Republicans DeLayed (The GOP leadership deficit is one of ideas, not ethics.)

From OpinionJournal.com:

The Tom DeLay indictment has Democrats believing they can play the ethics card to retake Congress. But with the 2006 elections still 13 months away, the more immediate and important question is whether Republicans can use their leadership turmoil as an opportunity to remember why they were elected...

The path back to public approval, and re-election next year, is to return to their principles. Respond to the economic damage of Katrina by making energy exploration and production less burdensome. Help sustain the current expansion by making the Bush tax cuts permanent, repealing the death tax as they've promised for years and taking a stab at larger tax reform. If Social Security is too daunting, then turn to health care, by passing free-market reforms that lower the cost of insurance so employers can give larger wage increases instead of paying ever more for health care. And restore Medicaid to the program for the poor that it was designed to be instead of a middle-class subsidy for long-term care.

We could go on. It's not as if the agenda that Republicans ran on in 2004, or for that matter 1994, has been fulfilled. The question is whether Republicans still believe in that agenda, or whether their main ambition now is simply to stay in power. If a year from now voters continue to believe the answer is the latter, no amount of money or muscle will save Republicans at the polls.