"The Republican Lock" and "The Blue Wall"

This is another article about the direction of the Republican Party. Sorry this fascinates me because my focus as a History major was on the United States during the 20th century. As a result, my studies focused on conservative domination of the beginning and end of the century, while liberals dominated the middle. David Broder wrote in this article about Ron Brownstein's theory that the GOP ran into and continues to face a "Blue Wall." Both make a fair point that Democrats have had more safe electoral votes in recent elections primarily because of the shift in Republican ideology. But I don't believe Democrats were truly able to harness those differences until 2008.

Broder doesn't really touch on this, but I am interested to find out if the pendulum has actually begun to swing back to the left, thus putting conservative ideology on extended leave. Or if Obama's election (like Carter's and Clinton's) is simply a sign of lukewarm moderation and in 4 or 8 years we will revert back to the status quo that began in 1968 and reached its peak during the 1980s. Without laboring over the details, I tend to think liberalism has been revived and we are entering a period of government action and soft power.