North Star Writers Group

So begins Charles Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities," and one could argue the same for a new era of Democratic dominance and conservative retreat. Make no mistake – for all the centrist and moderate rhetoric Democrats employed to win last fall, they will stop at nothing to push the bar as far to the liberal left as they possibly can. There isn't a single item on their so-called "First 100 Hours" action list (spread out so no one would actually have to work at an inconvenient time) that isn't about expanding government and wrecking the private sector as much as possible, for the purposes of making as many of us as dependent on them as possible. (And as an ironic side effect, causing or making worse the very things they claim to want to alleviate.)

• "Pay-Go": More accurately known as spend like mad, then insist that taxes just have to be raised to cover it all. This is purely a sham to make profligate spenders look disciplined when they are anything but. Meanwhile, unless the Bush tax cuts are made permanent and entitlements reformed before the Baby Boomers retire en masse, we will have trillions of dollars in automatic tax and spending increases just by Democrats doing nothing and running out the clock.

• Raising the Minimum Wage: More accurately known as a sop to the unions as payback for the electoral work they did for Democrats. Forcing employers to pay more for low-skill labor than it is worth only ensures this labor never gets employed in the first place, thus harming most the very people Democrats are purportedly trying to help. And if the idea is that people should just get paid more because Democrats think they should, then why not raise it to $100 an hour so we can all instantly be millionaires? (Not to mention changing their party name to the Communist Party, to honor the silly Manifesto from which this moronic notion sprang.)

• Repeal Oil Subsidies/Invest in Renewable Fuels: More accurately known as transferring subsidies from the environmentally incorrect but profitable and useful to the environmentally correct, unprofitable and wasteful. And in the process, deepen our dependence on foreign oil ever further while disingenuously and hypocritically denouncing the very same. If Democrats gave a damn about energy independence and not green environmental extremism, they'd let us drill for and refine all the domestic oil we have and stop wasting tax dollars on boondoggles like ethanol subsidies (which would grow as an industry on its own if it were sufficiently profitable, but wouldn't get presidential primary votes from Iowa corn farmers). The fact is Democrats despise both energy and independence, especially as reflected in an SUV with a full gas tank that you can drive anywhere anytime.

• Cutting Interest Rates on Student Loans: More accurately known as subsidizing the very waste that causes tuition to be so high in the first place. If you want to lower tuition, stop enabling colleges and universities to overcharge for a lousy product by shoveling endless buckets of money at their customers. Force them to cut the waste, lower their prices and improve the service they provide. In other words, what any business would have to do. Rewarding them only guarantees more of the same.

• Requiring Medicare to Negotiate Lower Drug Prices: More accurately known as the stake through the heart of the pharmaceutical industry. And then more people dying unnecessarily because the drugs that would have saved them were never researched, developed or brought to market because the Democrats outlawed profit from it. This is a blatant attempt to exterminate an entire industry outright, and I'm not sure whether to be grateful or terrified that Democrats have been so transparent with their thuggish intents.

If Democrats are this determined to forcibly impose unconstitutional socialism, there can only be two possible responses – fight back or get steamrolled. So what should the conservative response be? Precisely what we should least expect from the Republican Party in its current state of castration. It appears the GOP will be more than happy to get steamrolled. For whatever reason, they are no longer the main vehicle for promoting and implementing conservatism in America. The leadership has sold out, convinced that re-election on conservative principle is impossible.

And they may not be entirely wrong in that belief, but it's no reason to give up and say, "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em." Since when did putting one's tail between one's legs ever rally people around a cause?

In truth, there is no one more free than one with nothing left to lose. If defeat is inevitable, then at least go down fighting and swinging and make that defeat as difficult and as costly for your opponent as possible. You just might find that it wasn't as inevitable as you initially thought. If nothing else, you can at least look at yourself in the mirror and respect who you see there after all is said and done.

These are dark times for conservatives, but they should also be bright times. We could not feel more free to be more obstinately, proudly, stubbornly conservative than we feel right now. After all, we're going to get called every name in the book by liberals no matter what. Why not earn those sobriquets and calumnies and wear them with pride? Is the cause not worth even that small sacrifice?

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