Pity Party [Peggy Noonan on the Republican Party]

The Wall Street Journal ^ | May 16, 2008 | Peggy Noonan

[Irish Rose]

Pity Party

Big picture, May 2008:

The Democrats aren't the ones falling apart, the Republicans are. The Democrats can see daylight ahead. For all their fractious fighting, they're finally resolving their central drama. Hillary Clinton will leave, and Barack Obama will deliver a stirring acceptance speech. Then hand-to-hand in the general, where they see their guy triumphing. You see it when you talk to them: They're busy being born.

The Republicans? Busy dying. The brightest of them see no immediate light. They're frozen, not like a deer in the headlights but a deer in the darkness, his ears stiff at the sound. Crunch. Twig. Hunting party. ...

"This was a real wakeup call for us," someone named Robert M. Duncan, who is chairman of the Republican National Committee, told the New York Times. This was after Mississippi. "We can't let the Democrats take our issues." And those issues would be? "We can't let them pretend to be conservatives," he continued. Why not? Republicans pretend to be conservative every day.

The Bush White House, faced with the series of losses from 2005 through '08, has long claimed the problem is Republicans on the Hill and running for office. They have scandals, bad personalities, don't stand for anything. That's why Republicans are losing: because they're losers.

All true enough!

But this week a House Republican said publicly what many say privately, that there is another truth. "Members and pundits . . . fail to understand the deep seated antipathy toward the president, the war, gas prices, the economy, foreclosures," said Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia in a 20-page memo to House GOP leaders.

[Sybeck1]

In Mississippi, you did have a hard fought Republican primary just weeks before these runoffs with Childers between Greg Davis and Glenn McCollugh. McCollugh was the more establishment candidate and lost by only a few hundred votes. I personally don't think many of McCullogh’s supporters came to Davis’ defense after such a hard fought primary with negative ads.

[1rudeboy]

How did you manage to type that with your knees jerking so badly?

[MBB1984]

Excellent post. I also think Noonan nailed much of the problem in the GOP.

[TomGuy]

My first thought was: You have to be stupid to be stunned by that. Second thought: Most party leaders in Washington are stupid – detached, played out, stuck in the wisdom they learned when they were coming up, in '78 or '82 or '94. Whatever they learned then, they think pertains now.

McCain offers nothing that is inspiring or makes one enthusiastic to support him. He is just another politician making empty campaign promises and hoping voters don't look too closely at his 25-year record in Washington.

Like it or not, Obama is inspiring his followers and bringing enthusiasm to his campaign. He is also bringing in many new young voters. Obama's message (lofty words that have little substance, but they sound good) is resonating: He is something different, he represents a signficant change, he is not old-Washington-establishment-status-quo-same-ole.

Obama's trend in the primaries was to bring in new voters. If he continues that, he could bring in more than enough new voters to overcome the disaffected Hillary loyalists.

McCain depends on the old voters, and he has to reach across the aisle for disgruntled Dems and Independents for much of his support. It may not be enough, especially if the Conservatives write in Donald Duck or vote for a 3rd party or go fishing.

[TomGuy]

Fox&Friends

Geraldo declares that McCain is the savior of the Republican Party, because of McCain’s stand on immigration [that is amnesty for illegals, which Geraldo also supports].

[TADSLOS]

What happens to the Republicans in 2008 will likely be dictated by what didn't happen in 2005, and '06, and '07. The moment when the party could have broken, on principle, with the administration – over the thinking behind and the carrying out of the war, over immigration, spending and the size of government – has passed. What two years ago would have been honorable and wise will now look craven. They're stuck.

Noonan is a spurned and scorned WH speechwriter who consistently takes jabs at Bush. There is no love lost between them, but she is on the money with that paragraph.

[PjhCPA]

Typical shoot the messenger response.

Peggy has been spot on this entire election cycle. Point out one thing wrong in this column. The GOP just plain SUCKS!!!!

Go ahead and drink the coolaid with the rest of the party.

[1rudeboy]

I couldn't figure out that reaction, either. As if the person writing the column makes any difference. What about the rest of the columns stating exactly the same thing all over FR?

[brydic1]

Peggy woke up to this coming debacle before the vast majority of Bushbots went to bed. If George Bush had any political sense, he would have taken elocution lessons from Noonan a day after getting into the White House. As for a speech writer, his was lousy. Noonan was the speech writer for Ronald Reagan, need any more be said. Although I sometimes did not like to hear what Peggy Noonan was telling conservatives 6 or 7 years ago, she was right on target. The presidential conduct of George Bush and the party he led is like 8 year study of a planned suicide.

What a shame we did not listen to this wise woman years ago. Not sure that this debacle could have been avoided but we could have been better prepared for it and maybe could have arranged to have some life jackets on board as GWB ship of state begins its plunge into the oceans depths.

[MortMan]

I sure hope our purist finger pointing conservative psuedo-intelligentsia are right about an intentional tank job this year leading to a conservative resurgence in 2010. Depress the vote! Show “those people” in Washington what’s what, as if they(and we) have no responsibility whatsoever for the silly decisions our party “leaders” have made.

You are SOOO right! Lauding our elected "leaders" for doing such a bang-up job at gutting conservatism right out of the R party would be so much more effective at bringing conservatism back.

[PjhCPA]

Agree. I’m very tired of posters who don’t read the article and just bash the author.

[brydic1]

What does it take to wake up the brain dead. I suppose only a sweeping 75% defeat in November, oh no, it would be just the same old same old, blame the conservative that has the principles to reject the failing leadership of the GOP. They will go to their graves believing that the compassionate conservatism of George Bush was really a great success.

Go outside, visit your neighbors and find out how they feel. Work at the polls on election Day. Those sitting at their computers in some imaginary world can not experience the views of the average American voter. Our citizenry have completely turned off the Republican Party and they tune out anything that comes out of the mouth of George Bush. It is sad because a lot of what he says (after disregarding his flawed delivery) makes sense but they will no longer listen.

[AndyJackson]

. "Members and pundits . . . fail to understand the deep seated antipathy toward the president, the war, gas prices, the economy, foreclosures," said Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia in a 20-page memo to House GOP leaders.

Peggy is spot on, and Republicans better look hard in the mirror and take stock. I support a strong and effective counter terrorism strategy. While I think Petraeus is doing the best he can, I support nothing else this administration has done. The neocons who led this mess have not one day of military experience between them. NOT ONE. Chertoff is the public face of Homeland security, and it is not a pretty one. He needs to be gone - and like yesterday. HS is a fraud anyway. It is the DOD, CIA NSA and FBI who will save us from terrorists, not a bunch of highschool dropouts with rubber gloves scaring little girls in airports.

Running hyperinflation and then denying it exists in order to bail out the banks, and the national debt for an ill-planned war, is Jimmy Caterism. The lesson when you don't know how much things cost the average voter is that you lose the next election (Bush Sr, Carter).

[AndyJackson]

Lauding our elected "leaders" for doing such a bang-up job at gutting conservatism right out of the R party

The Republican party needs to take a hard look at why Ron Paul has done as well as he has (beaten many "serious candidates" in the polls, best selling book, still getting lots of money). Where there is smoke....

[andy58-in-nh]

Solid analysis on your part, sad to say. Sad, because while some folks here have responded reflexively in denigrating the messenger, I do not see Ms. Noonan's observations as the result of personal bitterness or disillusionment, but of clear-eyed realism. She sees what Washington insiders frequently fail to see: that even people of principle and good character are seduced by the lure of a lavish Congressional lifestyle. She also recognizes that the President bears a fair degree of responsibility for the GOP having lost its way, partly as a result of embracing big government programs, partly by allowing great national problems to fester, but also by his serial inability to articulate policy.

Government service is a vastly different enterprise for liberals and conservatives, and one in which conservatives, absent force of will and unshakable principle, are always going to be at a disadvantage. Liberals believe in government, actively pursue its expansion, and participate in it as a vocation. Conservatives see government as a necessary evil, seeks its reduction, and participate in it as a matter of public service.

When the GOP began to gravitate toward and ultimately embraced Big Government, it abdicated not only principle but motivating spirit. They ceded public arguments to Democrats who are always happy to seize on any opportunity to accuse Republicans of being unprincipled, if they cannot otherwise charge them with being evil.

Hence, Ms. Noonan is correct in her charge against RNC chairman Robert Duncan, who doesn't want to let Democrats "pretend to be conservatives," while failing to grasp that Republicans "pretend to be conservative every day".

[1rudeboy]

I wish I could remember exactly what it was that Noonan wrote that ticked people off. It would be funny (in retrospect) to see if she was merely pointing out the obvious.

[sarasota]

And we will. We will not “appease” the Democrats; we will crush them. (I never get tired of saying that.)

[AndyJackson]

seduced by the lure of a lavish Congressional lifestyle. She also recognizes that the President bears a fair degree of responsibility for the GOP having lost its way, partly as a result of embracing big government programs, partly by allowing great national problems to fester, but also by his serial inability to articulate policy.

A minor correction. Lavish is not the right word. While Congressmen receive salaries that put them in the top 5%, DC is a very high cost of living area, and it provides what is not much more than a standard middle class living. I would rather say that they are seduced by power, connections and the Washington DC influence machine which sits on their doorstep, home and at work, in DC and in their districts and advocates this or that special interest.

Bush gave a great speech during reelection about helping small business - i.e. sole proprietors - who are the engines of employment - through a number of measures including legal system relief and regulatory reform. Problems have gotten worse, not better.

He cannot articulate policy, because at this point he has no policy. In the ME he is endless playing the Game, but there is no end game.

[Theodore R.]

The complete bottom of the hollow GWB presidency fell out on March 31, 2005, the day Terri Schiavo was murdered.