Oh horrors! Al Franken gives the Democrats control of the Senate, and at least one Republican, Frank Feehery, knows just what that means, that the Democrats will force us all to count using base ten. Woe is us. Hide the women and children, bring the dog in for the night, and careful that Aunt Lily is taking her medicine. Yawn! From Feehery’s commentary at CNN:

The metric system is the kind of thing that you can expect from the 60-vote filibuster-proof majority Democrats now have in the United States Senate.

After the Watergate scandal in 1974, Democrats trounced Republicans in the mid-term elections, getting 61 seats in the Senate and 291 in the House.

In the Senate, they adjusted the rules to make it harder for Republicans to filibuster (reducing the magic number from 67 to 60 to invoke cloture, which ends debate). In the House, they passed all kinds of reforms to take power away from senior members and give it to junior members. And Congress mandated that the American people embrace the metric system.

The only thing worse would be gay men fencing with meter length measuring sticks on Broadway while singing about grams and liters. But I do understand the Republican fear of the metric system. It would bring them into the 18th century, and that was certainly a scary place to be. Why, there was a revolution back then, with real live tea parties that didn’t involve Republicans sucking on balls! The fine, fine thing about Feehery’s column is that he agrees that the Republicans suck, and that they are ultimately responsible for the Democrats getting 60 Senate seats:

This is a good time for such self-reflection. Republicans lost three top-notch senators in the last election — Norm Coleman, Gordon Smith and John Sununu — who lost not because they were bad senators, or because they had scandals, or because they had lost touch with constituents. All three lost because they were Republicans.

In other words, the brand killed them. And if you look at the latest polls, the GOP brand hasn’t gotten any better in the last six months. In fact, according to Gallup, even 38 percent of Republicans have a negative view of the Republican Party.

OK, Feehery is a bit loony to think Coleman was a top-notch Senator. But he is right that the Republican brand is suffering, and further that there seems no recovery in sight. Not with “just say no” ruling the Republicans on the national level and scandals plaguing them out beyond the bletway. Feehery cites 38% of Republicans who are dissatisfied with their own party. That just isn’t a small number.

Meanwhile, Happy Independence Day to Al Franken and to all of us who are tired of Republicans and their fears. This weekend my family will be down the shore. Young Jack will take part in a small ceremony of conversion to the Jewish faith. Alas, we will not be using a traditional mikvah for his immersion, but the Atlantic ocean. Well, as you can see, the boy likes the beach enough, so he should like the ocean as well. We’ll see.

Hmm, we could start a War on Independence Day, couldn’t we? I mean, it is the wrong time of year for a War on Christmas, but the Republicans always want a war on something. Maybe just a Duel on Independence Day would do, sparklers at ten paces and all that. Hmm, I’ll have to check into it.