GOP's hard times provide rays of hope for Demos

Webb: Scandal. Lackluster hurricane response. An unpopular war. Out-of-control gas prices. Ballooning deficits. An uninspired Supreme Court nomination. No question about it, the Republicans are taking some body blows at the national level.

But not to worry. It's actually all part of a Karl Rove master plot. We Republicans have those naive Democrats right where we want them. Every administration and majority party has ups and downs, and Rove has timed all of President Bush's and the GOP Congress' woes so they hit rock bottom a year before the election, and from here on things only get better. By next summer Bush is the "comeback kid" and the GOP rolls to a big victory next November.

At least that's my fantasy. It won't quite happen that way in real life.

Bush is getting hammered not just by his Democratic opponents but also by conservatives angry (rightly so) about the growth in the size of government and ballooning deficits since the Republicans took over Congress and especially during the current Bush administration.

The George Bush who seemed so smart politically through two elections and his first term suddenly became politically tone deaf, missing a great opportunity to rally and unify the country in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The political implications of his nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court have yet to play out, and the legal troubles of Tom DeLay and Bill Frist have added to GOP woes.

But the Democrats aren't in any great shape to capitalize on all of this. While the country has slowly but surely become more conservative, the national Democrats are veering to the left, following liberal pied pipers like MoveOn.org and George Soros, who lure Democrats along with their immense fund raising and organizational prowess.

Currently the Republicans are in tough shape because they are being compared against a high political ideal. When they start to be matched against actual Democrats, and the Democratic agenda (whatever it is), they will do much better.

The real danger for Republicans would be if the Democrats move to the middle, where the vast majority of Americans are, and they actually put forward some plans that make sense, instead of just complaining about Republicans. Fat chance of that happening.