Obama: GOP "Fever Will Break" During His Second Term

Link

You've just gotta love this guy. While obliquely acknowledging that the GOP has gone insane, he appeals to their historical inclination to be more reasonable, and holds out hope for a return to that tradition.

Sadly, I really don't think we can expect rationality and principle alone to drag American conservatives back to sanity. Although those are real forces, they are not most efficient when slugging it out toe-to-toe with self-interest. It is up to the rest of us to administer a figurative slap to the face of conservatives, to help self-interest work in the service of reason, and to lower the probability that their irrationality will be politically effective. If the GOP were consistently winning, the realities of governance might very well force them to be more reasonable. And if they were consistently losing, that would bring them back to something resembling their senses post-haste. But now, when they are threatened with something like permanent minority status, and in full campaign mode all of the time, rage, fear mongering, demonization of their opponents, lying and obstructionism are alluring.

If the GOP were winning all the time, I think we could expect better behavior from them--but we can't count on it, and there is no chance of them winning all of the time. If, however, they start to lose pretty frequently, I expect this to be pretty effective in bringing them back to their senses. Whether one more loss will do the trick...well, of that I'm less certain.

But, anyway: we know what we need to do.

Though there was little doubt that the President knew what was what here, it's good to hear him say it explicitly.