Whether Teddy Roosevelt wannabe No. 1 or No. 2 is elected, the American welfare state is unlikely to be dented. To repeat, the thing is "bigger than the entire budgets of almost every other country in the world."
To answer the opening question: The dice were loaded in Teddy's favor. The sitting Democratic president (Obama) and the Republican odds-on favorite for president (Gingrich) are in TR's corner – in everything from executive power and the projection of American power abroad to property rights stateside.
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