Matt Ygelsias has a generally sensible and wise post about the need for Democrats to come to grips with the reality of the war on terror. But he also writes this:

“When the Cold War ended, the Republican coalition collapsed rather spectacularly, and Bill Clinton was swept into office with a historically low share of the popular vote. With national security back on the agenda, even the collapse of Ralph Nader’s support wasn’t enough to give the Democrats a majority.”

How did the Republican coalition collapse spectacularly? Bush I lost in a squeaker largely because Ross Perot was in the race as a fiscal conservative. Bill Clinton ran as a moderate, pro-death penalty, anti-welfare candidate in 1992 who often ran to the right of Bush on foreign policy (remember “butchers of Beijing” and all that?). Of course, he was more than a little dishonest in his campaign because when he got in office he tried to govern from the left — gays in the military, Hillarycare etc. When he did this, that “collapsed” Republican coalition retook the House and the Senate. Bill Clinton then tacked to the right on domestic policy signing on to a Republican Budget and a Republican Welfare reform bill. Clinton ran in 1996 against a decent man but a terrible candidate. Nevertheless Clinton championed small-bore issues which were largely culturally conservative and certainly small-c conservative (school uniforms, the V-chip, seat belts on busses). In his second term he did almost nothing of historical note except diddle an intern and lie under oath about it and go to war without UN approval (something anti-Iraq war liberals saluted at the time). In 1998, Congressional Republicans had a setback because of impeachment, but they didn’t lose the House. Meanwhile, 2000, 2002 and 2004 were all very good years for the GOP.Of course, ‘02 and ‘04 were post 9/11 but throughout the 1990s the GOP increased its control of state legislatures, state houses and the Congress. So again, I ask, what exactly was this spectacular collapse Yglesias is talking about?