Deranged Republican Thinking
A few days after the election, Kyle Moore observed, about the dysfunctional Monday morning quarterbacking going on in Republican circles:
If anything this seems to be one of the leading arguments here in the early stages of the Republican party’s “time in the wilderness.” When government by ideology fails, the reason it fails must have been a result of not enough ideology.
[...]
… Following Democratic defeat, I’ve heard time and time again that our losses were a result of the fact that we were not adherent enough to the left, that being so centrist showed a weakness of character and failed to energize the base. There can be merit to this; energizing the base is always something you hope to do in politics, but one must always weigh the costs and benefits of doing so, and take into serious consideration the possibility that energizing the base will cost one the rest of the country.But it is what it is. If ever there was a repudiation of movement conservatism, the last two election cycles would have to be it, and yet you still see figureheads like Tony Perkins [of the far-right Family Research Council] declaring that when this ideology failed, the right answer is to try more ideology.
The latest example of this comes from Sen. Jim Demint, of South Carolina:
The conservative senator, speaking to a group of GOP officials gathered in Myrtle Beach at a conference on the future of the Republican Party, described how the party had strayed from its own “brand,” which, according to DeMint, should represent freedom, religious-based values and limited government.
“We have to be honest, and there’s a lot of blame to go around, but I have to mention George Bush, and I have to mention Ted Stevens, and I’m afraid I even have to mention John McCain,” he said.
DeMint offered a long list of complaints about McCain’s record in the Senate and on the campaign trail.
“McCain, who is proponent of campaign finance reform that weakened party organizations and basically put George Soros in the driver’s seat,” DeMint said. “His proposal for amnesty for illegals. His support of global warming, cap-and-trade programs that will put another burden on our economy. And of course, his embrace of the bailout right before the election was probably the nail in our coffin this last election. And he has been an opponent of drilling in ANWR, at a time when energy is so important. It really didn’t fit the label, but he was our package.”
Bush and Stevens, he said, had corrupted the party brand by expanding the size of government and engaging in wasteful government spending. Had Republicans not strayed from their core beliefs in recent years, DeMint argued, the election results might have been different.
“Americans do prefer a traditional conservative government,” he said. “They just did not believe Republicans were going to give it to them.”
Okay, so Republicans are saying that Barack Obama was elected because he is a traditional conservative?
When the corporate media and Republicans say Obama should “govern from the center” of a “center-right” nation, what they mean is that Obama should govern for the white, the rich, and the owners of corporations. They’re saying he should follow all the policies that got us into the mess we are in.
According to Scott Rasmussen in the Wall Street Journal, Obama is a Reaganist, and that’s why voters chose him:
Barack Obama won the White House by campaigning against an unpopular incumbent in a time of economic anxiety and lingering foreign policy concerns. He offered voters an upbeat message, praised the nation as a land of opportunity, promised tax cuts to just about everyone, and overcame doubts about his experience with a strong performance in the presidential debates.
Does this sound familiar? It should. Mr. Obama followed the approach that worked for Ronald Reagan. His victory confirmed that voters still embrace the guiding beliefs of the Reagan era.
The fact that Reaganomics and Obama’s tax plan are about as similar as night and day doesn’t faze Rasmussen.
John Amato and Barbara O’Brien each have excellent commentaries on the post-election “This is a center-right country” meme.
