It is July and the pollsters are all saying the public is close to evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans.
I think that if you look at a lot of domestic issues which this country has faced since the 1960s the Democrats have served America better. We have sought to live up to the Constitutional demands of Equality by supporting the Civil Rights laws ensuring civil, economic and political opportunity for everyone. Getting a bank loan, being able to vote, getting married to someone society disapproves, freedom to ride in any seat on a bus -- these are all things Democrats have championed and continued to fight to accomplish. Republicans have fought to prevent many people from voting or from getting married to the person they love and they regularly dismiss our president for his skin color. Decades ago Republicans crowed they were the superior party for making the economy go. But, the economy ran fine with Jimmy Carter until OPEC used oil prices to hurt us all. The economy ran great with Bill Clinton and even an attempted Impeachment didn't stop the bull market which helped balance the budget and start reducing federal debt for the first time in forever. More recently it has been a bigger challenge: the Bush economy was run into the ground *twice* (how many presidents have caused TWO recessions during their time in office. Bush the Democrats, led by Pres. Obama, ended that recession (technically) in six months and had all the fundamentals going in the right direction within 5 years. That's not bad considering the scope of the crisis we all faced. Yes, the federal debt grew terrifically, but that was the price of Republican economic policies and not something Democrats planned or wanted. Today the economy is still moving in the right direction with over 50 months of job growth and a declining unemployment rate and with a GDP higher than ever. The Republicans in office today are still calling for deregulation and a return to the Bush-era economic disaster. During the last presidential race their candidate argued for more war and military spending to boost the economy. That's an immoral approach to growing the economy and just a bad idea. But, there are still Republicans in office who believe that's good policy.
On social issues we can have a free society or we can let Republicans shut off the rights of women to have privacy (with their doctor) to decide reproductive issues. Republicans have argued against birth control and many other things which most of us presume are private. Where is the "small government" belief Republicans claim they support? Their policies are incredibly intrusive and destructive.
On foreign policy they continually call for involvement in wars and yet claim if Pres. Obama does get us involved they would Impeach him. I don't know how to respond to that except to say it's crazy. Of course, they've also been considering Impeachment for other things (which they haven't yet specified). Their claim he is acting like a king is easily refuted by his acquiescence to their demand he not act militarily in Syria and his continual request they act on pressing issues to ensure better policy goes into effect than any Executive Order (which is dependent on extant law) could manage.
It seems every time they have the power of office they ignore pressing national issues in favor of playing political games. A small example is their current claim the president is executing a "war on coal" when the coal industry is in fact producing more coal than ever (most of which is sold overseas). The simple facts are contrary to their claims. But, it excites their base to hear those claims, so they continue.
Aside from their addiction to playing politics (instead of doing their legislative jobs) they show a lot of signs of simple incompetence. Recently a freshman member of the House addressed two administration officials as though they were from India. It was incredibly embarrassing. When we see some of them are still considering supporting New Jersey's governor Chris Christie in a presidential run it's embarrassing since he has so obviously misused his office and is being investigated by three groups which can charge him with crimes. This sad state of affairs also existed with the governor of Wisconsin, Walker. He was indicted. How many times has Speaker of the House John Boehner agreed to a deal with the administration, only to have members of his Republican caucus disagree and kill the deal. He doesn't even have the power to negotiate a deal. Who runs the Republican caucus? The Speaker is supposed to work for the entire House of Representatives, yet the Republican Speaker will only bring a bill to the floor if it has support from the majority of the Republicans. Why? Because they will (essentially) fire him if he tries to do his job by standing for ALL the House.
The Republicans criticize the president, but most of the time the Republicans are like clowns in a circus, running about in 50 directions and making embarrassing sounds with horns. For some observers they're just scary.
When will they do something about immigration, tax reform, infrastructure spending, regular road repairs, raising the minimum wage, ending corporate personhood, voting on nominees to fill ambassadorships, closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay, etc. ? Democrats are ready to act, but Republicans are too busy arguing with themselves.
