What Bush & Company Has Done To The Republican Party

Today the NYT has a story about Rep Sununu in reelection trouble in NH over Iraq. I don't think Iraq is the problem because I never heard moderate voters mention it in the 06 midterms. It was always something else eating them about Republicans. They've got big problems with middles and swing type voters that has nothing to do with Iraq same as No New Taxes had nothing to do with Bush blowing out 1992.

Republicans would do well to parse what Krugman says:

Op-Ed Columnist
Emerging Republican Minority
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Remember how the 2004 election was supposed to have demonstrated, once and for all, that conservatism was the future of American politics? I do: early in 2005, some colleagues in the news media urged me, in effect, to give up. “The election settled some things,” I was told.

But at this point 2004 looks like an aberration, an election won with fear-and-smear tactics that have passed their sell-by date. Republicans no longer have a perceived edge over Democrats on national security — and without that edge, they stand revealed as ideologues out of step with an increasingly liberal American public.

Right now the talk of the political chattering classes is a report from the Pew Research Center showing a precipitous decline in Republican support. In 2002 equal numbers of Americans identified themselves as Republicans and Democrats, but since then the Democrats have opened up a 15-point advantage.

Part of the Republican collapse surely reflects public disgust with the Bush administration. The gap between the parties will probably get even wider when — not if — more and worse tales of corruption and abuse of power emerge.

But polling data on the issues, from Pew and elsewhere, suggest that the G.O.P.’s problems lie as much with its ideology as with one man’s disastrous reign.

For the conservatives who run today’s Republican Party are devoted, above all, to the proposition that government is always the problem, never the solution. For a while the American people seemed to agree; but lately they’ve concluded that sometimes government is the solution, after all, and they’d like to see more of it.

Consider, for example, the question of whether the government should provide fewer services in order to cut spending, or provide more services even if this requires higher spending. According to the American National Election Studies, in 1994, the year the Republicans began their 12-year control of Congress, those who favored smaller government had the edge, by 36 to 27. By 2004, however, those in favor of bigger government had a 43-to-20 lead.

And public opinion seems to have taken a particularly strong turn in favor of universal health care. Gallup reports that 69 percent of the public believes that “it is the responsibility of the federal government to make sure all Americans have health care coverage,” up from 59 percent in 2000.

The main force driving this shift to the left is probably rising income inequality. According to Pew, there has recently been a sharp increase in the percentage of Americans who agree with the statement that “the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.” Interestingly, the big increase in disgruntlement over rising inequality has come among the relatively well off — those making more than $75,000 a year.

Indeed, even the relatively well off have good reason to feel left behind in today’s economy, because the big income gains have been going to a tiny, super-rich minority. It’s not surprising, under those circumstances, that most people favor a stronger safety net — which they might need — even at the expense of higher taxes, much of which could be paid by the ever-richer elite.

And in the case of health care, there’s also the fact that the traditional system of employer-based coverage is gradually disintegrating. It’s no wonder, then, that a bit of socialized medicine is looking good to most Americans.

So what does this say about the political outlook? It’s difficult to make predictions, especially about the future. But at this point it looks as if we’re seeing an emerging Republican minority.

After all, Democratic priorities — in particular, on health care, where John Edwards has set the standard for all the candidates with a specific proposal to finance universal coverage with higher taxes on the rich — seem to be more or less in line with what the public wants.

Republicans, on the other hand, are still wallowing in nostalgia — nostalgia for the days when people thought they were heroic terrorism-fighters, nostalgia for the days when lots of Americans hated Big Government.

Many Republicans still imagine that what their party needs is a return to the conservative legacy of Ronald Reagan. It will probably take quite a while in the political wilderness before they take on board the message of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s comeback in California — which is that what they really need is a return to the moderate legacy of Dwight Eisenhower.

 

NYT continues its examination of the Republican Party. Will they get it or will Rudy run right into the shredder thats coming in 08?


Op-Ed Columnist
No U-Turns
By DAVID BROOKS
There is an argument floating around Republican circles that in order to win again, the G.O.P. has to reconnect with the truths of its Goldwater-Reagan glory days. It has to once again be the minimal-government party, the maximal-freedom party, the party of rugged individualism and states’ rights.

This is folly. It’s the wrong diagnosis of current realities and so the wrong prescription for the future.

Back in the 1970s, when Reaganism became popular, top tax rates were in the 70s, growth was stagnant and inflation was high. Federal regulation stifled competition. Government welfare policies enabled a culture of dependency. Socialism was still a coherent creed, and many believed the capitalist world was headed toward a Swedish welfare model.

In short, in the 1970s, normal, nonideological people were right to think that their future prospects might be dimmed by a stultifying state. People were right to believe that government was undermining personal responsibility. People were right to have what Tyler Cowen, in a brilliant essay in Cato Unbound, calls the “liberty vs. power” paradigm burned into their minds — the idea that big government means less personal liberty.

But today, many of those old problems have receded or been addressed. Today the big threats to people’s future prospects come from complex, decentralized phenomena: Islamic extremism, failed states, global competition, global warming, nuclear proliferation, a skills-based economy, economic and social segmentation.

Normal, nonideological people are less concerned about the threat to their freedom from an overweening state than from the threats posed by these amorphous yet pervasive phenomena. The “liberty vs. power” paradigm is less germane. It’s been replaced in the public consciousness with a “security leads to freedom” paradigm. People with a secure base are more free to take risks and explore the possibilities of their world.

People with secure health care can switch jobs more easily. People who feel free from terror can live their lives more loosely. People who come from stable homes and pass through engaged schools are free to choose from a wider range of opportunities.

The “security leads to freedom” paradigm is a fundamental principle of child psychology, but conservative think tankers and activists have been slow to recognize the change in their historical circumstance. All their intellectual training has been oriented by the “liberty vs. power” paradigm. (Postwar planning in Iraq was so poor because many in the G.O.P. were not really alive to the truth that security is a precondition for freedom.)

The general public, which is less invested in abstract principles, has been quicker to grope its way toward the new mental framework. As a Pew poll released last week indicated, the public has not lost its suspicion of big government. Most Americans believe government regulation does more harm than good. But they do think government should be more active in redressing segmentation and inequality. Almost all corporations, including Wal-Mart, have extraordinarily high approval ratings. But voters are clearly anxious about globalization.

The Republican Party, which still talks as if government were the biggest threat to choice, has lost touch with independent voters. Offered a choice between stale Democrats and stale Republicans, voters now choose Democrats, who at least talk about economic and domestic security.

The Democrats have a 15 point advantage in voter identification. Voters prefer Democratic economic policies by 14 points, Democratic tax policies by 15 points, Democratic health care policies by 24 points and Democratic energy policies by 20 points. If this is a country that wants to return to Barry Goldwater, it is showing it by supporting the policies of Dick Durbin.

The sad thing is that President Bush sensed this shift in public consciousness back in 1999. Compassionate conservatism was an attempt to move beyond the “liberty vs. power” paradigm. But because it was never fleshed out and because the Congressional G.O.P. rejected the implant, a new Republican governing philosophy did not emerge.

The party is going to have to make another run at it. As it does, it will have to shift mentalities. The “security leads to freedom” paradigm doesn’t end debate between left and right, it just engages on different ground. It is oriented less toward negative liberty (How can I get the government off my back?) and more toward positive liberty (Can I choose how to lead my life?).

Goldwater and Reagan were important leaders, but they’re not models for the future.

 

"your values"??

Your just another droid.

Wake up!!


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Fascists:_The_Christian_Right_and_the_War_on_America

You don't understand where the real danger lies.

bt

 

David Brooks is a smart man but he is also what Pat Buchanan refers to as a "kennel-fed conservative." They are the PC conservatives who are always quick to find fault with their own party and careful never to offend the mainstream media or their opponents. They held sway in the Republican Party for decades, decades when it was a permanent minority.

The problems Republicans face now are largely the result of failed policies pursued by Bush and to a lesser extent failed leadership in the House and Senate. There is no real indication that core conservative values are highly unpopular with the public. What has happened is that the Party itself and by extension its ideas have been tainted by the disastrous Iraq war and Bush' s continuing incomeptency on things as diverse as immigration to firing US Attorneys. We saw with Ronald Reagan that a rising poltical tide tends to lift all that party's boats. We are seeing the reverse of that now. Bush is dragging his party down with him.

For Republicans, there are no simple solutions. Iraq will continue to be an anchor. A pullout carries its own risks, and for Bush, is unthinkable given how much he has invested in it. As we saw in the post-vietnam period, a weakened superpower creates a vacuum into which all sorts of troublemakers seek to infiltrate. The very success of Republican economic policies have created a sense of entitlement among voters, making them open to Democrat demgoguery.

There will be powerful forces attempting to point the party in the direction urged by Brooks, which would lead inevitably to a Guiliani candidacy and a retreat from the party's conservative values. I think that would be a disaster. Given a choice between a real Democrat and a synthetic one, why choose the fake? The Republican Party is truly at a crossroads. It can go back to its days as a minority party catering to the country club, corporate set, or it can live up to the legacy of Ronald Reagan. Unfortunately, it will be hard to do the latter with the candidates currently in the race.

 

aaa your writing has become more concise and pointed with time. You deserve a wider audience.

 

I've said that for years Jem. He's very talented.

During the Congressional I borrowed some of his lines.

Oops, that makes me a regular Joe Biden......

 

Interesting.

You put all the blame on those voted in, and not the dumbasses that voted them in...

 

You and many other liberals assume that ME policy conducted under Bush differs from what Gore/Lieberman/Clinton would have done.

Hindsight's 20/20.

Would Gore have panicked after 9/11? Or looked for stimuli via war to prop up the post crash economy? We'll never know. But we do know the anti-Saddam rhetoric of Dem's in the late 90's and how those established leaders voted in 2002.

One thing is undeniable Z. HC, Edwards and Obama are ALL on the record recently as saying Iran is to be stopped and Israel to be defended. Is that a departure from our current foreign policy?

If you missed David Rieff's commentary in Sunday's NYT here a link. He nailed it.......

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/25/magazine/25WWLNlede.t.html?fta=y

 

Ask me if I care what Obama, Edwards, Gore, et. al think...

Ultimately, the people of America have got to stop blaming the people they vote in, and start making better decisions in the booth...and then holding these politicians to their word, feet to the fire if necessary.

I will say it again, the presidential candidate who says their first act as president will be to reduce the power of the executive branch, gets my consideration.

Anything less is just more power hungry people wanting the same power as Bush has expanded into the presidency while in office but thinking they are going to use the power for "good."

Power to the people, power to the people...right on.

I am not moved by any presidential candidate, I see no greatness on the landscape...

Oh, and I don't buy into the "Iran has to be stopped" bs. Their Russian neighbors to the north don't seem to be all that worried, and Israel can find for themselves...

 

Put aside the polling numbers for a minute, do you folks that are solid Reps really think Rudy is more electable than McCain?

And what about the cancer issue and questions whether he can go two terms?