Life on the fringe

(Hat tip: Betsy Newmark) Jeff Jacoby has some observations about fringe elements in both parties.

IF NOTHING else, Texas Congressman Ron Paul's presidential candidacy makes it clear that the Republican Party is not a monolith. It has its ideological outliers, and they march to the beat of a very different drummer than George Bush and most GOP candidates do. .... Paul helps illustrate what may be the most significant difference between the two major parties today: Republicans who don't take the threat of radical Islam seriously are marginalized. Democrats who don't do so constitute their party's mainstream. .... What explains the Democrats' unwillingness to acknowledge the gravity of the global jihad? In part, it may stem from the sense that Islamists and the left share common foes.... ...But to a large extent, the Democrats' lack of seriousness about the war we are in can only be explained by Bush Derangement Syndrome. ....

What if not derangement can explain such fever-swamp nuttiness as the findings of a new Rasmussen poll, which asked whether Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance? Among Democrats, 35 percent believe he did know and another 26 percent weren't sure. Only 39 percent said he didn't. In other words, nearly two out of three Democrats are unwilling to say that Bush wasn't tipped off to 9/11 in advance.

In another poll recently, respondents were asked whether they personally wanted Bush's new security strategy in Iraq to succeed -- not whether they expected it to, but whether they wanted it to. Among Democrats, a stunning 49 percent either hoped that the US plan would fail or couldn't make up their minds.

After this article, Betsy asks:

What if a Democrat gets elected in 2008 and on January 20, after being sworn in, is given the daily press briefings that show how many attempts are being made all the time around the world to kill Americans or our allies? Then will these Democrats start believing that we're in a global fight. And, if they do, what will they plan to do differently to protect Americans from jihadis emboldened by their propaganda successes in Iraq? And how will the new administration protect a fragile democracy like Iraq from descending into a Sudan-like state of genocide and alliances with the very terrorists who are working to destroy all hope of a peaceful Middle East?

And if they wind up doing anywhere near the same kind of things Bush is doing, will the nutcase base revolt?