The Republicans' health-care disaster will invoke a populist revolt that will destroy them

This isn't going to end well ... for anybody

The populist revolt.
(Image credit: fixer00 / Alamy Stock Photo)

With their astonishing vote to pass the American Health Care Act, Republican members of the House of Representatives have brought the GOP, and perhaps the United States itself, one step closer to vindicating Karl Marx.

It was Marx who suggested that history moves dialectically, especially at moments of dramatic change. At such times, tensions within institutions and ideologies rise, eventually building to an outright contradiction that becomes heightened or intensified. Eventually the contradiction snaps, tearing the institution or ideology apart and contributing to the formation of a new one that does a better job of resolving the original tension.

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Damon Linker

Damon Linker is a senior correspondent at TheWeek.com. He is also a former contributing editor at The New Republic and the author of The Theocons and The Religious Test.