Apr 20

　　Sniff the air in Washington, DC, this spring and you notice the smell of decay. The Republicans have been America's dominant party, winning seven of the past ten presidential elections and controlling both houses of Congress since 1994 (except for a brief interlude in 2001-02 when one of their senators defected). Wherever you look—from welfare reform to foreign policy—the conservative half of America has made all the running.

　　Yet this machine is stalling. The White House is doing its best to engage in some emergency repairs. The past few weeks have seen the appointment of a powerful new chief of staff, Josh Bolten, and a new director of the Office of Management and Budget, Rob Portman. Karl Rove, George Bush's chief political adviser, is also giving up his policymaking role to concentrate on preparing for this November's elections. But the party's problems go too deep for personnel changes to solve.

　　Mr Bush is the most unpopular Republican president since Richard Nixon: a recent Washington Post-ABC poll showed that 47% of voters “strongly” disapprove of his performance. Tom DeLay, the former House majority leader, is retiring in disgrace. More Republicans may well be implicated in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal in the coming months.

　　The ideological shine has gone, too. The party of streamlined government has been gorging on legislative pork. A party that once prided itself on businesslike pragmatism has become synonymous with ideologically skewed ineptitude of the sort epitomized by Donald Rumsfeld. “What is the difference between the Titanic and the Republican Party” goes one joke in conservative circles. “At least the Titanic wasn't trying to hit the iceberg.”

　　This presents an opportunity for America's other big party. The Democrats hope to win this year's congressional elections in November and, on the back of those, to capture the White House in 2008. They need a net gain of 15 seats to take over the House and six seats to take over the Senate.