David Frum makes good points about the state of the Republican Party, and he makes them much more clearly than I have been able to do:

  http://www.newsweek.com/id/188279/page/1

 Now, I usually disagree with everything Frum says, and I think he's kind of a smarmy jackass.  His appearance on Rachel Maddow's show last October was a remarkable example of said smarm.  I remember watching it and wanting to reach through the TV to shake him like a British nanny (I am easily frustrated by people who say stupid things, which is why fiction writing is the perfect career for me...if one of my characters says something stupid I can immediately drop a piano on his head.)  

 But in this case Frum makes smart points about the Republican Party and its current adherence to the old small-government dogma that swept Ronald Reagan into office.  He argues that the party needs to adapt to the twenty-first century and they need to do it fast, before they become irrelevant to today's under-30 voters.  Now I'm perfectly happy with the Republicans being out of power, but I'm always willing to listen to reasonable ideas.  So if the GOP adapts and comes up with a few, hey, maybe I'll even vote for them some day.  

 But I do think our political system needs a relevant opposition party as a check on the Dems.  And the GOP is quickly making itself irrelevant to the times.