Mark Steyn, writing in COMMENTARY last November, pulled out a great quote:

In 1975, Milton Friedman said this: “I do not believe that the solution to our problem is simply to elect the right people. The important thing is to establish a political climate of opinion which will make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing. Unless it is politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing, the right people will not do the right thing either, or if they try, they will shortly be out of office.”

Perhaps that climate is upon us. Who, in political terms, is more “wrong” than the progressive whistlers inhabiting the fiscal graveyard known as California? Yet, on Tuesday, Chuck Reed, the Democratic mayor of liberal San Jose won nearly 70 percent support for a ballet initiative that will deal huge cuts to the bloated pensions of city workers. Currently, retirement costs eat up more than 20 percent of San Jose’s general fund. None other than a Democratic mayor, backed by a clear majority, intends to slam on the brakes. Tea Party not needed.

On national security, we see similarly encouraging signs. Democratic Senators Dianne Feinstein and John Kerry were among others who called for an investigation into recent Obama administration leaks about American cyberwarfare action against Iran. “Whoever is doing that is not acting in the interest of the United States of America,” said Kerry, using the kind of black-and-white tough talk he used to accuse the Bush administration of using to divisive effect.

And of course a slew of Democrats, from Feinstein to Deval Patrick to Bill Clinton, called foul on Barack Obama’s anti-private-equity reelection strategy.

The beautiful thing about living in a democracy with protected speech is that politicians aren’t solely in charge of framing the terms of debate—citizens set the political climate. In what has already passed of the Obama years, the temperature has been raised enough to make liberals sweat. Today a trickle. Tomorrow who knows? As Friedman saw it, that’s ultimately a greater conservative victory than what may transpire in November.