The issue of cynically wanting the economy to fail just so that the GoP can win an election falls on the party strategists and leaders, not the rank-and-file.

In the Clinton impeachment votes, both parties voted along party lines. The Republicans supported Bush until it became evident that Bush was massively umpopular with the electorate at large – then they distanced themselves.

For a Democratic Party equivalent, the only example I can think of at the national level in recent times is Jimmy Carter. A one-term President, did Democrats turn on him even surreptitiously (failing to campaign for him as enthusiastically as possible), which may have contributed to Reagan’s landslide? They probably wouldn’t have stopped Carter from losing; they might have stopped him from losing so badly. Certainly Carter faced opposition from Ted Kennedy’s supporters within the party.

I had plenty of discussions before TARP complaining that spending didn’t work for Hoover or for FDR or for the Japanese, yet we are trying it again. Now you can argue I am wrong, but you can’t claim that I and all the other conservatives out there who were concerned with spending simply didn’t exist. Then with the Stimulus we doubled down. This was all in addition to the huge amount of spending that went on for all 8 years on wars and everything else.

I know my anecdotes are not data, but I am tired of hearing that no one cared about spending under Bush, while many of us certainly did. Of course both parties ignored us and continue to. I doubt I am part of some bizarre small minority, but who knows maybe I am.

Party political thinking has to be one of the lowest kinds there is.

Since the Gingrich era, the GOP’s modus operandi has been to use words as weapons–they just don’t believe they have meaning (and, as you yourself have documented, often twist those meanings).

Klein is naively overthinking the problem.

For the first, I think that the withdrawal dates for Iraq, the closing down of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, and the elimination of the No Child Left Behind (No Child Gets Ahead) provisions are all significant platform reversals for the Democratic party, however each has individual reasons for the reversal, just as the Republican reversal on stimulus has much to do with learning from mistakes as well as seeing key individuals replaced.

What it really comes down to is that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats really actually have ideals or morals anymore. They are more like parliamentary coalitions than parties, horsetrading for gains in votes until they hold positions that are mutually exclusive of each other (We support free trade, but get rid of those damn migrant workers!) (We support welfare to help the poor, but need to slow the economy so we don’t damage the environment!). For that reason, and because the vast majority of voters don’t really care what they are voting for, we get the policy flip flops above.

Remember, both the Democrats and Republicans support almost all of the same policies, they just disagree on the details. No republican candidate legitimately wants to eliminate welfare (except Ron Paul). No democratic candidate legitimately wants to take away private property. Afterall, “we’re all Keynesians now” was said by a Republican president, who just happened to be wrong and one of the worst presidents of the last century. The parties are arguing in the margins, which generally makes for much more heated and visceral arguments.

We are essentially a single party system (the Big Government party) with two flavors.

They believe that government can actually exact positive change and will vote for something they find partially distasteful. Figuring they can always go back and change it legislatively down the road.

I don’t think conservatives are the same way. They will vote against legislation sometimes just because of one aspect they dislike.

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Also, in our two-party system, you can logically make the case that you should never support another party’s idea or bill. If it is a success, you will get none of the credit .. if it is a failure, you will be attacked by candidates in your own party as being soft or not a ‘true’ party member. With primary elections having such a small amount of voters participating, it’s quite easy to make those charges stick. Which is why the Tea Party has been so successful.