After looking at some polling data a reader legitimately asks as to what strategy the GOP ought to pursue at the moment. I think it is a valid question and one to which I do not have a full answer. I do think that ultimately the party will have to moderate to some degree or face a long-term minority status in the Congress.
However, beyond that, I would make the following suggestions:
1.Own up to the failures of the Bush administration. Someone in the party is going to have to do better than “time to move forward” and deal with the many failures of the Bush years from national security to executive power to domestic/economic policy. I recognize that any given list of such things may not comport with the list I would make, but some sort of reckoning is needed.
That the voters have roundly rejected the previous administration is manifestly clear. At the moment there are only passing acknowledgment of this fact from Republicans (because they don’t want to upset the base). However, someone has to explain to voters how they won’t be a repeat of the past. McCain, for example, did an exceptionally poor job of that.
2.Turn away from the anti-intellectualism. Much was made during the 2024 cycle, rightly at times, about the GOP being anti-science. However, of more significance is the anti-intellectualism of the party and its most vocal proponents at the moment. There currently is no voice in the party/conservative coalition of any prominence that is attempting to articulate an intellectually-based message about free markets, individualism, limited government and so forth. It may be that the libertarian/classic conservative wing of the party is dead. If so, I don’t see a traditionalistic, populistic approach winning the day. At a minimum, the leading lights of the party at the moment seem to be people like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and the like (not to mention Sarah Palin, Joe the Plumber and Carrie Prejean). Talk radio and cable news chat may get ratings, but that approach won’t create a rich intellectual base to rebuild the party and attract voters.
Shorter version: stop confusing entertainment with intellectual discourse.
3.Put the cookie-cutter away: as much as no one wants to pay taxes, the notion that that solution to every problem is a tax cut is intellectually dishonest and is nonsensical policy-wise. This is not a suggestion that the GOP has to become a party of tax increases, but there has to be a recognition that a) there does come a point where cutting isn’t an option and b) we do have to pay for government. It is worth noting that while Reagan was a tax-cutter, he also raised taxes. I note that not as a model necessarily, but as a reality check for those who envision Reagan as a transcendent spiritual figure with a tax-cutting sword in his right hand who only cut, cut, cut.
4.(While we are on the subject): Enough with the Reagan worship—or, if one is going to look to Reagan, be realistic. He cut and raised taxes, he oversaw huge increases in spending and deficits and he was staunchly anti-torture.
This is just some ideas off the top of my head–any other suggestions? (Or critiques of these suggestions?)
If anything, at the moment (and these things have a way of changing), it seems that the party is appealing to a fairly narrow (both in terms of ideology and in terms of geography) slice of the population. That is not a viable strategy if the goal is being anything other than the minority.
There is always the following caveat in US politics: since there are only two viable parties (in terms of winning majorities), the best strategy for the down party is for the up party to fail. This will likely happen at some stage, but it could be a while.
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May 19th, 2024 at 11:23 am
I have to agree. The party has turned into a bunch of whiners with no plausible vision of where they want the country to go.
May 19th, 2024 at 11:58 am
I am generally in agreement with your suggestions.
I would add that the party needs to take seriously the demographic shifts in the country and come to terms with the heterogeneity of the population.
For years the only way they deal with this fact is through tokenism (e.g. Clarence Thomas, Harriet Miers, Sarah Palin, Michael Steele, etc…) and that strategy doesn’t seem to be too compelling.
However, to take heterogeneity seriously will require serious policy shifts on issues such as xenophobia, the drug problem, and privacy that the party has not exhibited in recent years.
May 19th, 2024 at 12:52 pm
Ratoe:
I concur. I suspect, however, that the advice will go unheeded.
May 19th, 2024 at 2:35 pm
Reagan “was staunchly anti-torture.”
Really? This may come as news to many Salvadorans and others.
May 19th, 2024 at 2:38 pm
By the way, how many of the past 60 or so years has the Republican Party not been the minority in Congress (particularly the House)? Maybe that’s just the ‘natural’ order of things.
May 19th, 2024 at 2:42 pm
MSS:
A more than valid point. I was speaking of his public statements, at a minimum, which run counter to public statements made by people like Cheney.
May 19th, 2024 at 2:46 pm
MSS:
Perhaps (in re: GOP minority status). However, during much of the last 60 years (prior to the mid-1990s) the South was one-party Democratic, skewing the comparison over time.
May 19th, 2024 at 3:47 pm
Problem is, Republicans have spent decades building their intellectual infrastructure, and ll of it is based upon absolute self-confidence, with a strong dose of religious self-righteousness.
The very trait that powered them ‘out of the wilderness’ (more self-accepted religious imagery) was their belief in their own rectitude but now threatens to choke the movement, purifying it of all but 4 honest True Believers.
How can they change that up now? Some of their beliefs were innate (evangelical beliefs) but others calcified it seems solely out of the joy of sticking a finger in the eyes of liberals (anti-environmentalism and easing up on pollution regs).
Self-righteousness has been their appeal, how can they come clean to people who hate America and promote abortion, secularism, and media bias?
Can’t be done, just can’t. Once the mystique of Republican self-righteousness is punctured, they’re fallible like everyone else and lose much of their mojo.
How else to try and claim the high ground while torturing people of questionable guilt, or preventing gays from gettting … married?
They’re really stuck, and they’ve painted themselves into a corner.
May 20th, 2024 at 4:52 am
Nice.
I hated RR back in the day, but I’ve grown to appreciate him. Worship? No. Appreciate? Yes.
May 20th, 2024 at 2:05 pm
Back to the ‘permanent minority’ point, above.
Steven, your point about the solid South is, of course, valid. However, it only points to the problem: whereas the Democratic Party then was broad, having a constituency that extended well beyond its “one party” region, the Republican Party as of now looks a lot like a one-region party.
May 20th, 2024 at 2:21 pm
MSS:
I agree with that assessment, and also agree that the “natural” state of the party for the moment may be minority status–I was quibbling with the historical record as evidence.
May 20th, 2024 at 2:59 pm
Unfortunately, this is the problem I see in BOTH parties. Between Hannity/Limbaugh, and Matthews/Olberman, the parties are more than ever driven by personalities instead of ideas.
The GOP is going to be down for a while. Momentum driven by media is hard to slow on either side.
May 20th, 2024 at 3:05 pm
I think it certainly does exist in both parties, but it is decidedly more pronounced on the Rep/Con side these days. Matthews, for example, is a poor ideologue compared to say, Hannity.
May 20th, 2024 at 4:26 pm
You failed to mention: “Keep Dick Cheney as far away from the public eye (and ear) as possible!”
May 20th, 2024 at 6:35 pm
I don’t see how Prejean is a party leader. She has the same views about marriage as Obama and the majority of the country.
I agree that talking about capital gains, corporate and upper income tax cuts is pointless. Tax policy more friendly to parents makes more sense.
With unemployment rising I think calling for a reduction in legal immigration makes sense - call it American jobs for American workers. Siding with the white fire fighters in the Ricci case would also be popular.
Attacking China’s currency manipulation would help in the Midwest.