By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Bobby Jindral, Governor of Louisiana, has caused quite a stir in Republican circles calling on the party to throw off the mantle of the stupid and prejudiced among us. Pleading for an end to dumbed-down conservatism, the former golden boy of the party (before a disastrous 2009 televised reply to President Obama’s address to Congress) begged the party to turn away from being the champion of the “haves” and, most importantly, jettisoning its appeal to the lowbrow of society.
It is no secret we had a number of Republicans damage our brand this year with offensive, bizarre comments — enough of that. It’s not going to be the last time anyone says something stupid within our party, but it can’t be tolerated within our party. We’ve also had enough of this dumbed-down conservatism. We need to stop being simplistic, we need to trust the intelligence of the American people and we need to stop insulting the intelligence of the voters.
That sentiment is being echoed in many of the cloistered salons of the GOP. Even bomb throwing (but weirdly cerebral) Newt Gingrich, responding to Mitt Romney’s childish comment that he lost the election to Obama because of bribes gifts to core Democratic constituencies, seems poised to make a philosophical change of course. “I just think it’s nuts,” Gingrich said on ABC. “I mean, first of all, it’s insulting. The job of a political leader in part is to understand the people. If we can’t offer a better future that is believable to more people, we’re not going to win.” Amen.
The transition appears broad-based and involves more than a little soul-searching for the political party whose victories in the 2010 mid-term elections seemed to leave it poised for a complete take over of the government this time around. The shock of November 6th seems sincere enough and could lead to something we haven’t seen in conservative circles for some time – a push to make the party one of ideas and not just demagoguery.
Not so long ago — before the party was held hostage by that tax-pledging Rumpelstiltskin of the Right, Grover Nordquist, — Republicans felt free to represent conservative values and the nation’s interests. Imagine a Republican congressperson saying today, “I am a man of fixed and unbending principles, the first of which is to be flexible at all times.” That was the late Everett Dirksen, the horn-rimmed Senator from Illinois, and one of the men directly responsible for the Herculean efforts to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Open Housing Act of 1968. Both laws decidedly liberal, decidedly unpopular, and decidedly needed to realize the American dream of social equality.
Voting for cloture against the southern Democrats who filibustered the measures, Dirksen told the Senate:
Victor Hugo wrote in his diary substantially this sentiment, ‘Stronger than all the armies is an idea whose time has come.’ The time has come for equality of opportunity in sharing of government, in education, and in employment. It must not be stayed or denied.’
That’s intellectual gravitas not seen in the GOP in some time. Compare it to the rhetoric from the current Republican intelligentsia, this time in the person of South Carolina Lt. Gov. André Bauer arguing against the Food Stamp Program and free school lunches for poor children:
My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed. You’re facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don’t think too much further than that. And so what you’ve got to do is you’ve got to curtail that type of behavior. They don’t know any better.
It doesn’t take a physicist to see how far the party’s grip on the American soul has slipped or how fast.
What can a resurrected GOP accomplish? Here are some ideas:
1. Less Government Intrusion Into Our Lives – The GOP has a traditional and noble role of advocating smaller government with an eye on protecting the property and privacy of its citizens. It was Dirksen who said, “It is the expansion of Federal power, about which I wish to express my alarm. How easily we embrace such business.” Few people would disagree that endless (sometimes mindless) government regulations and bureaucratic red tape are social ills that an effective government could end. Henry David Thoreau’s observation that, “[t]he best government is that which governs least” is as true to the American psyche now as it was in 1849.
2. Strong National Defense — The world is still a dangerous place as Einstein used to say. Whatever you think about the military-industrial complex, it’s worth remembering it is that institution that’s kept us safe and free for decades although we can certainly debate the costs of that security. It’s also worth remembering that for all our flaws, America remains the only nation in the history of the world who having once conquered foreign lands promptly returned it to the indigenous people to govern. A strong America means some sense of justice in the world if only an imperfect one.
3. Protection of Privacy – A political party founded on conservative principles could be in the forefront of protecting the privacy of its citizens. Women’s issues should be the cutting edge of that philosophy especially those relating to control over their own bodies. True conservatism means less government interference in personal decisions and a rejuvenated Republican Party could lead on this issue with perfect philosophical consistency.
4.Advocating For Small Business – The backbone for the American economy remains small business. According to the SBA, fifty percent of all American jobs remain in small business (defined as any entity employing 500 workers of fewer). Most importantly small business fill niches in the labor market that are under-served. For example small businesses employ greater proportions of Hispanics than large businesses (65% versus 35%). Also small businesses hire more high school degree or lower attaining workers as well as more of the elderly and disabled than large business. While small business does not match large business in campaign contributions it is the largest growth area in the economy and worthy of support from a party openly dedicated to capitalism.
These are just a few of the areas where bona fide conservative principles aid rather than detract from the national dialogue. A return to them, and away from the religion-based rhetoric that got the GOP scorched in the last national election, would mean a stronger party and a stronger nation.
For the two-party system to work you really do need two viable political parties who are willing to both advocate and cooperate. The GOP has done a poor job of both. If demographics truly are destiny in politics, the GOP will have to change or die. For the sake of all of us, let’s hope they change.
~Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Update 7:46 p.m.: Is the dike breaking? South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham has added his name the growing number of Republicans rebuking Grover Norquist’s no tax hike pledge. Graham joins Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) in disavowing the now almost two decade old pledge. “I’m willing to generate revenue,” Graham said on ABC. “It’s fair to ask my party to put revenue on the table. We’re below historic averages.” New York Republican Congressman Peter King has also refused to honor the pledge bushing off any of Norquist’s threats of retaliation saying, “A pledge you signed 20 years ago, 18 years ago, is for that Congress.” Norquist was nonplussed and blasted Chambliss. “If he wants to change his mind and become a tax increaser so we don’t have to reform government, he needs to have that conversation with the people of Georgia,” Mr. Norquist said on CNN’s “The Situation Room.” Chambliss retorted that “I care more about my country than I do about a 20-year-old pledge.”
This one is going to get good.
Source: CNN
Great job Mark. I am not sure the Republican Party will ever return to normalcy and sanity. When you allow the Tea Party nut jobs to control your message, along with lobbyists like Grover Norquist, there is not much hope. The GOP wanted to not only end abortions, but contraception! I can understand their argument on abortions, but I disagree. When it comes to ending contraception, but women don’t seem to agree with that return to the kitchen type mentality.
Tony C, It is kind of hard to leave the religious right at home when they are your core. They will be the ones that show up in the primaries in 2014 and 2016. Marco Rubio has that figured out.
Speaking as a liberal, half-socialist atheist academic: Gingrich (that clinical sociopath) is right and Mark’s column is what Gingrich is talking about.
This is a case where Gingrich’s ditching of sick wives, philandering, hypocrisy and full embrace of self-serving, misleading, self-enrichment politics is all truly beside his point: He is a smart sociopath that understands what it takes to win, and what it takes is votes, and votes are attracted by a “believable offer of a better future.”
Here would be my prescription for a “real” Republican party:
Leave the religious right without a home. Embrace, completely, social libertarianism. Pot smokin’, abortionist, free-speechifying, privacy lovin’ gay-rights libertarianism; the core idea that what you do in your private life with your body is not the government’s business unless you recklessly endanger others without consent.
To end the war on drugs, to end the surveillance state, to put an end to the emerging police state in which cops commit crimes up to and including murder without so much as an investigation, to end the unconstitutional searches and the TSA.
The “New Republicans” could embrace fiscal conservatism that still recognizes the value of and necessity of some social programs that VOTERS love. They can say, this country is ruled by the PEOPLE, and the people have spoken loud and clear and unmistakably by super-majority: They want social security so we stand behind it. They want Medicare and Health care, so we have their back. They want school lunches so we are IN. They don’t want war, so we stand in opposition to that.
They can say, we are the stewards of the people, and our “fiscal conservatism” is to properly manage the money and business of the citizenry to accomplish the goals THEY set us with as little waste, as few taxes and as much leverage as we can muster. Our “fiscal conservatism” is the job of stopping the free riders and criminals that would abuse the system, but without denying aid to the sick, disabled, addled and at risk youth the citizenry believes need our help.
We New Republicans do not want to be the party that rules you, but the party that obeys you. Ours is not to question what you clearly demand, our job is to meet those demands with as little waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption as possible. We are not the party of big government or small government, we are the party of the smallest, simplest, clearest, least regulation government that still meets your demands.
Thus we are the party of ending subsidies to profitable businesses, ending tax breaks that prevent change and progress, we are the party of balancing tariffs on goods born of abusive labor and slave labor that make it impossible for American workers to compete. We are the party of getting out of the business of picking winners and losers, if we finance necessary research on your behalf it will be your property: public knowledge that cannot be patented.
Finally, we are the party of transparency in government because although you have delegated the power of decisions to us, you have not relinquished your sovereignty, and we remain your servants with a duty to prove we act in your best interest, a duty that can only be met with transparency in our dealings.
People let’s not forget that this author of this article is Pro Obama’s Illegal Drone Strikes & doesn’t mind his “secret kill list” which is reactionarily consistent with somebody who imagines that Indians were given back their lands to self govern and who blathers on about the need for a “strong defense.”
“Bobby Jindal was the Golden Boy of the GOP for a reason and he isn’t talking policy he is talking “messaging”.”
I agree with Justice Holmes on this as in the quote from Mark’s blog:
“we had a number of Republicans damage our brand this year”
The concept of “brand” is a marketing one, not one of ideas. A “brand” of
food for instance is trying to sell its’ concept, rather than its taste or it nutritional value.
I made a good friend this summer, his name is Paul. He has a degree in engineering and he runs a successful business. He is also someone well-respected in his community as a civic leader. Paul is far less dogmatic than I and is politically an independent. He voted though for Obama, even though the tax increase on the wealthy will affect him. In our exchange of E Mails after the election he wrote me this. I think it is in line with Mark’s blog/thinking. You know that when I write it is with the perspective of a political junkie and cynic. Part of why I think talking with Paul and learning his ideas is so refreshing is that he is coming more from the place of someone to whom politics isn’t an avocation, but one concern among many. He also represents someone who is quite successful in his work, yet he is neither pretentious, nor greedy, nor cares solely about his own needs.
“Why can’t the major parties put forth a candidate that is truthful?
I am an independent. I sometimes favored the Republican candidate, and sometimes the Democratic candidate. This time it was Obama.
Immediately after the election results were in, the excuses poured in on why Romney lost. Not on why Obama won. Of course there are numerous avenues to go down and here are a few.
The Republican party needs to reform itself to attract minority voters, and not alienate them. The obvious result of their anti immigrant policy surely dissuaded many Latinos. Plus the obvious result of the dysfunctional abortion policy not in sync with the majority of women surely dissuaded a huge segment of the population as well.
I believe a party that can rally around a candidate that is conservative on fiscal issues, and liberal on social issues, would be more receptive. But most of all, there needs to be a level of pragmatism that has left the party leaders. Signing a pledge to not raise taxes under any circumstance, as put forth by Grover Norquist, is just plain stupid. It is tantamount to a three year old’s tirade when they don’t get what they want. It’s no way to run a country. Signers of that pledge (as far as I know, only Republicans) are saying they want to get elected, more than they want to solve problems. I don’t know why the Democrats didn’t expose them. And do not say stupid things like ‘our main goal is to see that Obama is a one term president’ when the next election is years away. You are elected to serve the people. If you want to be in office, do your job!
And while I’ve got your attention, if you want to differentiate yourself as a party, be the party of ‘truth’. While both parties participated in ‘ untruths’ and misleading campaigns against their opponents, my take is that the Romney campaign lost more voters by the obvious lies, particularly in Ohio. Making an obvious lie makes people wonder what else you are lying about. Interestingly, there is no punishment for the most or the biggest lies in a political campaign, and that is why this tactic is used more and more. Let your opponents be the party of ‘lies’. Introduce legislation regarding penalties for libel and slander for politicians and their so called independent committee advertisers. And, why be the party trying to stifle votes? Become the ‘welcome to everyone’ party, and not own an ‘us vs. them’ mentality.
I’m waiting for the time when a candidate answers a question directly, and doesn’t respond with a prepared answer that has little to do with the question asked. I’m fed up with these kinds of responses, and suspect many others agree with me. The debates highlighted this behavior. If you don’t have an answer, say so. If you don’t know, say “I don’t know.” You can find out and report back.
There are enough Fact Check organizations out there that could be used as an advantage. It should not be a tit for tat, where it’s okay for you to lie because they lied. That’s a bunch of crap.
And there can be no argument on MATH or SCIENCE. These are to be considered as universal truths. If you don’t agree, you don’t get my vote. Maybe there are enough lemmings out there for you to attract.”
mespo727272 1, November 25, 2012 at 10:20 am
Bruce:
“The fiscal crisis and a war in middle east, so where does obummer go, Burma, RELLAY?
****************************
You’re so right. I suggested he go to Texas and cut wood like his predecessor but no one at the White House would listen.
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LOL.
Ross Perot was right when he said “as soon as half the people depend on government for their existance the party’s over. He must have been talking about the same 47% Romney was.
Frankly 1, November 25, 2012 at 9:56 am
Fonda – thanks for explaining that, I guess the GOP does not need to change a thing!
I read where the administration has put together more detailed rules for drone strikes so it is nice to know these random bombings in foreign countries will now be a continuing, formal part of out foreign policy. Like so many of these horrors both parties have a hand in the degradation. The lack of a sane party on the right has allowed Obama to stake out ground no Dem would have even considered a generation ago. That does not excuse him for his part in this atrocity but demonstrates the need for two sane parties.
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You wrote “The lack of a sane party on the right has allowed Obama to stake out ground no Dem would have even considered a generation ago.”
Big Time bingo!
Sometimes I drift into contemplation of theories which begin with a premise that this is scripted from a layer of planning somewhere above national governments and political parties.
Excellent column, Mark, but I tend to agree with OS on this issue in that the damage may not be reversible and with Justice Holmes that the proof is in the eating of the pudding, not the talking about the pudding. Plus, given his track record, I’m pretty sure Jindal isn’t the guy to be leading anyone in the “charge to smart”.
The tea party gets a bad rap from the main stream media. But all they want is fiscal responsibilty. So lets keep the country in a nose dive.
It’s happening again a Republic says something that “sounds” rational and everyone thinks they have changed. Consider the source, please. Bobby Jindal was the Golden Boy of the GOP for a reason and he isn’t talking policy he is talking “messaging”. A very different kettle of fish or malarkey. Change for the GOP must be measured by how they move forward on policy fronts. On that basis as we can see in Congress if anything they have hardened their positions. Before I believe they’ve changed I will have to see policy results and votes in congress and state governments that stop trying to control women’s lives and stop trying to suppress the votes of people they don’t like. You show me a track record and then we talk change.
OT: Anonymously Yours: “What’s wrong wit the system we forced Germany to take before we’d leave?”
I’m not quite sure I understand what you mean by that. The only point in which the Military Governors tried to put pressure on the Parliamentary Council was the relationship between the federal government and the state governments. The Military Governors tried to make the federal government as weak as possible.
In the end the German federal government is overall about as powerful as the American federal government, although with a different profile of powers.
Do you really think that the federal/state balance of power is the problem?
The middle east truce was a done deal before Hillary got there.
What a great leader Ha.
Bruce:
“The fiscal crisis and a war in middle east, so where does obummer go, Burma, RELLAY?
****************************
You’re so right. I suggested he go to Texas and cut wood like his predecessor but no one at the White House would listen.
The fiscal crisis and a war in middle east, so where does obummer go, Burma, RELLAY?
I want a third party called the common sense party.
It’s also worth remembering that for all our flaws, America remains the only nation in the history of the world who having once conquered foreign lands promptly returned it to the indigenous people to govern.
What Old Nurse said! with the addition of the Phillipines after the Spanish-American War, and Hawaii, and dozens of other countries ranging from Mexico after the Mexican-American War of 1846 to all those Central and South American “protected” by Marine invasion forces, and Western Europe after WW II. The U.S. might not have deposited colonial empire governments a la the British Raj in those places, but it kept control over the indigenous Mexicans, Panamanians, West Germans et. al. with dollar power, NATO, etc. The U.S. is not ALL bad, but don’t fool yourself that it’s all that altruistic, either. Empires come in many forms…
“I just think it’s nuts,” Gingrich said on ABC. “I mean, first of all, it’s insulting. The job of a political leader in part is to understand the people. If we can’t offer a better future that is believable to more people, we’re not going to win.” Amen.
From the above quote I sheperd out, “that is believable to more people”
Gingrich talks to his own ears. Writes to his own perceptions, Thinks within the walls of his own self aggrandizment. These traits are common and ones we are all vulnerable to at times. Newt seems to swim in this self deluded morass, and his head stays well above its murky waters, floating on the raft of money he makes from it.
My point is, When Newt says believable he does not mean true. He means what sounds good and what we can sell to lead the sheep into our GOP pens.
OH YES, “by the way” his personal efforts, I am sure will include several new books and countless speaking engagements, that will raise his monied raft even higher.
PS. Is there a Cynicals Anonymous Organization I could perhaps sign up for? … I imagine Frank Luntz could format a real good 12 step program that would make me an admirer of Gingrich and all things Republican. SHEESH. 🙂
Frankly,
I see your point…. It seems that the party in office tries to out stupid the previous…