Roger Kimball has come up with a new contract with America for the 2010 election. I disagree with his contract in some of its particulars, like requiring a balanced budget by constitutional amendment (that would be a very dangerous straitjacket in the event of a major national emergency) and imposing term limits (I’d prefer the abolition of gerrymandering and other incumbent-protection rackets). And I’d certainly like wages and benefits frozen not only for Congress but also for the entire federal bureaucracy, which is far better paid than its private-sector counterparts.

But I wholeheartedly agree with Kimball’s concept. There is a strong tide running through American politics right now, made only stronger yesterday with the president’s submission of a $3.8 trillion budget that has a $1.56 trillion deficit.  Even the New York Times is uneasy with it, likening the budget to the “picture of a nation that like many American homeowners simply cannot get above water.” USAToday has similar editorial discomfort.

The Republicans have hardly been paragons of fiscal rectitude in recent years. But they are in a far better position to make a credible contract than the Democrats. The Democrats have to at least give lip service to a budget seemingly inspired by St. Augustine’s famous prayer: “O Lord, make me good. But not yet.” And the Democrats, heavily funded by public-sector unions, are ineluctably the party of big government.

That tide has already carried Scott Brown into office in Massachusetts and (as Jennifer has noted) put Mario Rubio far ahead of Charlie Crist in Florida. The tide is rallying large numbers of ordinary people to tea-party events around the country. If the Republicans have the political sense to take it at the flood, it will, as Shakespeare explained (Julius Caesar IV/iii/218) lead on to fortune. If not, “all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries” (translation: being the minority party).