A column published in Friday’s Macon Telegraph by Macon City Councilman Erick Erickson expressed the opinion that Georgia’s Republican “leadership” is forging its way into another extended camping trip in the minority wilderness perhaps never to return to the Promised Land for decades. History suggests that Mr. Erickson is right.

Prior to 2003, Georgia had no Republican governor since the 1870s and prior to 2005, the Georgia General Assembly was dominated by Democrats for the same period. In the U.S. Congress, Democrats held a majority in the House for 40 years before 1994. Republican party elites have a habit of squandering their opportunities to show leadership and to demonstrate conservative principles. As Davis and others have written, there are and have been big differences between “Republicans” and “conservatives.”

We and others have been writing for some time on the theme of systemic leadership failure from both major parties. Both major parties have failed the American citizenry at the state and national levels. Sheldon Richman, in his commentary entitled Blame the Republicans for Big Government, writes “The Republicans’ cynicism and lack of principle are as responsible for what’s going on as any Democrat’s — even more, because they have undermined sound economic reasoning by their hypocrisy.” Michael Tennant, in his commentary entitled Socialism, Republican Style, writes, “One could probably make a list ten times as long of all the socialist institutions supported by the very same Republicans who now pose as defenders of capitalism. They are correct that Obama’s plans are socialist in nature, but they fail to see – or conveniently forget – that they, too, are guilty of giving America a huge push down the slope of socialism.”

What happened to the “Contract With America?” Remember that from 1994? The Republicans could have done better with the "Contract" but they effectively checked Clinton in the late 1990s. They quickly squandered their opportunities to implement conservative ideas during the Bush years. The GOP Congress with Bush brought us “Compassionate Conservatism” which we now understand means to spend money like drunken sailors (with apologies to sailors since they spend THEIR OWN money rather than taxpayer’s) and to expand Big Government programs.

On the state level, which is where the majority of the domestic governing should happen (per the disregarded Constitution), we have a similar pattern of hypocrisy and leadership failure.

Gov. Sonny Perdue campaigned in 2002 promising to address Georgia’s education problems, to give Georgia citizens a fair vote on their state flag and to pass meaningful ethics reform. He promised to be more of a consensus peacemaker than King Rat Roy Barnes. The result?

Georgia still ranks in the cellar on education despite the best manipulation of the test numbers and the test participants. Perdue has managed to alienate teachers as badly as Barnes whether the state had a budget surplus or was tightening with budget cuts.

Before the election, there were only two state flags known to voters: The Barnes flag (2001), also known as “the ugliest flag in North America,” and the 1956 flag. After the election, Perdue sold out and withheld a vote for the popular 1956 flag, offering instead a previously unknown backroom deal flag. That bait and switch led to the widespread presence of SONNY LIED signs and bumper stickers. He betrayed the voters who put him over the top in 2002. Though denied by Perdue and his parrot posse, the widely held belief was that the flag issue defeated Barnes. The Kennedy "Profiles in Courage" award Roy Barnes accepted stands as testimony to his agreement with that widely held belief. Perdue's betrayal of those voters bore the fingerprints of Republican elite strategists like Karl Rove, Ralph Reed and a few Georgia Republicans.

Perdue and ethics.... just putting those two words in the same sentence evokes giggles and belly-laughs. So much for Perdue Promises.

We have been pointing out since 2005 that the Georgia Republicans wasted no time entrenching themselves in the seat of power with an aim to maintaining their power and the status quo. The agenda the people wanted was ignored while Georgia Republicans concerned themselves with posturing and fundraising for re-election and enriching themselves.

House Speaker “Honest Glenn” Richardson immediately changed House rules to enable him to dominate the legislative Committee process. For our parodies of Honest Glenn, we chose as his theme music the Rolling Stones' “Under My Thumb.” Richardson became known as the “New Sheriff In Town” and if you wanted anything done, you had to pony up to Honest Glenn’s favorite PAC (political action committee) first. The Panhandlers of Atlanta descended on the Capitol to wrestle their way to the taxpayer treasure trough. After a year of the GOP General Assembly, we pointed out in 2006 that Legislative Output was basically the same whether Donkeys or Elephants were in change. Either way, the taxpayers and voters ended up holding the bag.

As we noted in a previous commentary, the business climate in 2005 for real estate developers and other favored special interests changed significantly. Suddenly Georgia citizens were alarmed to learn that the General Assembly was favorably considering various Land Grab bills (eminent domain) and secrecy bills to circumvent Sunshine Laws. Shady Sonny’s Secrecy Forecast called for no sunshine.

Notorious hypocrite conman and lobbyist influence peddler Ralph Reed was at first a leading Republican contender for Lt. Governor in 2006. His campaign crashed and burned as his sleazy associations remained highly visible in the national news. Eventually, avoiding “Ruthless” Ralph Reed became the serious ethics reform at the Georgia capitol. Give Republican primary voters credit for rejecting this obvious crook.

We know that Gov. Sonny Perdue was really busy during his first term putting together personal land deals, engineering special retroactive tax cuts for himself and operating his personal businesses which he refused to turn over to a blind trust while he sat as governor ---as his predecessors did to avoid the appearance of conflicts. Perdue’s net worth almost doubled in the first three years he was in office.

During his re-election campaign, Perdue advertised the farce of his “SONNY DO” list. We suspect that arranging huge undersecured loans from local banks, punishing legislative opponents and haggling over budget cuts have kept him so busy that he’ll leave office with much of the SONNY DO list incomplete. I don't think anyone took it seriously anyway.

In the 2009 session, Senate Resolution 452 was proposed to have the Georgia Revenue commissioner report to the Georgia Senate any Senator who has tax delinquencies (fails to file or pay taxes). Here was a Republican opportunity to lead on ethics concerns. Obviously, you already know or can guess what they did. The Resolution was defeated. I recently wrote a commentary entitled Gold Dome Deadbeats & S.R. 452 with all the gory details. Corruption has become routine. At least 22 unnamed members of the Georgia General Assembly are delinquent in their tax filing or paying...yet the Republican powers that be won’t let the public know who they are. The Macon Telegraph reported that two of them are Sen. Robert Brown (D, Macon) and Rep. Willie Talton (R, Warner Robins).

Special interests continue to rule in 2009. The Residential Ratepayer Ripoff bill, also known as Senate Bill 31, passed the General Assembly and awaits the Governor’s signature. If it becomes law, this lottery will pay big for Southern Company stockholders, out of state electric customers and non-residential ratepayers.

The Big Losers are Georgia residential ratepayers. Obama’s proposed Cap & Trade bills and other energy proposals are likely to drive up electric bills significantly, as much as 40% or more. Economic hard times are upon us and Georgia’s General Assembly, controlled by Republicans, thinks that now is a good time to let Georgia Power grab more money from the people to fund future electric capacity, much of which will be sold out of state. The saddle feels rather tight to me...and I'm really dreading the quirt and the spurs.

The sad, pathetic truth is that we, the people, have been betrayed. Neither major party represents the people first; both have their preferred special interest constituencies they work to please first. The major difference is that with Democrats, a large part of their base believes in class warfare and wants the government to steal on their behalf. They believe in Government as Robinhood whose job it is to rob from "the rich" and give to the poor. Democrat elites just want to keep dependents down on the plantation where their votes can be harvested.

Democrat politicians are relatively honest lying thieves who hide their theft plans in euphemisms, tortured logic and emotional populism. Republican politicians, on the other hand, are lying hypocrite thieves who pretend opposition to theft, but who dive in and steal with best of their Democrat colleagues. Republicans politicians have to be better liars.

"Party knows no impulse but spirit, no prize but victory. It is blind to truth, and hardened against conviction. It seeks to justify error by perserverance, and denies to its own mind the operation of its own judgment. A man under the tyranny of party spirit is the greatest slave upon earth, for none but himself can deprive him of the freedom of thought." ---THOMAS PAINE, "To the Opposers of the Bank", 1787