Actually, it won’t be 1972
Noah Millman says George Packer has it wrong, that the GOP is not, in fact, going to have a McGovern moment anytime soon. I think these are good observations:
The Presidency of George W. Bush hasn’t been mentioned much on the campaign trail this season, but that doesn’t mean his policies have been repudiated by the various contenders for the nomination – particularly not with respect to foreign policy and the ongoing “War on Terror” – with the exception of Ron Paul. The same can’t entirely be said for domestic policy – there has been some sniping at TARP, some criticism of the level of spending, but nothing resembling a sustained critique – except from Paul. If anybody fits the McGovern mold this time around, it’s Paul, not Gingrich.
This is an underappreciated point. Can you find a single significant point on which Romney, Gingrich, or Santorum differ substantially from George W. Bush? It’s amazing. If Bush were considered a successful president, they would be bringing him up all the time. That they do not, even as they have an incumbent Democrat they deride as a failure, tells you that they know Bush and his legacy are poison. And yet, they may not believe in Bush, but they sure believe in what he stood for. And so does the GOP base, evidently.
Noah again:
Regardless of who the GOP lost with this year, I wouldn’t expect a profound soul searching. The Democrats had to lose a run of five out of six Presidential elections over two decades to thoroughly remake their party. If you want to know what will likely follow a Romney loss, take a look at what followed Dole’s loss in 1996.
Regrettably, this is probably true. I really did think after the failed Bush presidency and the Obama defeat of McCain, the GOP would do the soul-searching thing. Didn’t happen. Not even close. Maybe it’s just me, but whenever I hear Romney speak, it’s nothing but recycled GOP boilerplate. I cannot imagine why anybody who isn’t already a highly partisan Republican would vote for him, except that he’s Not Obama (which, let me be clear, might be reason enough). My point is that the GOP is not offering a credible vision of the future. Nobody wants Newt because they think he has good, innovative ideas for America’s future. They want him because they think he can tear Obama’s heart out with his teeth. That is hardly what future GOP victories are built on, especially when the oldsters start to die off.
Daniel Larison also has smart things to say about the GOP future, should Obama win a second term:
Something that makes it difficult to analyze the possibility of “an ideological reckoning with the base” is that there is no consensus among conservatives about what that reckoning would look like and what it ought to produce. More “reformist” moderates and conservatives in the GOP think that this reckoning would involve driving Tea Partiers and populists to the margins and developing a more “centrist” governing agenda, whereas many movement conservatives see Bush-era accommodations with the welfare state and so-called “big-government conservatism” as the things to be repudiated and resisted in the future. Dissident conservatives see both groups as too accommodating of the security/warfare state as well as the welfare state. The desired “reckoning” would look different for each group, and there are enough contradictions in Gingrich and Romney to provide justifications for each group to claim that their view has been vindicated by an electoral defeat.
“Regardless of who the GOP lost with this year, I wouldn’t expect a profound soul searching…” The GOP now has the character of a fundamentalist church, and such people do not do soul searching (i.e. critical examination) because that is definitionally heretical. The GOP holy trinity of 1) globe-spanning military force, 2) the priority of tax cuts, and 3) restrictive social policies, cannot be reexamined. So instead of a remaking themselves into a new type of party, I’d think it would become shrinking minor sectarian party, as is the case in some European countries, or in Israel.
The question is not whether the candidate is sufficiently Not Obama. The question is why one is Not Obama. If it is for policy reasons, to what policies do you object (ObamaCare?) and how do they differ from the policies that you offer (RomneyCare?) If it is for “leadership” reasons, what do you mean by “leadership” and how do those criteria differ from Romney’s style? If it is for “style” reasons, how does Obama’s “style” differ from Romney’s? Ultimately, though, the question is why the most moderate/conservative Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter is so widely reviled.
Ron Paul is probably America’s last shot to pull its ass out of the fire, the debt levels will enter the real danger zone in the next administration.
You’re going to get Ron Paul’s policies, it’s just a matter of whether it’s planned or not.
“Ultimately, though, the question is why the most moderate/conservative Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter is so widely reviled.”
Because he’s “not us”?
“Ultimately, though, the question is why the most moderate/conservative Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter is so widely reviled.”
Have you fogotten Bill Clinton? He had a massive healthcare plan (Hillarycare), but, fortunately, it failed. After losing Congress, Clinton went on to sign welfare reform and tax cuts and actually balanced the budget. That’s a far cry from Obama, who has vastly expanded Federal spending and actually enacted a massive healthcare plan. He also called for laws (cap and trade) that he couldn’t get the Senate to pass. He repealed DADT for the military that Clinton came up with. What makes you think Obama is moderate to conservative?
Hate to disappoint you, 8, but the debt levels have been in the danger zone for quite some time. The central government’s unfunded liabilities total, as of right now, $ 200 trillion dollars. Do you really and truly think any member of the political class is going to stick its neck out and say “Sorry, all you elderly types ! We’re not going to pay you what you’re under the impression we owe you !”
We’re not going to get Ron Paul’s policies, not with our current political structure. We’re going to get inflation (which is starting to happen now), we’re going to get continued overspending, and we’re going to get a systemic collapse. The only issue I see that is even up for discussion is when the bust happens. Even if Ron Paul were to be elevated now, quickly and without fanfare, it would do precious little good. The demands are there, they are “baked in the cake”, and they will continue to be there, unsustainable and ongoing, until The Day comes.
I give it nine years or so, no more than 10-12. And the clock is ticking.
Your servant,
Lord Karth
For a giddy moment I read 1972 as 1792 and had a wonderful vision of tumbrils, guillotines and tricoteuses.
Damn.
I voted for Obama in 08 and Romney during his senate and governor campaigns. So I won’t be that upset if either of them wins, because they both seem competent.
However, the GOP is so tainted by hurricane Bush, that any GOP nominee will have an uphill battle. This is ironic because in a normal election cycle Obama would be toast because of the economy.
TL;DR If the GOP loses to Obama they should crawl under a bed and hide in shame. Their party is that badly damaged.
johan, the US doesn’t have proportional representation, so it is hard to impossible for third parties to be viable. If the GOP became a regional/sectarian party I would expect a swift collapse.
Considering the commenters on this blog seem to want the republican party to become dovish, socially and fiscally liberal, or drink the koolaid of ron paul, don’t expect a reassessment you’d like anytime soon.
“Nobody wants Newt because they think he has good, innovative ideas for America’s future. They want him because they think he can tear Obama’s heart out with his teeth.”
No, no, no, no, no. “They” (who?) “want” (they don’t, really) Newt because he’s Not Mitt Romney. And why is the base so opposed to Romney? Because while the base hates TARP, hates the GM-Chrysler bailouts, hates the “stimulus” joke, hates the apocalyptic budget deficit, hates Obamacare, Romney isn’t on the correct side on any of these issues. Somehow the GOP is going to nominate him anyway.
The fact that Newt is so badly flawed is why he was the very last Not Mitt to gain any traction, and why he’s failing. Tim Pawlenty’s gotta be kicking himself, and all his advisors, in the pants these last few months. He would have had his turn as Not Mitt Romney, and he’s solid enough that he might actually have won.
And Republican up-and-comers like the Neocon Militarists Marco Rubio and Allen West are even more of the same. I.e., discredited Supply Side Economics, discredited theory of cutting taxes and reduced spending will follow, and shoveling even more debt funded money to the voracious Military-Security Leviathan.
P.S. I wish I could say “discredited” Military-Security Leviathan. Only the Cult of Military Exceptionalism and sustaining the American Empire Project have been embraced by both sclerotic political parties.
We see his presidency as a continuation of the Bush agenda: aggressive foreign policy, growth of welfare state, centralization of political and economic power. Whether comeing from the right or the left, these are bad policies born of bankrupt enlightenment philosophy that should be rejected at the ballot box
“Maybe it’s just me, but whenever I hear Romney speak, it’s nothing but recycled GOP boilerplate.”
It’s not just you.
Brian,
Ron Paul and Rick Santorum are not Romney either. Both opposed TARP, and oppose Obamacare. Gingrich supported TARP at the time, and praised an individual mandate for health insurance in years past (one of Obamacare’s — and Romneycare’s — central features). Paul has long been the most consistent member of Congress on spending reduction, opposing Republican big government as well as Democratic; Gingrich has long been a big-government Republican. Santorum is a more forceful advocate of the social conservative agenda than Gingrich, lacks Gingrich’s messy personal history (martial, financial, ethical), and is less abrasive personally. Gingrich is also a supporter of mass immigration, and tried (and failed) to play the race card in Florida — political black marks among core Republicans.
So why are so many anti-Romney voters turning to Gingrich? What Rod and commenters have been talking about for a little while now: Gingrich’s pugnacious, FOX/Limbaugh style and pseudo-intellectualism.
I’m afraid, 8, that Karth has a point…even if Ron Paul got the nod; Congress would keep spending regardless of veto….when thousands are screaming at their senators and congressman to “help us”…..
The next generations will surely curse us….
Correction: “marital”
He’s not Obama, that gives him an electoral majority. The reasons are pretty irrelevant unless something dramatic happens before November, like say American tanks rolling into Tehran in October.
The GOP won’t reform itself absent massive failure. The problem for the GOP is that it enjoyed much success in the past, and enjoys just enough success in the present, that it believes it needs only to find the right “messaging” to continue to win.
But the real problem is the incoherence of the GOP coalition’s positions on the major issues that confront the nation, which was neatly summed in this Economist article… http://www.economist.com/node/21542180
What makes you think Obama is moderate to conservative?
He passed a Republican-sponsored health care plan that was advocated by Republicans in the 90s and pushed for cap-and-trade, which was the Republican answer to emissions regulations.
The guy is temperamentally conservative. In his own writings, he admits to being interested in finding solutions from the Republican side of the aisle that he thinks are good for the country and implementing them, and that is precisely what his presidency has done.
Considering the commenters on this blog seem to want the republican party to become dovish, socially and fiscally liberal, or drink the koolaid of ron paul, don’t expect a reassessment you’d like anytime soon.
While I am not a Ron Paul supporter, I cannot blame Republicans for wanting to reject the legacy of George W Bush and instead go in a radically different direction.
For the GOP as a practical matter its various members hold positions that are just not reconcilable:
small government ≠ the world’s most powerful military
tax cuts ≠ deficit reduction
“enhanced interrogation techniques” ≠ the rights of the individual against the state
less government regulation ≠ family values legislation
No matter where you stand on these, you have someone within the GOP whose view is just as stridently on the other side of the equation. And the leaders of the GOP, in order to win elections, tell each group what they want to hear without resolving the conflict.
Such a resolution will only come about after sustained failure.
Noah: Paul & Santorum both have poisonous attributes that prevented their being taken seriously by most voters. Paul comes across as a crank who doesn’t even really like America. (Sorry, folks, but he does. Don’t hate me for saying what polls and results have made clear–he’s Dennis Kucinich with a R next to his name rather than a D.) Rick Santorum comes across as a loser, as he was in crushing fashion in 2006, plus let’s not even mention the whole google thing.
Newt was the last (i.e., worst) Not Mitt Romney who more than 10% of GOP voters were willing to consider. You’re about to see a big push among the GOP base to forget about supporting Romney and concentrate on expanding the Tea Party presence in Congress from its initial footholds from 2010.
Rod wrote:
“Ultimately, though, the question is why the most moderate/conservative Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter is so widely reviled.”
[Note from Rod: Rod did not write that. Please find out who did and give this quote proper attribution. -- RD.]
Because he’s black Rod. The Republican party is the party of racist resentment and has been since Nixon enacted the Southern Strategy in 1968. Republicans gave us eight years of the worst president in the history of the United States, George W. Bush, who, with the support of a Republican congress expanded government more than any president since Lyndon Baines Johnson while running up more debt than any president in history and the rank and file Republicans who are so angry with Obama didn’t give a damn because he was a white guy who they wouldn’t mind having a beer with.
The fact that Newt Gingrich won in South Carolina, indeed the fact that a big-spending, big-government, philandering Washington insider like Gingrich has any traction at all with Republicans proves that Republicans are liars and hypocrites when they talk about family values, limited government or fiscal restraint and that what they really want is a white guy who will pander to their fears and resentments and make them feel tough by talking tough to foreigners and blowing up brown people in far away places.
cp wrote:
For the GOP as a practical matter its various members hold positions that are just not reconcilable:
small government ≠ the world’s most powerful military
tax cuts ≠ deficit reduction
“enhanced interrogation techniques” ≠ the rights of the individual against the state
less government regulation ≠ family values legislation
No matter where you stand on these, you have someone within the GOP whose view is just as stridently on the other side of the equation. And the leaders of the GOP, in order to win elections, tell each group what they want to hear without resolving the conflict.
To this you could add
“enhanced interrogation techniques” ≠ basic Christian values
Let’s face it. Today’s GOP is a bunch of doubleplusgood double thinkers and the politicians who win their support are doubleplusgood duckspeakers.
The GOP, without serious motivation, is not going to change anytime soon. A Ron Paul third-party campaign would provide that motivation.
Wile E. Quixote screwed up and wrote:
Rod wrote:
“Ultimately, though, the question is why the most moderate/conservative Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter is so widely reviled.”
Rod very politely responded.
[Note from Rod: Rod did not write that. Please find out who did and give this quote proper attribution. -- RD.]
Which forced Wile E. Quixote to pull his head out and re-read the thread, only to find that JLF had written what he originally attributed to Rod. Wile E. Quixote would like to apologize to his host and is now hanging his head in well-deserved shame.
Wile E. Quixote is also somewhat concerned about the fact that he is referring to himself in the third person.
Recall also that Grover Norquist, who’s more or less 100% responsible for about 95% of GOP legislative priorities, was the “field marshal” of the Bush agenda in Congress. And Paul Ryan voted with Pres. Bush 94% of the time (e.g., on Medicare Part D, the Bush fiscal policies, and the invasion & occupation of Iraq). (Links to substantiation here).
These guys, and folks like them, remain the backbone of the GOP.
No Republicans anywhere care at all about Bush’s record in office– his fiscal profligacy, his series of inept, self-inflicted wounds in foreign policy. He was a Republican, so Republicans loved him, because Republicans don’t care about policy. They just like having a team to cheer for.
Just like it was a mistake for us to trust Saddam Hussein’s erstwhile arms dealer Donald Rumsfeld to oust Saddam and occupy Iraq when Rumsfeld had shown zero capacity for reflection and self-assessment, so too it is a mistake to trust Bush allies today. Elected GOP leaders now claim that they care passionately about the deficit, but they’ve shown no capacity to admit they’ve made mistakes, much less the ability to learn from them.
Not Rod: “Ultimately, though, the question is why the most moderate/conservative Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter is so widely reviled.”
Clinton wasn’t a fire-breathing socialist either, but that didn’t stop the GOP from wasting half a decade digging around his personal life and turning every wild accusation into a national emergency in need of a taxpayer-financed “investigation.” Moderation has never gotten you anywhere with ideologues of any stripe.
But heck, you don’t need to look to centrist Democrats for examples of this. Plenty of Tea Party types have been happy to lump Orrin Hatch and Dick Lugar in with Bernie Sanders as “leftists.” When your standard is purity, everything looks dirty.
I suspect Romney wins in a squeaker. Obama support is stalling out at 48-49%, the nominally undecideds almost uniformly disapprove of Obama’s handling of the economy.
Romney will necessarily exploit Conservative policy credibility on economic affairs, such as it is, to win the election. But a Romney Administration will then quite inevitably expend that credibility as ideologically correct implementations of the policy that prove not to deliver.
That will leave the Republican Party with one last set of Nixon/Reagan wares with appeal to the political center in two or three years: Conservative stances on American public culture/ethics issues. Selling on those will get them victories in one more set of elections post-Romney. Right around when the country tips to liberal majority later this decade.
After that the Nixon/Reagan-created form of the GOP will be entirely out of gas. Part of the base is unable to change, of course, and will marginalize out of the mainstream over time. The realistic and adaptable people in the party will pragmatically accept the great developments- social democratization and cultural deEuropeanization- occurring across the generation that follows as realities to live within. These folks will form the conservative side to arguments within the new dispensation.
I don’t agree with the ‘it took Democrats six elections’ interpretation of recent history. The truthful element to that is that Democrats indeed recovered national political initiative in 1992-93 when the liberal/post-1968 wing attained and exceeded parity in strength with the party’s pre-1968 wing. But badly lacking in that interpretation is that (a) large portions of the Nixon/Ford terms were moderated by Democratic power, and (b) Ted Kennedy functioned as something of a shadow President in the mid/late Eighties when Reagan went into the Iran-Contra eclipse. He got the 1985 immigration bill passed and derailed Bork, pretty decisive actions in the domestic issues of the day and long term.
Gosh, I’m racking my brain to recall an occasion, ever, of the GOP doing anything with more than a gut-feel, shot from the hip level of introspection. Why would another loss to Obama, should we be so fortunate, change that long party tradition?
[...] Rod Dreher speaks a harsh truth. [...]
[...] Rod Dreher: “Can you find a single significant point on which Romney, Gingrich, or Santorum differ substantially from George W. Bush? It’s amazing. If Bush were considered a successful president, they would be bringing him up all the time. That they do not, even as they have an incumbent Democrat they deride as a failure, tells you that they know Bush and his legacy are poison. And yet, they may not believe in Bush, but they sure believe in what he stood for. And so does the GOP base, evidently.” Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire Tweet This Post Posted in Breaking News Tags: Bush's, legacy « Gingrich looks for a bright side in Fla. defeat You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. [...]
The reckoning is coming, the Paul Revolution will remake the GOP from the inside out throughout this decade. Ron is capturing the majority of under-40s in the first primary contests.
With the factured neocon/talk radio base split between Romney and Gingrich/Santorum, Ron will pick up enough delegates (my prediction is at least triple digits) to be the kingmaker at the convention to shape the platform and maybe even influence who gets on the ticket as veep.
Once you go Paul you don’t go back, it’s only a matter of time for us (Generation X and Millennials) to retake the party as the Baby Boomer neocons die off.
[...] Rod Dreher of The American Conservative: This is an underappreciated point. Can you find a single significant point on which Romney, Gingrich, or Santorum differ substantially from George W. Bush? It’s amazing. If Bush were considered a successful president, they would be bringing him up all the time. That they do not, even as they have an incumbent Democrat they deride as a failure, tells you that they know Bush and his legacy are poison. And yet, they may not believe in Bush, but they sure believe in what he stood for. And so does the GOP base, evidently. [...]
[...] Rod Dreher: “Can you find a single significant point on which Romney, Gingrich, or Santorum differ substantially from George W. Bush? It’s amazing. If Bush were considered a successful president, they would be bringing him up all the time. That they do not, even as they have an incumbent Democrat they deride as a failure, tells you that they know Bush and his legacy are poison. And yet, they may not believe in Bush, but they sure believe in what he stood for. And so does the GOP base, evidently.” [...]
Look at the average age of GOP voters in the 4 states thus far – low 60s. Oh and overwhelmingly WHITE. These things tell you with terrifying precision what the future holds for the party of Lincoln and TR. Demographic annihilation. Give it 20 years and most of the people who were in their teens and twenties in 1964 will have died off or simply become immobile. The young aren’t interested in fake religion and hate peddling towards gays, minorites, hippies – all the old GOP targets. Ron Paul’s supporters are deluding themselves if they think they have any sort of sustainable movement going. Ron Paul will retire from Congress and quite possibly croak in the next five years and Rand Paul is a charmless buffoon. End of Paulism, with a small, sad thud. And good riddance too. The GOP has eked out more years than it deserved as a party without policies or any sort of vision of the future – and it did so by hyping up the worst and most reactionary elements in its base. Now it has no way to escape the clammy, crazed, white fingers that it placed so carefully around its own throat. Look at California – GOP registration collapsing, voters coming ever closer to giving the Democrats a 2/3 majority to actually reverse the follies of Reagan and his GOP successors. More Latino voters, pushed away by GOP racism, turning to the Democrats. Younger voters looking at the GOP and disliking what they see intensely. That sound you hear isn’t the cavalry coming over the hill, but a panicked stampede of elephants.
There’s wasn’t soul-searching per say but there was a reaction, it was called the Tea Party. The problem was they had no interest in soul searching. Their only interest is, as Austin Bramwell so well put it: “see to it that the flame of pure intention is not quelched.” They thought it quelched in the Bush Adminstration and by 2009 they were ready to light their torches with flame throwers
One cannot soul search if one feels their soul perfected. What’s there to search about? They know what they believe and what they’re against and that’s all that matters. Whenever a GOP candidate loses it’s all because they weren’t conservative enough. It was true for Bush I, Dole, McCain and it will be true for Romney as well. So long as this article of faith remains they will never feel the need to change anything, because it’s never them who has to change it’s always the candidate! Already there’s built-in excuse and so long as talk radio hosts and Fox News keep telling them they’re perfected, then there’s nothing they have to change other than politics, and that’s the easy part to fix. That’s what they would rather dwell upon.
[...] DREHER Republicans still have a Bush problem…ROD DREHER: Republicans still have a Bush problem. “Can you find a single significant point on which Romney, Gingrich, or Santorum differ [...]