The Tactics Being Deployed by the Current Republican Leadership is the Problem

Two of our smartest Political Scientists...and both try to avoid being partisan, and one is a conservative analyst from the American Enterprise Institute...recently concluded that the Republican Party leadership is "ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition....  No doubt,  Demcrats were not exactly warm and fuzzy toward George W. Bush during  his presidency. But recall that they worked hand in glove with the  Republican president on the No Child Left Behind Act, provided crucial  votes in the Senate for his tax cuts, joined with Republicans for all  the steps taken after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and supplied the key  votes for the Bush administration’s financial bailout at the height of  the economic crisis in 2008. The difference is striking."

If you only read one piece of political analysis this year, read this one (meaning the link if you click on 'concluded' above).