public appearances, and finally and fatally his lack of knowledge and poor choice of surrogates regarding the economy. This will be a terrible recession or depression to recover from as a nation, but the severity of the crisis should force us to “retool” our thinking and change our personal behavior and demand, finally, a change of behavior in Washington. Whatever lies ahead will be a darn sight better than if the republicans had succeeded in their plan – a plan that would have worked had Bush been at all competent- a plan that McCain/Palin continue to push for almost as if they really believe they are the “change agents” we need. I never thought I would ever say this, but it is becoming clear in my mind that it is time for all Americans to say “Thank you president Bush.”