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How does the Senate work now?

Let's talk about that.

Do you think the businessman or Governor in Romney would stand for Harry Reid continuing to fail to pass a budget in the Senate? What "power" would Romney deploy to get the Senate to change?

First, Romney would try compromising with Democrats, but then he would realize that, to Democrats, compromise is really just a stalling tactic to delay Republicans from implementing their agenda while the MSM pounds on them day after day, week after week, until Republicans give it up, whatever "it" is. See Jay Rockefeller's famous "pull the trigger" memo for an example of "pulling Republicans along as far as we can" until they "have exhausted the opportunity to usefully collaborate with the majority."

Second, Romney would try peer pressure to try to pick off one or two Democrat Senators to vote with Republicans. Democrats are notorious for their solidarity, while Republicans are often weak and unreliable, undercutting each other when negotiating comes down to brinksmanship. Just witness how Mitch McConnell interfered at the last minute with House negotations over the debt limit increase to see what I'm talking about.

Third, Romney will need to take control as the head of the party and create a party discipline around messaging that doesn't exist today. Democrats also excel at messaging discipline across the House, Senate, and White House. Republicans never seem to have a coordinated plan in how they communicate on issues. There doesn't seem to be anybody who story-boards the GOP agenda so that the party leadership not only is consistently on-message, but that there is a strategy to the message that everybody understands.

Fourth, it's time for new leadership in the Senate and House. McConnell is to old and tired, too stuck in the past regarding "traditions" that his long-departed friends and foes demanded. It's a new time in politics, and we need new leaders who's first reactions aren't so predictable. We need bold leadership now, people who won't shrink from the MSM's portrayals of them. Or worse, won't shrink from their suppositions of what the MSM will say about them -- but haven't yet -- and then talk themselves out of action before they even get started.

The last one starts with the "freshman orientation" that is intended to indoctrinate new-comers into not rocking the boatload of old-timers. Let's stop disillusioning people as soon as they get to Washington. Let's give new people a chance on committees to show what they can do. Again, the likes of McConnell and Boehner need to be swept aside for this to happen. If that happens, we can see if they go the way of Richard Lugar and try to undermine those who replaced them, or will they behave higher than that, and mentor the new-comers from behind for the good of the party?

-PJ

You make some great points here. On messaging, one problem Republicans have had that Democrats haven’t is that the politicians on our side are less likely to fully embrace the general philosophy. I’m convinced that literally ALL of the Democrats are true believers in hardcore socialism, and that they will ALWAYS get away with every tiny bit as much as they think their constituents will put up with. There are no ‘blue dogs,’ there are only socialists smart enough to know which votes for socialist policy are permissible in the eyes of their state/district, as well as with an eye towards future higher office.

But on our side, we often have to fight members of our caucus, even those who are representing conservative states/districts. Imagine trying to do the kind of messaging you’re talking about, in the past decade, with some of the Republicans we’ve had in the Senate, for example. Could we have really trusted Lincoln Chafee, Chuck Hagel, John McCain, Greg Voinovich, Lisa Murkowski, Lindsay Graham, Bob Bennet etc. to carry out conservative messaging?

Could you imagine Dems representing Dem states breaking their messaging? Never in a million years.