Just a few years ago, there was plenty of hubristic wankery from the Right-wing pundits about their alleged "permanent majority" in Congress. Over at Salon, Joe Conason enjoys rubbing conservatives' faces in their failure--particularly the odious Grover Norquist, who claimed that "the Republicans are looking at decades of dominance in the House and the Senate." Conason praises the 2002 Judis/Teixeira thesis (which I mentioned yesterday), lays out the demographic situation quite well, but adds a note of caution:
...gloating only goes so far, as Norquist learned the hard way. On Thursday morning, he joined dozens of right-wing leaders in Washington to plan for a conservative comeback -- and what they hope will be the next realignment, without the burden of George W. Bush. Don't misunderestimate them.
For the record, I went through some of my old posts, which predicted the same realignment as Judis & Teixeira:
5 December 2004 "Having been on a nearly unbroken ascent for four full decades, the political Right is at the apex of its power; the Left, having just experienced its "Goldwater moment," is in the midst of some much-needed introspection."23 June 2007
"When 2006's electoral embarrassment for the GOP becomes 2008's landslide, I suspect that [Andrew Sullivan's The Conservative Soul] will be diligently examined. As more conservatives try to understand how their dream of a permanent majority was so thoroughly dashed on the rocks of reality, a look into the substantive past of conservatism--rather than its degenerated present--will do us all some good."
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