About a week ago, after several exhausting days, I wrote a piece entitled “Four More Years: AKA Take That You Sons of Bitches.” It was written in a state of rage. It was also, in my personal opinion, the least well-written and least-coherent major piece that I’ve written in quote some time. Naturally, then, it also quickly became the most read. In a week, it’s received about 50,000 views and climbing. It seems certain to me that more people have read it than would have if I’d managed to have it published in any average big-city newspaper.

Combining these two features (my feelings about the inadequacies of the essay and its higher readership) I decided to take it upon myself to give the same themes a second glance. In particular, it was inspired by the few individuals who, after reading the article, sent me rational e-mails which made coherent points, as opposed to tens of thousands of words worth of foul and often hypocritical abuse.

To begin, let me restate what I should have explicitly stated last week. I do not consider the present, undeniably poisoned, political environment to be a positive thing. Far from it: I consider it an utter catastrophe which has spread desolation across the land.

That being said: I don’t feel that we of the right began this. The true origins of the modern cult of Presidential destruction lie mostly in the Nixon years, when the left destroyed Richard Nixon for doing far less than the two previous (Democratic) Presidents had done. It resurfaced again in the Reagan years, when the Democrats turned one of the biggest nothing scandals in memory into a near-impeachment. The Republicans tried to replay the Democratic assault during the Clinton years, but their nerve failed at the last minute.

History is, of course, written by the victors and, as a result of that unfortunate state of affairs, we have forgotten key points about this history. First: because the Democrats wrote the history of the downfall of Richard M. Nixon, the man has been transformed into a monster whose offenses seemingly threatened democracy itself. Second: Bill Clinton has been turned into the innocent victim of a well-organized campaign to destroy him which ended only because of popular opposition. Neither of these popular images is quite true.

Richard Nixon’s actual offenses were minor. A break-in of which he had no knowledge and a half-hearted cover-up. A Democratic President, I am certain, would have fallen. Nixon fell only because of the consistent fact that a certain faction of the Republican Party, having campaigned upon their own moral righteousness, insists on actually applying those principles at politically inconvenient times. The result of this is that Republicans are more anxious to turn on their own in times of trouble, in all probability as part of a misguided effort to confirm the personal virtue of the individual.

Bill Clinton’s offenses, however, were much worse than is otherwise recalled and, had the campaign against him not been badly botched by senior Republicans, it seems certain to me, in retrospect, that he would have been removed from office. Three things of significance are now generally forgotten. First: the Republican leadership foolishly limited the inquiry to simply the Lewinsky scandal, instead of opting for a broader assault on Clinton’s record and thus allowing the Democrats to spin that the entire thing was “just about sex”. Second: the Republicans moved much too slowly, allowing the 1998 Congressional elections to intervene. Third: the Republicans hesitated and failed to publicly disclose evidence against Clinton (regarding the alleged rape of Juanita Broderick) which was damning enough to privately convince many wavering House Republicans to vote for the impeachment. Had the Republicans been a bit more clever, or the Democrats a little less sure-footed, Clinton would have been removed from office or forced to resign.

This lengthy digression has a point. The cult of Presidential destruction reached its epitome in this last campaign. Every resource at the disposal of the left was thrown into the effort to destroy this President. Every dirty trick possible was attempted. The Democrats even, on multiple occasions, resorted to real physical violence and vandalism in their effort to destroy this President.

For some reason, in my e-mail exchanges, I remembered a scene from the brilliant play/film A Man for All Seasons:

Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!

More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
Roper: Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!

More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?

This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down (and you're just the man to do it!), do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?

Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!

Traditional standards of decorum that existed in Presidential campaigns were there for a reason. Not so much for the sake of the other side: who is traditionally regarded, in almost any intense campaign, as a reasonable substitute for the Devil: but for the sake of your own side.

Democrats spent three decades cutting down every one of those rules through their relentless assaults on every Republican President. When, in 1998-99, the Republicans’ turn came, just enough of the traditional restraint remained to keep them from truly going in for the kill.

Having cut down all the laws, they cannot call upon their protection.

Better yet, because the Republicans control Congress, President Bush is likely to escape the trouble which dogged previous second-term Presidents. Since Nixon, every President to see a second term has faced a serious assault during their second term. Nixon and Watergate, Reagan and Iran-Contra, Clinton and Monica.

As a result, we have the chance for an unprecedented assault on the Democratic Party. We can defeat them now and here, now and forever, because we are now free to abandon traditional restraint.