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Republicans Missed Opportunity with Obama
Like many bloggers, on November 4, 2008 I was feverishly watching election results come in and manically trying to live-blog something of importance from what information I had available to me. It was a good night, regardless of what side of the ideological street on which you happened to be set up. It was good because watching election results roll in on a contest as heralded as the presidential election is a thrilling experience, especially when you’ve been paying obsessive attention to it for months on end. This particular night was important not just in terms of Obama’s historicity, but also because it marked the end to what had been the longest and in some people’s eyes the most grueling presidential election in some time. We were all ready for a bit of a rest.
I was in touch with a number of good friend throughout the night, sharing impressions and predictions, and at one point following Obama’s official acceptance speech we all wound up on Skype to record our thoughts on the night for posterity. There were nine of us in total and we each took turns offering our insights and proposing questions to one another. The most interesting question I received was what I thought of Obama’s victory as the closest thing to a conservative on the call.
My answer was relatively simple. I said that I felt that Obama represented probably the best possible world for both conservatives and Republicans. Undoubtedly Republicans and conservatives would have rather seen McCain win, I noted, but given the damage that Bush-Cheney had inflicted to the conservative/Republican brand, that just wasn’t in the cards and of all the Democratic potentials Obama offered an administration that was likely to be the most hospitable to conservatives and Republicans as they prepared for their time in the wilderness to figure out just where they went wrong and what to do about it.
Listening to Mitch McConnell on ABC’s This Week last Sunday, it struck me how poorly conservatives and Republicans are using this moment.
Throughout the campaign, Obama made his respectful disagreement with conservative ideology a cornerstone of his rhetoric. In almost every speech, there was a reference for the need to reach across the isle and a recognition that good ideas are not always the sole property of particular ideologies. Drawing vehement criticism from the Clinton’s and some segments of the Democratic base, Obama even went so far as to offer complimentary words to conservative Citizen Kane: Ronald Reagan. And bearing largely true to his words, the opening chords of the Obama administration’s time in office were dressed in discussion of the need and desire for bipartisanship.
Unlike some Democrats, Barak Obama doesn’t seem interested in destroying Republicans and the conservative movement in the slightest. Obama might not agree with 95% of what conservatives and Republicans suggest, propose, or offer, but his deeply felt historical understanding of the American project lends a recognition of the important role that conservatives and Republicans play in cultivating a successful and healthy country. Therein lies the key to the opportunity that conservatives and Republicans seem so committed to ignoring.
As has been noted by many pundits, demographics are not siding with Republicans or conservatives. The procession of American popular opinion is a steady war of attrition with the future of conservatism and Republicanism in their current forms. So this time out of power is in many ways vital for conservatives and Republicans, it allows a time for careful consideration, at times painful reflection, but ultimately an ability to retool and rework the ethos that they seek to present. In all, though no political party or movement relishes the process of losing power, such milestones are inevitable and must be seen as opportunities to strengthen the narrative that one has to offer.
And by my lights, under no president in recent memory did conservatives and Republicans have a better ability to engage in this phoenix project. While it is certain that the ruminations of such a project are under way in certain segments of the conservative camp fire (David Frum’s New Majority comes to mind), the mindset presented by Republicans on the Hill and many conservatives in the streets is: double-down or die.
McConnell and others simply cannot effectively refute the charge of being the “party of no” because their cupboards are bereft of any ideas that haven’t already come under the damning critique of public opinion. All they can do is point to George W. Bush and say, “We’re not him,” which might be true, but it isn’t enough. And it won’t be enough until such a time as conservatives and Republicans have en masse come face-to-face with the challenge that lies at their feet: to articulate a conservatism of the twenty-first century.
Alas, you can lead an elephant to water…
(Cross posted at The League of Ordinary Gentlemen)
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11 Responses to “Republicans Missed Opportunity with Obama”
“….of all the Democratic potentials Obama offered an administration that was likely to be the most hospitable to conservatives and Republicans as they prepared for their time in the wilderness to figure out just where they went wrong and what to do about it.”
Please, lay down the crackpipe.
Obama did not reach across the aisle. Obama played dog whistle politics. when in front of a group of blacks or Hispanics, he promised to tax the rich (read whites) and given the money to them. When in front of upper class whites, he said that he would establish new government mechanism to given them power over others (environmental, energy, transportation, health regulations).
Maybe someone can explain who open borders and unlimited immigration is going to help any conservative in the U.S. After having a Republican President who was too stupid to understand that poor mexican voters are automatic Democratic party voters, does anyone really think that President obama refusal to enforce the borders to the U.S. is going to help Repubicans.
The Republicans are dead to history and it was their own doing. first, the leadership of the Repubican Party insisted on open borders and unlimited immigration in the stupid belief that poor Mexican would eventually become Republicans. Second, after running as a party of fiscal conservatives, they spent at a faster rate than Democrats. third, after running on the small party platform, they could not wait to grow the government.
The Republican leadership is too stupid and too incompetent to understand that if people want high spending, big government, the people will vote for Democrats.
That leaves the GOP in a bit of a bind, now doesn't it… next time they want to run on small government / fiscal conservatism their slogan will have to be “No, really, this time we mean it. Promise.”
Well, Ryan, the Democrats held a majority in Congress for a very long time and then were turned out in '94, largely on corruption. It did take a while for people to forget that, but for some reason voters over the last two cycles have assumed that 'this time they really meant it' when they promised 'the most ethical Congress ever.”
Short memories, short attention spans, and an opposing party which screws up have a way of wiping the slate clean.
I'm not terribly sure you can attribute '94 to 'corruption'. It takes a lot to vote for somebody you don't agree with just because they haven't had the opportunity to abuse the position yet. And I'm not sure which campaigns you were watching but I got the impression that the Democrats were running on “See, you put the Republicans in charge and they broke it.”
That said, the Republicans have been more than happy to talk about 'fiscal conservatism' and 'small government' for the past three decades and when given the ability to implement their stated agenda, choke. Then they lose and go back to whining about the evils of big government. It's getting annoying.
Ryan, I agree that the GOP hasn't delivered well in the last 8 years, but Reagan really did accomplish a good bit to reduce the size and scope of the federal government (devolving certain things back to the states, which is very much of an improvement and we could do with a lot more of that) but he just didn't hold the line on spending. And Gingrich's Congress didn't fulfill their Contract with America on all counts, but they did a pretty fair job keeping Clinton to a more moderate agenda and they helped accomplish badly needed welfare reform.
So while there's definitely a lot of room for criticism of the more recent GOP majority, it's not as bad as you're making it out to be either.
And aside from that, what will undoubtedly happen now is that some of the current group who really have been fiscally conservative (Pence, Cantor, Flake, Ryan, etc) will inherit the mantle along with some of the governors, so they'll be able to distance themselves from the Frists, Boehners, and Hasterts.
CStanley–
Could you be more specific about what Reagan did to reduce the size and scope of the federal government? What things got devolved to the states?
Thanks.
“poor Mexican voters are automatic Democratic party voters”
for someone with a Lucha mask Super Destroyer doesn't seem to know much about Latinos.
CStanley,
Interesting that you cite Republican small-government success stories only in times when Democrats either controlled Congress (under Reagan) or the White House (under Clinton). Yet, when Republicans controlled BOTH ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, they did what? Surely the Democrats didn't make the Republicans spend between 2001 and 2006 (excepting a brief year and a half when Dems controlled the Senate in 2002). The Democrats didn't make the GOP pass the Medicare Prescription Drug bill, which adds trillions in unfunded liabilities.
If the Republicans couldn't cut spending when they had TOTAL control, when can they ever be expected to cut spending? Only when they are opposing a Democrat? Sounds like politics, not principle.
Instead of discussing the irrelevant Repubican Party, the real disucssion is how will the U.S. funciton as a one party state. What will happen to government spending in the coming one party state. Will Hispanics and blacks benefit from the coming one party state or will the elite white leadership stop sucking up to them when they are no longer needed to beat the Republicans.
Don't worry your pretty little head, the Republican Party will make a come-back, if not right away, in a couple of decades.
Once enough Hispanics, African-Americans & Asians become members of the upper-middle-class and start intermarrying with the white upper-middle-class, they will start resenting having to pay taxes to support those shiftless lazy bastards in the underclass, and the working class, and if the parents who made the leap from working class to upper-middle-class don't resent the taxes they have to pay, you can pretty much depend on their children who where born with a silver spoon in their mouth to.
And once you have enough ethnic diversity in the upper-middle-class you can always convince the idiots in the working class that but for a little hard work and a little luck, they too could be members of the upper-middle-class.
And there is your new republican party, easy as Apple Pie. You can always depend on greed and resentment to recreate the Party of Shrub and Reagan.