Even though I’m a Republican, I’m not a big fan of David Frum.
That said, he is starting to make some sense lately about the future of the GOP. In his op-ed found in Friday’s New York Times, he sets up an interesting conversation among the three wings of the party. And what an interesting chat it is.
There is a lot of meaty stuff to glean from this op-ed, but what struck me was his take on the social conservatives:
Of course you can’t understand why we care about the marriage issue. You’re rich and secure and highly educated. The divorce rates for people like you have plunged since 1979. With your big new salaries up there, mothers can quit their jobs and stay home with the children — while your illegal-immigrant housekeepers make the beds. Down here, though, it’s still the 1970s. Our wages are stagnant. Both parents need to work, and those megachurches you laugh at provide the day care that makes it possible.
We can’t afford a single mistake. We need government to send consistent moral messages to offset the poison your Viacoms and Facebooks are dripping into our children’s minds.
You got a tax cut. We didn’t. That big increase in the per-child tax credit with which you garnished your big payday? We can’t use it. It’s only credited against income tax, and many of us don’t pay very much income tax. And even if we could use it, it usually gets clawed back by the alternative minimum tax. We are the party — but we’ve got little enough to show for it. It’s about time we ran it.
Being a gay Republican, I tend to have a pretty simple view about social conservatives. But Frum reminds me that some of their fears concerning gay marriage is not simple bigotry but also rooted in anxiety about their stagnating economic situation and a changing moral scene where marriages don’t last very long. It makes me wonder if some of the fears of gay marriage comes out of some sense of jealousy; why give support to two men, when straight families are hanging on by a thread?
Of course, none of this excuses some of the hatred concerning the issue; but it does help me understand it.
This economic anxiety also feeds into why Mike Huckabee has made such an impact.
While many liberals and quite a number of Republicans have focused on his anti-gay screeds, many have not noticed his economic populism, where he rails against the high pay of corporate executives and wants government to help poor and middle income Americans.
When it comes to economics, the GOP has been stuck on tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts. Cutting taxes can be a good thing and can be a needed shot in the arm, but they can’t be the only thing in the GOP’s economic quiver. In the 1990s, Democrats learned to move beyond simply tax and spend, and also focused on balancing the budget. Now is the time for Republicans to start disversifying their economic policies.
The GOP has been considered the party of economic opportunity. But that has not been the case during the Bush years. Frum (who has written a book on this issue) has written a brief summary on what the Republicans can do to help the middle class:
* universal health care provided by private companies via competitive markets;
* cuts in payroll – not income! – taxes for parents, to be financed by new taxes on energy use;
* lower taxes in saving and investment, higher taxes on consumption by upper-income Americans;
* tight restrictions on unskilled immigration;
* government action to support marriage, discourage single-parenthood, and fight obesity;
* an energy policy that supports nuclear power and discourages petroleum and coal;
* education reforms that include curtailment of racial preferences so as to prod minorities to higher performance;
* macroeconomic policies that focus on long-term growth: free trade, corporate governance reform, lower corporate income taxes, a higher dollar – without the special favors and individual breaks that yesterday’s Republican party lavished on K Street with shameful eagerness.
Some of this is an anathema to liberals, but it is also an anathema to conservatives-even though it is conservative in scope. I don’t agree with all of it, but it is a start. It would mean that the GOP would have to start seeing taxes in a more pragmatic way, raising them in some cases, lowering them in others. Look at where he focuses tax cuts: on payroll the tax that most working stiffs deal with on a daily basis, and not income which focuses on higher income. If Republicans truly believe that lower taxes spur growth, then we should be lowering taxes where it will really make a difference.
Reiham Salam wrote in post earlier this month that the difference between Democrats and Republicans when it came to the economy is that Democrats tend to be pessimists and the GOP are optimists. However, he believes (and I agree) that the Bush years have tarnished that image with incredibly dumb decisions on taxes and healthcare. Salam offers a message that he thinks the Republicans should be adopting:
The message I’d love to see Republicans convey is a populism that speaks to the head as well as the heart, that doesn’t condescend or make easy promises but rather tells uncomfortable truths: A free economy offer risks and rewards. Government can’t miraculously guarantee that you’ll only experience flush economic times, or that you’ll never experience a serious reversal. But what government can help you do is become more resilient, by designing the right mix of bankruptcy and immigration laws and savings vehicles and social insurance programs and taxes. America has always been known as a frontier society, as a country that gives people a second and third chance. We celebrate those who take a chance and fail, and then dust themselves off and try again. Fear of failure is the mark of a hidebound society We can’t let that happen to us. And we can’t bail out every bank and every hedge fund that flies too close to the sun.
I don’t know if the GOP candidates for president get this. But I think there is a groundswell happening that might just cause a revolution in how Republicans think about economic policy.