Plate tectonics

Tim Higgins at Ohio's Just Blowing Smoke has an interesting theory on the development and death of political parties. He compares them to the plate tectonics in the earth's crust -- that is, they rub together and form mountains (political parties) which erode over time. He notes that the Democratic-Republican Party was founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in 1792 to enforce a stricter interpretation of the Constitution; then the Republican Party in 1856 which came to espouse a stricter interpretation of the Constitution; and now that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans do so, he sees a new mountain range rising (the Libertarian Party). I hope he's right, because we need a strong third party with a Consitutionalist bent, but we don't have millions of years to wait...