Still, for now, conservative reaction to Trump’s transition ranges from cautious optimism to borderline giddiness. Heritage president Jim DeMint, a former senator, says he is more excited than at any time since his first election to Congress in 1998. “It is now the happy task of conservatives . . . to ensure those ideas lead the way,” he wrote in a recent post at Heritage’s site.
Certainly, such an opportunity comes across only rarely. Since World II, each major political party has typically had eight years in the White House, worn out its welcome, and then been replaced by the other party for eight years. The first exception to this pattern was Jimmy Carter, who served only one term. The only other exception came when Ronald Reagan handed over his power to George H. W. Bush for a single term in 1988, for a total of twelve years of Republican rule in the White House — then Bush destroyed his credibility by breaking his “no new taxes” pledge and lost his 1992 bid for reelection
That cycle of eight years in power followed by eight years in the wilderness has meant that each party gets the chance to sweep away the legacy of the other party and make radical changes of its own only once every 16 years. Conservatives last had this opportunity when George W. Bush was took office in 2001, and they acknowledge that the Bush team made many mistakes over the next eight years. The reason conservatives or so eager to make the Trump transition — and administration — work is that they haven’t see this kind of opportunity since the dawn of this century.
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