The Death of Conservatism? - 43 Mistakes and the GOP's Dobson's Choice

There have been more than a few recent articles and editorials attempting to affix blame for the demise of the Republican Party. Peggy Noonan blames President Bush. Rush Limbaugh believes a McCain nomination will kill the party. However, even in a worse case scenario, the Republican Party will probably stagger along for several years much like the last decade of the Whigs. Conservative Republicans should probably be more concerned about the impending demise of the conservative movement within the party. Some individuals can be blamed more than others, but this folly has many fathers. The latest blow to conservatives has come from within – thanks to Dr. James Dobson and other egotistical evangelicals. Political doomsayers may be correct and it is likely too late to save the conservative movement in 2008. Conservatives can correct their path to destruction for 2010 and beyond, but only if they look back at recent history, recognize the actions and actors that have brought the party and movement to this point, and to learn from a long series of missteps and mistakes.

Ronald Reagan built a winning coalition of conservatives, independents and establishment moderate Republicans in 1980. A coalition of social, economic and security conservatives had come together to form a plurality within the GOP and wrest leadership of the party from the establishment, moderate GOP. The Iran-Contra scandal (Mistake #1) weakened the coalition and the moderate wing of the party regained control of the GOP (Mistake #2), which led to the election of President George H.W. Bush (Mistake #3).

While the elder Bush had adopted – albeit reluctantly – many conservative ideals, he and the moderate GOP leaders advocated a “kinder, gentler” approach (Mistake #4). Conservatives might have been content to take a back seat to moderate GOP leadership, but they read Bush’s lips and their support and enthusiasm for the Republican Party evaporated after the Bush tax increase (Mistake #5). In 1992 some conservatives were taken in by Ross Perot and his anti-establishment, anti-Washington message (Mistake #6). Others just stayed home (Mistake #7) and helped Democrats elect the Dope from Hope, Bill Clinton, with just 43% of the popular vote (Mistake #8).

The only positive to come out of 1992 was that it helped create an opening for an obscure, but brilliant Congressman from Georgia to lead conservatives to regain control of the Republican Party. Newt Gingrich reformed the three-legged conservative coalition and took an upstart innovative approach of leading the GOP from the House with a 1994 national congressional campaign platform – the Contract with America.

It is important to note that prior to the ’94 elections, Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole and other establishment, moderate GOP leaders scoffed at and were dismissive of Gingrich and the Contract. Dole and Senate moderates rode the Contract’s election coattails, but made it plain that the GOP Senate did NOT sign on to the program, was not obligated to it, reluctantly followed Gingrich's lead, and worked to water down each and every one of the Contract's provisions (Mistake #9).

By January 1996, Dole was the presumptive Republican presidential nominee (Mistake #10). Dole sought to convince Speaker Gingrich to fold up the federal government shutdown stalemate with President Clinton and allow Dole to lead the GOP via his presidential campaign.

Dole gave Gingrich the choice of single-handedly continuing the shutdown and fight with Clinton and the media with Candidate Dole seeking a different path from the House GOP or deferring to Dole's presidential campaign and resuming the conservative battle together with Gingrich’s friend Trent Lott to keep President Dole honest after the ’96 elections. Gingrich made the wrong choice (Mistake #11). Gingrich probably should have run for President himself in 1996 (Mistake #12).

We all remember what happened. By caving in and compromising on the shutdown, the conservative House leadership lost some of their ability to control their more moderate members (Mistake #13). Bob Dole lost (Mistake #14). Trent Lott built his own voice separate from the House (Mistake #15). And with no help from Lott & the GOP Senate and a Clinton veto looming on all conservative issues, Gingrich, Armey & DeLay focused too much of their efforts on the growing Clinton scandals (Mistake #16).

Gingrich was able to maintain order within the House even during the Clinton impeachment. But after the Senate RINOs failed to do their duty and convict Clinton (Mistake #17), the House moderates began feeling their oats (Mistake #18).

Then, the impact of the missing FBI files took effect. Allegations of marital affairs Gingrich and Hyde took their toll (Mistake #19). Seeing his conservative House coalition slowly diminish and Lott's desire to set on a different path, Gingrich stepped down as Speaker (Mistake #20). Then his presumed successor, Bob Livingston from Louisiana, was also taken out by a marital affair (Mistake #21).

House Moderates became emboldened and championed the lackluster Dennis Hastert as Speaker to muzzle Armey & DeLay and appear less confrontational (Mistake #22). This effort also helped to clear the agenda of party leadership for the 2000 GOP presidential candidates (Mistake #23). And in 2000, conservatives settled for the "compassionate conservatism" of George W. Bush (Mistake #24). Many conservatives stayed home, nearly costing Bush the presidency and actually losing GOP control of the Senate in 2000 (Mistake #25).

To be fair, conservatives should thank God everyday for W's leadership in dealing with 9-11. But Bush also squandered the opportunity to push the party and country to the right following that horrible event (Mistake #26). The GOP regained control of the Senate in 2002, but based solely on the country’s fears of Democrats’ inability to deal with national security concerns and not on conservative social and economic principles. Meanwhile, the House drifted further to the center (Mistake #27).

Conservative fears of repeating Florida 2000 helped Bush win reelection in 2004, despite the party's overall drift to the center. By now, any conservative elements in the House and Senate were in complete retreat. The moderates ruled the roost in both houses. RINO defections on the Iraq war (Mistake #28), wasteful earmarks (Mistake #29) and ethics scandals (Mistake #29) were now front and center for the GOP. The only conservative victories of 2005-06 were the confirmations of Roberts and Alito to the Supreme Court. And it took a battle to defeat Bush on his nomination of Harriet Miers to do it.

By Fall 2006 conservatives had become utterly disheartened. Attempts to make the Bush tax cuts permanent stalled (Mistake #30), the continued treachery of Arlen Spector, John McCain, Lindsey Graham and the Gang of 14 (Mistake #31), increased dissatisfaction with George Bush and the Miers nomination debacle all caused conservatives to stay home in November 2006 (Mistake #32). And the GOP lost both the House and Senate.

Occasionally, the conservative movement can still rise up. The reaction to the Amnesty bill was encouraging. But other than that, conservatives have again been wandering in the wilderness. GOP moderates and RINO's have been resistant to allowing a conservative to assume leadership in Congress. And any potential conservative congressional leader has held back (Mistake #33), in part due to the extremely early start of the 2008 presidential race (Mistake #34).

And what did conservatives get for 2008 GOP candidates? Were there any Reagan conservatives who possessed all three legs of the coalition stool - strong national defense, social conservatism, economic conservatism?

Instead, we got Rudy Giuliani. An autocrat who has little affection for social conservatives, but pledged to nominate strict construction judges. Whoopee!

Instead, we got John McCain. An angry RINO maverick who enjoys flouting social and economic conservatives AND even the GOP establishment to gain favor and positive reviews from the liberal media.

Instead, we got Mitt Romney, an uber-wealthy GOP establishment moderate. At least Romney panders to social and economic conservatives with recently discovered flip-flopped positions on issues of importance to those two factions.

Instead, we got Mike Huckabee – the Dope from Hope, part II. While he is just as slick and manipulative as Bill Clinton, Huckabee is nowhere near as smart.

Instead, we got Ron Paul, a true blue, libertarian nutbag. Paul has a few economic bona fides that have pulled away a few non-nut job libertarians. But I'm sorry, Dr. Paul is a kook.

Instead, we got the Obscure Four - Tom Tancredo, Alan Keyes, Tommy Thompson & Duncan Hunter. Tancredo & Keyes are single issue candidates. Tommy & Dunc are well-rounded politicians (especially Hunter), but they lacked the ability to have broad nationwide appeal.

Seeing this morass of blech, Fred Thompson entered the fray expecting to be the savior of the Republican Party and the conservative movement. Fred should have been that candidate.

Unfortunately, Dr. James Dobson and a few evangelical leaders decided to cut off their nose to spite their face (Mistake #35). You see, Fred's not a Bible thumper. Neither was Ronald Reagan. And like Reagan, Fred is a bona fide, all-around, federalist conservative. That wasn’t good enough for Dobson. And when Fred refused to kiss Dobson's ring of evangelical purity, Dobson went shopping for a candidate he thought he could control.

Flim Flam Huckabee seized on that opportunity. Huckabee played Dobson into thinking that Dobson could be a GOP kingmaker (Mistake #36). A handful of evangelical leaders blindly pushed Huckabee as a viable conservative (Mistake #37). The media, who knows a GOP loser when they see one, helped fan the flames of Huckabee's support. For a time, the scheme worked. Huckabee won Iowa (Mistake #38), but eventually the truth of Huckabee's Christian Socialism became evident to most conservatives.

But the damage had been done. Social conservatives were now spilt. Some had been taken in by Huckabee's class warfare (Mistake #39). Some had been taken in by the media's false depiction of Fred as a lazy campaigner (Mistake #40) and settled for Romney, Rudy or, worse, McCain (Mistake #41).

Added into this deceptive mix was the ability of independents and Democrats to participate in and distort the Iowa, New Hampshire & South Carolina Republican primaries (Mistake #42). Media darling McCain was back! McCain – the new Comeback Kid – was ready to lead....the GOP down to defeat. Meanwhile, Fred's race and the ability for the GOP to unify behind a Reaganesque conservative died (Mistake #43).

At best, the GOP could still end up with a George W. Bush-lite nominee like Mitt Romney. He will at least pretend to care about conservative ideals from his Country Club wing of the party.

At worst, the GOP could end up with John McCain. McCain, the perennial thorn in the GOP's side who was once touted as a possible VP running mate for John Kerry!

Who knows? It’s still remotely possible that none of the moderates and RINO’s still in the presidential race will win a majority of the primary delegates. Maybe a conservative nominee could still rise up in a brokered GOP convention. Maybe a conservative national congressional campaign like the Contract with America could still arise in time for the 2008 elections. But really, that’s a fantasy.

The reality is that conservatives will have to wait until 2010 or 2012 to reassert itself as the true and legitimate leaders of the Republican Party. The reality is that conservatives have allowed numerous people to make numerous mistakes which have led the movement to this precarious point. The reality is that conservatives and the GOP are now left with this Dobson's Choice of Romney or McCain. Pass the nose clips and prepare for the worst.

“Actualy, Rush, like me is suggesting that the only thing that will bring Conservatives back together is for someone like Hillary to be in office for very long.

I’ve said it a couple of times, to unite Conservatives will take a Hillary (or even Obama) in office.”

I think we’re more or less back to 1992. GHWB had squandered the coalition and momentum built up during two Reagan terms. He squandered it so badly that we went from three consecutive landslide wins to a loss to an obscure governor from Arkansas.

W has managed to do as “well” as his dad (but did get a second term thanks to 9/11). W squandered what had been built up by Gingrich and conservatives who won both houses of Congress for the first time in forty years, and the presidency for “compassionate comservative” W, and now things look dim to many for 2008.

But in 1994, after two years of Slick and the threatened Hillarycare, conservatives made a huge comeback. I agree we’d be better off with a Dem. president in 2008 than McCain, who’d be far worse than W. A couple of years of Hillary or Obama, and conservatives and many independents would be ready for a repeat of 1994. But I also believe Romney would be a fine president, and that he’d govern as conservatively as Reagan, and much better than the two Bushes.

An interesting fact: both GHWB and W chose running mates who were highly unlikely to be strong presidential candidates after they’d served one or two terms as VP. Coincident? Neither did a thing to ensure a strong candidate after they left office.

First of all, good job Sideshow Bob. I may not be in complete agreement in that not all unfortunate outcomes are necessarily "mistakes," but could also be "defeats" at the hand of the enemy within. You did do a good job of outlining the important events.

Substitute “trusting Fred Thompson and supporting only Thompson instead of promoting another conservative into the race” as a mistake for the last few paragraphs and I think it makes as much sense as your historical analysis

Conservatives, accustomed to being marginalized, routinely fall for the siren song of "he can win" without realizing that they are a large enough constituency to constitute a plurality in the Republican primaries as long as their opposition is divided. This year was the best opportunity for a conservative in ages and WE BLEW IT by not getting together, picking one guy, and backing him to the hilt early in the game.

FR is just the type of venue to accomplish such a consolidation because the activists and communications capabilities are here, but the membership stayed fractured to the very end between Thompson and Hunter. It is not a place amenable to leadership. Too bad the candidates didn't make of use of it as they could have.

Fred ran a lousy campaign and thumbed his nose at the evangelicals.

He didn't thumb his nose at them. He sismply didn't kiss Dobson's (or any other evangelical's) ring. He didn't lie about his church attendance to try to gain their support. He didn't lie about the best way to get fewer children murdered in abortions. He told the truth. Turns out most evangelicals didn't like the truth. They went for the lies that Huckabee spewed with practiced skill and they got bupkus. They will now complain (they meaning "Huckabites") that there's no one to represent them, when they refused to support a better candidate. You can repeat the propagandist mantra that "Fred's lazy" (which was started long before he even entered the race), or you can face the fact that the evangelicals are hoist upon their own petard.

Writer has personal issues. I stop reading.

I have to agree with the writer on this one. Dobson showed a side of himself which I do not care for. He fancied himself a "player" and leaked a "private" email to do his dirty work and then played like "well, it was private." He knew exactly what he was doing. A man who runs a multimillion dollar charitable organization which is constantly under the scrutiny of the left and the media (redundancy alert) knows that his office communications (by email or otherwise) will be made public eventually (especially on an issue like this).

It was planned, purposeful and choreographed. And dishonest, distasteful and unChristlike.

But I probably have a personal issue.

yes he’d reduce the tax cut to have the govt spend more money. I think the private sector can do a better job with the money...even if there is the possibility they might spend it on things Huck doesn’t approve.

I don’t trust the govt to make sound economic decisions to stimulate anything except union membership and power.

I would tell the truth: that the best way to stimulate the economy is to replace the rebate with cuts in the top rate and corporate taxes. But I’ll take any tax cut that denies government the power to spend more money.

"No, Fred thumbed his nose at Dobson. How did he thumb his nose at other evangelicals?"

His stances on the Federal Marriage Amendment and abortion showed he could care less about some key issues that are important to evangelicals. That's what caused Dobson to go off and threaten to go third party.

Granted Dobson might have reserved his fire for the more social liberals in the crowd. But I'm not sure the result would have been any different. Fred at that point became a dissapointment, and Dobson simply reflected that fact.

***

I'm an evangelical. I'm also a federalist.

As Christians, me & my buddy Fred are opposed to abortion and gay marriage.

As federalists, me & my buddy Fred believe that those matters are not defined in the Constitutions and are reserved for the jurisdiction of the states.

As Republicans, me & my buddy Fred can count noses and have figured out that both issues could or would lose in a federal legislation or constitutional amendment process.

What part of politics and the 10th Amendment do you & Dobson not understand?

Dobson didn't reflect disappointment in Fred. Dobson PROJECTED his religious bigotry and political ignorance.

So, it's your position that a Republican President could get not one, but two Constitutional amendments through a Democratic Congress? Non starter. And not federalist either. Dobson needs a political primer course.

"What part of politics and the 10th Amendment do you & Dobson not understand?"

The part where you assume that a Federal marriage admendment would lose. And the part where you feel the need to explained that powers are reserved to the states, when we are talking about a Constitutional amendment to give that power to the Fed.

Dobson is concerned about himself and his ego.

Anyone who claims to know that self-professed Christian (Thompson, who was baptised into the Church of Christ) is not, in fact, a Christian pretends to know the mind of God.

Talk about ego.

Are you suggesting it's not true? Or that Huckabee is saying something else?

I'm saying both. Would you accept that explanation from anyone else? If Romney said "The courts made me spend more money?" Or if he said "The courts made me legalize gay marriage?" would you say "okey dokey, as long as you were forced to."

Huckabee didn't increase state spending by 65% solely on education. He refused to look at places to cut spending when it was proposed by Arkansas Republicans. He left the Arkansas Republican party in a shambles and presided over the largest fine the FEC has ever handed out to a state party. He's a fraud. There's no there there.

"Gingrich probably should have run for President himself in 1996 (Mistake #12)."

If he had run that would also have been Mistake #12.

My point was that a 1996 Gingrich presidentail candidacy would have moved the GOP to the right and removed the whole "It's Dole's turn" canard. Gingrich has numerous flaws as a person and candidate, but his energy and conservative philosophy were wasted by defering to Dole in '96.

***

"And what did conservatives get for 2008 GOP candidates? Were there any Reagan conservatives who possessed all three legs of the coalition stool - strong national defense, social conservatism, economic conservatism?"

Clearly not, but could there have been?

Yes, I believe either Fred or Hunter could have fit the bill quite nicely. I preferred Fred.

***

Christianity has a social side that can't be denied forever, so naturally Evangelical social conservatives and laissez-faire economic conservatives wouldn't always be in the same boat.

Yes, Christianity has a social side, but I practice that at church or in my daily personal life and NOT in my politics. My faith colors my thinking and my politics, but it does not serve in place of them.

"So, it's your position that a Republican President could get not one, but two Constitutional amendments through a Democratic Congress? Non starter."

If Thompson had said, he supported a Federal amendment, but that it probably wouldn't pass, therefore his position would be to leave it to the states. He would have been better off.

This is not an issue that I believe is best left to the states. It needs to be addressed at the Federal level to keep states like Romney's from making it difficult for the rest of us.

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