Conservative strength in Congress hits rock bottom.

Prior to the vote on the "stimulus" bill, Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) called the legislation "probably the worst bill that has ever been introduced in the U.S. Congress."

Not only was the "stimulus" bill filled with wasteful spending which the nation cannot afford, it will silence the non-profit sector of the economy.  In addition, the new law sets up the machinery to ration health care, especially for seniors.

An online poll at ConservativeHQ.com at http://conservativehq.com/active-polls/ found that 82% agreed the stimulus bill was the worst bill ever.  An additional 12% thought it was among the worst one percent of bills ever introduced.  Two percent thought it was a bad bill in a run-of-the-mill kind of way.

Despite this near-unanimous objection of conservatives to the stimulus bill, it easily passed the House 246-183 and the Senate 60-38.

No Republicans in the House voted for the stimulus bill. 

In the Senate, with 60 votes needed for procedural reasons, liberal Republicans Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania provided the margin of victory. 

Thus, it appears that conservatives are powerless to stop liberal legislation in Congress.  This may represent the weakest conservatives have ever been.

Following the disastrous 1964 elections, Democrats controlled both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate by more than two-to-one margins.  Today the Democrats again outnumber the Republicans 295 to 140 in the House and 67 to 33 in the Senate.

But in the 80s there were hefty numbers of conservative and moderate Democrats who frequently voted with the Republicans.  In the Senate, a coalition of conservative Republicans and Democrats could muster enough strength to sustain a filibuster against liberal legislation. 

Today there are no conservative or moderate Democrats in the Senate and only about a half dozen in the House.

Some observers thought that Senator Jim Webb of Virginia, a Vietnam veteran who was Secretary of the Navy in the Reagan Administration, would be a moderate to conservative Democrat.  But Webb has proven to be a rock-solid liberal with only a 16% rating from the American Conservative Union.

During the 2009-10 session, conservatives in Congress appear headed for defeat after defeat.

Since conservatives are unable to prevent the passage of any liberal legislation in either the House or Senate, their only hope is to "run out the clock." 

Conservatives in both the House and Senate should try to take up as much time as possible on everything-including routine, procedural, and non-controversial matters.  Every hour of any day that is spent on one piece of legislation is an hour that cannot be used for a different bill.

At the grassroots level, conservatives must fight back in hopes of gaining strength in future elections.  Letters to the editor of newspapers and websites and calls to radio talk shows should inform the public whenever Congress passes terrible legislation.