the extent to which the minority party had been very nearly completely marginalized was unprecedented.
I would agree with the assessment that (IIRC) no single party has ever enjoyed such unilateral power within the nation as the reps just enjoyed.
I'm not so comfortable speaking about a minority party being so demonized, but let me accept that for sake of argument.
That doesn't change my point. Once shut out of real power, it really doesn't matter how much more one is shut out. And regardless of the degree, including demonization, how does that argue for having fallen to pieces like they did?
The founding fathers were arguably shut out of power and villified. They banded together in cause. I'm not suggesting that the dems should have started a revolution, but they could have stuck together and made their presence known in a solid opposition.
Instead you had constant backstabbing and doublethinking trying to figure out who was to blame for failure, and public deliberations of how to move back into power by embracing rep stances... or not rocking their boat.
The neocons succeeded in placing themselves in power and undercutting dems to begin with. The dems had a hand in keeping themselves right where they landed.
holmes
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)