John Bolton And The Boltin’ GOP Moderates

Scientists recently excited the world by showing a restoration of mummy King Tutankhamun’s face — but it might be time to ask if political scientists will one day soon have to do the same thing to see what the GOP’s one-time power daddies called Republican moderates once looked like.

The ostensible issue is the controversial nomination of John Bolton for U.S. Ambassador to the UN. But the real issue is the diminishing influence of GOP moderates — and not just elected ones such as the ones in Congress, but unelected ones such as former Secretary of State Colin Powell who reportedly has opposed the nomination.

If you had to place money on it today you could easily say: Bolton’s nomination WILL pass…because the White House and GOP leaders have made it a must-win battle to demonstrate their power to prevail.

But it’s indicative of a larger issue, as the New York Times notes:

The unusual pact that permitted the nomination of John R. Bolton to go forward on Thursday without the support of a crucial Republican senator has exposed, in a very raw and public way, the extreme pressures facing Republican moderates in a Senate that is increasingly dominated by conservatives.

President Bush called the dissenting Republican, Senator George V. Voinovich of Ohio, on Wednesday, the day before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on which Mr. Voinovich serves, was to take up the nomination, the White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, said.

Karl Rove, the president’s powerful political adviser, and Andrew H. Card Jr., the chief of staff, also called to chat with Mr. Voinovich in recent weeks, Mr. McClellan said.

And Mr. Voinovich, who has steadfastly refused to answer questions about any discussions with the White House, is hardly the only Republican who is feeling the squeeze these days.

The Times piece details the growing gloom of the GOP moderates, the pressure on them, and how it’s noted that the GOP got lots of moderate votes in 2004. So should that be a factor — GOP moderate votes?

Writes Michelle Malkin:”All I know is mainstream conservatives (known in MSM terminology as right-wing radicals or extremist Republicans) are calling Sen. Voinovich a lot of names these days. But “maverick” isn’t one of them.”

And Malkin is RIGHT: “mainstream” Republicans are now different than what they were years ago. It is NOT being judgmental to note that the GOP’s mainstream has undergone a profound shift which seems to be close to firm consolidation with the likely passage of the Bolton nomination — and with what seems to be shaping up as the upcoming successful triggering of the “nuclear option” to eliminate judicial filibusters.

The days of “country club moderate Republicans” have passed. The GOP’s mainstream is NOT the same as it was when then Pennsylvania Gov. William Scranton tried a last-ditch effort to stop Barry Goldwater from getting the GOP nomination. The Nelson Rockefellers have vanished (conservative can be heard saying “THANK GOD!” to that). The party’s mainstream is NOT what it was under Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan or the first George Bush (who ran in the GOP primaries as a moderate Republican against conservative Reagan). Colin Powell is respected, but a major influence within the Republican party, he ain’t..

Unless there is some major shift or defeat, moderate Republicans and pundits should come out and say state the obvious:

In the GOP, the Social Conservatives have “won.”

It’s their agenda that is being pushed aggressively by the party higher-ups and their sensitivities that are most important in cold, hard political terms to the party elites. But even that is too cynical a view. A PERCEPTION shift seems to have taken place within the GOP Powers That Be on issues. It doesn’t seem to only be political calculation.

The pleasing of social conservatives is much more of a priority to party leaders than the concerns of Republican libertarians and Republican moderates. The way Republican moderates are perceived, they might as well paint themselves purple and sing “I Love You, You Love Me…”

The question for 2006 and 2008 will be: if the GOP received centrist and moderate votes in 2004 where will they go next time? Or has the center of the COUNTRY shifted in such a way that if GOP moderates aren’t already irrelevant, they soon will be? And, if that’s the case, what does the prospect of even worse polarization say for both the tone and content of American politics in the decades to come? Will the Democrats fill in any gap or will they be too far to the left?

So next week if, as expected, the nuclear option comes to the forefront, GOP moderates will be under pressure again. Will they fall on their swords for a more moderate path? Or will they argue that they need to follow the wishes of their party leadership so they can work within the party to change it — a prospect at this point that’s as likely to happen as Bill Frist becoming the Democratic party nominee in 2008.

The most likely prospect if existing political trends hold: within a few election cycles GOP moderates — with the exception of an occasional exceptionally charismatic one such as Rudy Giuliani — will go the way of the dinosaurs.