Me, too, but I don’t think that would necessarily be good for the party. I would also prefer that the Democrats quit harping about the minimum wage, but I wouldn’t advise them to do it if they wanted to maintain the current majority…
I don’t know that the RNC has to dump anyone. I do think they might need to work on defining themselves again. Read Free Republic for a bit and you’ll find that Freepers think that Sarah Palin is a “true conservative” whereas Bush and McCain aren’t.
From the outside, Bush and McCain look more like “true conservatives” than Palin does. Palin’s only claim to conservatism seems to be being pro-life. If that’s all it takes, why not be “pro-lifatives”?
If I can’t figure out what they’re selling when they say they’re conservative, how am I supposed to switch to them?
My suggestion for the RNC. Finish the transformation. Turn your party into an explicitly religious, litmus-test party. Continue to feel free to imply that those who vote for Democrats are un-Christian. Nominate officeholders who will engage in Inquisition of non-Republicans. Pursue power with the relentlessness of Sun Wu, & crush your enemies if you can.
I appreciate that sentiment, but the thing is that without competition for reasonable voters, the Democrats will get away with anything.
You don’t want only one viable party. You really really don’t.
Sure we do. The Democrats will go a little power crazy after the country is more or less fixed. Drift back to the left and then the New Moderate Smaller Government/Pro Business/Fiscal conservative party will occur. The old Republican party will fall by the wayside and in 2-3 election cycles disappear. It has happened before and can happen again.
**foolsguinea **is suggesting an excellent recipe for it to happen. Then we could go back to where we were about 50 years ago with a Liberal Democrat party and a Moderate party to keep the bread and circuses at bay. Of course back then the Liberal Democrats were somehow saddled with the Southern Theo-crats. Not likely to happen this time but I also don’t think the Republican party is likely to follow either **foolsguinea **'s recipe for suicide or Liberal’s very reasonable path to retaking itself and claiming the middle.
If the Republicans kick all the whack jobs out of their party, they won’t have anyone left.
No, they’d still have the moderates, whom the whackjobs want to kick out of the party. Problem is, they need a coalition of both to win anything (well, in most states, anyway).
Here are my somewhat random thoughts on the question; what could be more authoritative than some guy on a message board, right?
First, the right may be tempted to think they lost this election only with a perfect storm of bad news: a not-really conservative candidate, a horrible campaign strategy, an “unpredictable” economic crisis, a charismatic once-in-a generation opponent. Even with all this, 46% of the electorate voted for McCain, so you could conclude the problem wasn’t the message itself but factors outside the party’s control. If this were so, the right approach would be to re-emphasize “true” conservative values under a new, Reaganesque leadership and fire up and expand the base with cultural issues and conservative platitudes, a strategy that’s worked at least for the past 20 years…
But IMO this is exactly the wrong approach. Let’s be honest: When Sarah Palin was talking about campaigning in the “real America” and “Joe the Plumber” became John McCain’s buddy for 15 minutes, they were courting working class, rural white voters without a college education earning between $30-$80K a year–not poor enough to automatically sign up as Dems, but not rich enough to identify with the values of “coastal/media elites”. The problem is, this core constituency is shrinking, thanks in part to immigration and changes in immigrant politics (e.g. Cuban-Americans were once solid GOP, but as Cuban families become 2nd/3rd generation and the Castros grow more irrelevant, they’re becioming more politically connected to Dem-leaning Mexican-Americans). I’d also credit the growing percentage of Americans who earn a college degree or have some postgraduate education–not a knock against the education level of GOP supporters, but it seems Dems do better with higher-educated voters. I also think the flip of once-solid red states in the South and West is more than an Obama phenomenon. More immigrants are moving into these areas, and anecdotally I think a growing class of wealthy coastal emigres to places like Colorado and Montana–think Aspen or the plains ranches owned by folks like David Letterman and Tom Brokaw–are starting to have an effect on what were once reliably red states.
IMO the GOP needs to re-think its core values and ditch the automatic invocation of Ronald Reagan (hey, it took nearly 50 years for the Dems to stop referencing FDR and the New Deal until Bill Clinton moved the party philosophically forward). With the current economic crisis, Americans have come to see a role for government; they no longer automatically swallow Reagan’s mantra “government isn’t the solution to the problem, government is the problem.” Intransigent disregard for environmental issues, right-to-life spectacles like Terry Schiavo, and oversimplified “drill, baby, drill”-style policies are viewed with cynicism and disdain by a large segment of the American public. To be quite frank, it seems as if many right-wing positions during the past election were spouted simply because the base thought they would drive liberals nuts: “Oooh, those libruls are going to HATE Sarah Palin! Oooh, their going to HATE off-shore drilling!” Figuring out some way to make conservatism relevant while acknowledging the current political climate is IMO essential to GOP survival as a relevant party. They might start by coming out in favor of US infrastructure projects to boost economic growth–kind of a WPA for the new century–or offer tehir own regulatory package for Wall street reform.
Finally, I’d look at dismantling parts of the right-wing noise machine–at least those parts which seem to revel in the stupid. Yes, leaking to the Drudge Report or having administration officials go on Limbaugh is an effective way to point the base in the right direction, but it also lends credence to the loonier elements of these outlets–who besides these whackos cared about Obama’s birth certificate? Insulating the base with its own news channel makes for an irresistable echo chamber, but politics is the “art of the possible”–possible in a real world, not in a disengaged internet chat room or cable news shouting match. If I were RNC head Mike Duncan (and I still had a job after this year’s deacle), I’d quietly put the word out that certain media outlets are off-limits to medium/high-level party members and start grooming a new iconservative intelligensia that could articulate new ideas in a real forum away from the mud-wrestling that passes for political punditry today.
But hey, I’m a Democrat, so don’t take my advice. Seriously, don’t; I want you to continue to fail:-)
I also would add currently elderly people who are a Republican stronghold and will be dying off (literally) over the next decade or two. I do not think that being old makes you Republican. I think the current crop of the elderly grew up in a different America. As they are replaced a pillar of the Republican base will crumble. They’ll have 75 year old ex-hippies instead.
Hear, hear! And this from a Massachusetts liberal. In my state the Republican party is almost extinct. (In fact, one result of this election is that there is no longer a Republican Congressman in the U.S. House of Representatives for all of New England.) Power is entirely in the hands of the Democratic party, and that’s not good for the long-term health of our politics. I want to have the sort of (old-fashioned Rockefeller/Northeastern) Republicans you speak of as an alternative to crappy Democrats.
Unfortunately, I don’t see a new generation of Frank Sargents and Eliot Richardsons emerging from the smoking ruins of the current GOP, at least not in the near future.
ETA: Hear, hear, jsgoddess!!
I think the best move for the GOP was doing exactly what they have just done: lose this election. Now instead of McCain playing Hoover fiddling while America burns they can play their old game of Blame the Dems. (Not that I’m theorizing that the GOP deliberately lost.)
I don’t understand why people think the GOP would drive out or distance themselves from conservative values voters or the hate machine that spurs (many of) them. How could they replace those votes without moderating their drive for plutocracy? That drive sustains the elite support that funds the political infrastructure that makes them so much more powerful than the Democrats.
Sure there are long term demographic changes that the Republicans need to address to continue to win but ditching the “Moral Majority” would only exacerbate them. I expect the GOP will compromise their fiscal agenda only so much as the political climate requires and continue their current strategy of divide and conquer. And I expect they will continue to be successful at doing so.
If you run around claiming Obama is a Marxist, then I am going to assume that you don’t understand economics or history.
If you run around claiming Reagan cut taxes and increased federal revenue, and you lived through the Regan administration, then I am going to assume you are insane.
If the RNC wants to get my vote, they at least have to function in some sort of reality.
As I explained in the OP, once they re-become a party of fiscal conservatism and social liberalism, they will take back many of us who fled to the Democrats. Obama’s attraction, for many, is that he is closer to a Goldwater Republican than any of the Republican candidates (except for Ron Paul). The social conservatives, after trying and failing to form a third party, will simply disengage from politics, and attribute their disengagement to one or another Biblical prophecy.
My advice for the RNC-
1.) Don’t take advice from left-leaning, religion-disparaging message board posters.
2.) Economics & national security issues used to be yours, but you overextended in both.
Don’t make promises. Set goals to cut spending & taxes where they can be cut, raise spending & taxes where they have to be raised (and sometimes they do), withdraw our military presence where it can be & beef it up where it needs to be- but make the ultimate goals to be a leaner, more efficient government; a freer more self-reliant & socially-responsible people; and a more restrained but stronger military.
One of the few things I agree with Bill Maher on- Gov’t exists for projects too large for the private sector & local communities. Anything that can be done by the private sector or on the local level should be left to it.
3.) The Middle East- who the hell knows? Protect Israel, encourage free & peaceful Islamic/Arab socieites, contain terrorism & belligerency, try to get out of Iraq & Afghanistan- but how to get all this done is sure above my pay grade!
4.) Social/religious conservative issues- Being against abortion, federall-funded embronic stem cell research, gay marriage & evolution did not get us embroiled in Iraq, the mortgage & banking messes, or the Katrina debacle. In fact, it was those people who probably provided the most effective relief during Katrina. The churches were right there into it while all levels of government were getting in each others’ way, turning back private corporations’ truckloads of supplies.
Abortion- Latest stats show abortion rates are declining, fewer abortionists are in practice, and the public favors pro-choice with regulations. Don’t yell for an outright ban- just encourage the above trend for life & against disposable pregancies. Does Gov’t belong in the birth-control dispension business? Aren’t there enough liberals to fund Planned Parenthood on a private level? Any gov’t funding of federal planning services should still make a sharp distinction between birth control & abortion. Drugs that prevent implantation- I don’t care. Drugs that expel an implanted embryo- iffy.
Gay issues- I’m almost ready to shrug on this, AS LONG AS RELIGIOUS RIGHTS AND FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION ARE PROTECTED. OK, let gays get married & don’t rule them out as possible adoptive parents in public adoption services. Don’t allow that to be used against churches & religious organizations that disapprove of gay sex, as was done on the inter-racial marriage issue with Bob Jones University.
Teaching on evolution-creation: Not a Federal Gov’t issue. On the local level, schools should teach facts, not interpretations. The age of the Earth & the Universe are facts. A process of development does indeed look like possible evolution. (Then again, it could also look like old-earth creationism.) Don’t shut down student discussion or penalize students who don’t believe in Evolution, as long as they understand it.
Btw, on sex-ed in schools, also not a Federal Gov’t issue. Local educators need to work with families to decide on a curriculum that is accurate & thorough & essential, and respectful of moral & religious concerns.
Acknowlegement of God in the Public Sector- Part of America’s heritage, done by every Founding Father & President, including Mr. Separation Tom Jefferson, widely supported by the people, recognized by the courts. Get over it.
Use of the public sector to promote a specific religion- Iffy. That includes Ten Commandments displays, Nativity scenes, prayer at school functions. That can all be relegated to the private sector. However, historic displays that have been around for decades should probably be left alone.
Exactly. Our nation is becoming younger, browner and more urban. If the Republican party continues to claim that white rural voters are somehow more American than the rest of us, they are shooting themselves in the foot. I think the most helpful thing the Republican party can do is tone down the divisive rhetoric with regards to “real America.” They should be actively courting Abdul Al-Fulan in Dearborn and Lashawna Washington in Atlanta, not disdaining them.
I’m not sure that’s what would happen. There have always been factions within the GOP just as there have always been factions within the Democratic party. The GOP has always denied it, claiming unity, but now that the divide between the demagogic faction and the moderates and fiscal conservatives is so wide, why not let the demogogues split off and form their own party?
The GOP resembles nothing so much right now as “God’s Own Party,” with more moderate and sensible voices getting lost in the shouting for ID, anti-gay legislation and one nation under Christianity. Give them their own party and let sanity come back to the Republicans who know what it means to be conservative. Moderates and independents will follow, and I’ll happily return to a party that right now scares the ever lovin’ daylights out of me.
Sorry, not gonna happen. If Obama would have lost, would you have recommended that the Democrats dump poor people and minorities?
This is how the game is played. Those of us who want small government have found support from the evangelical hick idiots, and those of you want big government have found support from the poor and minorities. We each try to whip our idiots to victory with varying degrees of success.
FriarTed, that sounds all pretty reasonable to me.
I take you feel somewhat alienated by the sense of visceral rejection of the religious right in this thread. But I reckon a lot of that stems from the central role they played in blindly enabling the recent era - after being dangled on the knee of the Republican Party with wedge issues and polarising rhetoric they never really intended to follow through with - such as the Federal Gay Marriage Constitutional amendment.
If the religious right was slightly less credulous about this, it could still be politically active and retain most of its key position in a more moderated without facing this level of animosity. I’m secular myself but I have no problem with people of faith - indeed I think many religious critiques of the hollowness of materialistic liberalism tend to be pretty well aligned with communitarian ideas.
What annoys me is the religious right using Supply Side Jesus, without any sense of humility or good works taught in the Christian tradition. What annoys me is an inability to step down the polarising rhetoric of god-hating evil liberals. The Democrats have to do their part to not be see as accepting of faith - but I think the conservative religious movement ultimately bears responsibility for following the Republican party off a cliff.
Thankfully, some of evangelicals have started to reappraise their blind support of the Republican agenda.
Maybe I’m too isolated in my liberal bubble, but you lost me here. How do gay issues potentially endanger religious rights and freedom of association?
I am not sure if the causality works in the direction that you suggest. For my part at least, I endure big government and vote left because I care more about social issues than I do about the size of the government. I would find it unlikely that I am the only one. I have little choice but to vote left because I simply have no social positions in common whatsoever with the right. If that were to change, so would my vote and the votes of many other urban professionals like me.