Former folksy musician Roger Miller whose populist views have had broad appeal to mainstream America for several decades had one hit song with the lyrics,

England swings like a pendulum do,
Bobbies on bicycles two by two...

Watching the current trends in American politics, I'm of the belief that America swings like a pendulum do and that for the near term it is swinging in a direction favorable to my beliefs and those of my fellow conservatives.

However, (isn't there always a big however?) I am becoming concerned with the apparent euphoria with which far too many conservatives seem to be viewing the coming mid-term elections. Too many of them seem to be thinking that Republicans and conservatives are being handed a carte-blanche mandate to take this country off on a hard-right course, 180 degrees from Obama's socialist vision. My belief is that those who think this way are just as short-sighted as former Republican speaker-of-the-house, Tom DeLay, who thought he had an endless mandate to shove hard-right Republican policies down the throats of his Democrat colleagues and their faithful constituents. I said at the time that the man was an improvident fool and events have proven me right.

Now, at a time where I am again concerned that too many of us on the right may misinterpret the current societal heaves and groans, comes a spokesman far more capable than I, and most certainly a voice of conservatism with a far larger soapbox, to counsel caution.

Michael Medved, in a column published in U.S.A. Today says this:

Yes, the Democrats miscalculated by underestimating the deeply conservative nature of the American people, but the Republicans may yet miscalculate themselves by interpreting that conservatism as ideological rather than temperamental.

The public wants pragmatic, commonsense, problem-solving leadership more than purist dogmatism of the right or the left. Voters don't yearn for stirring 10-point programs, or radical readjustments of governmental institutions, or definitive demonization and defeat of opponents.

We're conservative in a deeper sense -liking the lives we've built for ourselves and wanting to conserve them from unwelcome interference by overreaching change agents or ideologues. The party that connects with these wholesome, optimistic, emphatically practical instincts most effectively (and respectfully) will not only make big gains in November, but also may soon begin to build the durable governing majority that has been missing in our politics for nearly 30 years.

The public wants pragmatic, commonsense, problem-solving leadership more than purist dogmatism of the right or the left.