Free Republic

There’s a slight spring in the step of Republicans these days. President Obama is stumbling on health reform and his job approval rating is sinking. Suddenly, life in the wilderness doesn’t look so bleak to a GOP that got trounced in the last two elections and was, to some, staring possible extinction in the face. The party could well take two key governorships – New Jersey and Virginia – away from the Democrats in November. Recruiting for next year’s House, Senate, and gubernatorial races has gotten easier, in anticipation of midterm elections that historically favor the out-of-power party. Already, top...

I was a little bit surprised about two weeks ago when Stu Rothenberg declared that Republicans' chances of taking back the House were not small, not tiny, but zero. The usually cautious Rothenberg states that the idea of a GOP takeover is "lunacy [that] ought to be put to rest immediately." Charlie Cook isn't as categorical, but he writes that "the 1934 model [where the President's party picked up nine seats] probably represents Democrats' best-case scenario and 1982 [where the President's party lost 26 seats] their worst-case scenario. As of now, Obama's Democrats are heading down a track much closer...

Senate Democrats are losing their fundraising edge on Wall Street, seeing less money for candidates at a time when the party’s liberal wing is demonizing billions of dollars in taxpayer bailouts to banks. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) raised $10.4 million through the first three months of this year, compared with $9.6 million raised by its Republican counterpart during the same quarter. That’s a much narrower margin than last election cycle, when the DSCC raised $163 million compared to the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s (NRSC) $94 million. The DSCC’s edge has all but vanished since Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.),...

Republican leaders in Congress have created something called the National Council for a New America (NCNA). It describes itself as "not a Republican-only forum" but one that seeks to "engage people in a discussion to meet common challenges and build a stronger country through common-sense ideas." The expectation--mine, anyway--is those ideas will differ from President Obama's in a way that makes Republicans look fairminded and reasonable. The council's first event at a pizza parlor in Arlington, Virginia, did just that. Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush showed up, media coverage was heavy, and the session was deemed a success. Improving the...

Two major debates face conservative Republicans about the future of the party. The first, rekindled by Sen. Arlen Specter's switch to the Democratic Party, is whether the GOP should move furtherfurther leftward. The second is whether conservatives should tone down their advocacy on social issues. History is on the side of outspoken conservatives in both debates. To learn where to position themselves, some big-government GOP loyalists are going on so-called listening tours. The trouble is, skulking around the country on pandering tours isn't leadership. Politicians, lobbyists and campaign consultants who caused the problem cannot fix it. You can also rebrand...

To Bob Schieffer's astonishment, when he wrapped up his Sunday interview by asking former Vice President Dick Cheney where he comes down between Rush Limbaugh and Colin Powell who both say the Republican Party would be “better off” without the other, Cheney declared: “I'd go with Rush Limbaugh.” Cheney related on CBS's Face the Nation how “my take on it was Colin had already left the party. I didn't know he was still a Republican.” Schieffer was surprised: “So you think that he's not a Republican?” Cheney explained: “I just noted he endorsed the Democratic candidate for President this time,...

President Obama’s chief economics forecaster said on Sunday that the country was not likely to see positive employment growth until 2010, even if the economy began to grow later this year. Speaking on C-SPAN, Christina Romer, chairwoman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said that she expected the G.D.P. to begin growing in the fourth quarter of this year. Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, made a similar prediction last week. But Ms. Romer also said that she expected unemployment to rise even after the economy turns, saying that the G.D.P. has to grow at a rate...

Via Greg Hengler at Townhall. It’s superficially surreal to watch a former VP side against his own Secretary of State, especially given Powell’s public approval rating vis-a-vis Limbaugh’s, but what’s Cheney supposed to say here realistically? That he thinks a guy who voted for Obama and has been known to muse that “Americans are looking for more government in their life, not less” is a superior spokesman for a conservative party? This is like asking a lefty blogger if the Democrats are better off with Keith Olbermann or McCain-lovin’ maverick Joe Lieberman. Sure, Liebs is the more impressive person, but...

There are optimists within the Republican Party. They look at the wreckage left behind after last year's elections, and recall 1964. That was the year that Barry Goldwater, the Republican nominee for president, was so badly trounced that pundits proclaimed the GOP dead. But it was also the year that a new breed of conservative activists, myself among them, brought a new energy to the party that eventually reshaped it and led to years of Republican domination of the executive branch. The whistle-past-the-graveyard crowd imagines that this year's doomsayers have simply forgotten history: Four years after the 1964 disaster, they...

f forced to pick, former Vice President Dick Cheney said he'd side with conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh over his administration's former Secretary of State, Colin Powell. "If I had to choose in terms of being a Republican, I'd choose Rush Limbaugh," Cheney said when asked about whose vision of the GOP he'd side with. "My impression was that Colin was no longer a Republican." Cheney spoke on one of the more dogged issues facing the GOP during an appearance on CBS's "Face the Nation" Sunday, encouraging Republicans' outreach efforts while maintaining that the party needs to be true...

You could forgive Republican leaders for rolling their eyes this past week as they read obituaries declaring the death of the GOP. After all, many Washington pundits had already declared the Republican Party dead following its defeats in 1964, 1974 and 1992. The Democratic Party was also written off after taking a beating in 2004, with Republicans and Democrats alike debating whether George W. Bush's re-election would usher in a permanent Republican majority. If it did, the Era of Republican Supremacy lasted a total of two years. With that as our historic backdrop, I suggest that political commentators sit back,...