As much as I enjoy watching the Republicans implode, I do wish that they would figure out a way to be a sane opposition party that can be trusted to run the country from time to time. Perhaps it is too hard to figure out what the GOP should do if we keep ourselves to analysis of the national party. It might be easier to see how an individual Republican can win in the Northeast or Mid-Atlantic regions of the country.
If I were a campaign adviser for a Republican running for Congress from the Northeast or Mid-Atlantic region, I would give the following advice.
First, being against environmental and energy reforms is like being against Kennedy’s space program. Rather than fight it, you should champion it. Make environmentalism and energy reform the keystones of your campaign. Don’t let your opponent get to your left on these core issues and make clear how your district can be part of the solutions and not part of the problems. In the same vein, talk about food, drug, and product safety, and make sure to promise that you’ll fight to see that the federal government does its job regarding inspections and oversight. These are the key areas where you want the federal government to be involved, and you need to let people know that you support these federal programs.
On the so-called cultural issues, regardless of where you stand, you need to make sure people know that they are of comparatively little importance to you relative to the big issues facing the country. If you are personally opposed to abortion, make sure that you communicate that you have no intention of imposing that view on others that do not share your beliefs. Don’t talk about restricting gay rights. Don’t obsess over non-white illegal immigration. Do not make your campaign about demonizing any group of human beings.
After you have established that you want to go to Washington to help Washington do a few vital things very well and not to beat up on minorities and people with different beliefs, start talking about the things Washington is not doing well. It’s okay to suggest eliminating some programs, but it is generally preferable to talk about how to make poor functioning programs work better.
This is especially true when you talk about education. There will always be opportunities to identify problems with public education. Come up with good ideas to improve education that connect with people on a gut level.
It is still acceptable to act like a traditional Republican when it comes to taxes and national defense. But it is preferable to allow for some nuance in those positions when campaigning in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. For example, it won’t hurt to admit that sometimes taxes need to go up and sometimes they need to go down, but it is always preferable to keep taxes as low as possible, and that deficit spending should be kept to a minimum. Right now is not the best time to argue for tax cuts for the rich, so don’t. It’s okay to talk tough about maintaining the world’s best armed forces, but talk about trimming the overall budget, too.
You need to reach out to the Republican base and to attract people toward Republican ideology, but you have to define a regional ideology. Small businesses are a natural constituency for Republicans if you can identify regulations, federal mandates, and tax law that negatively impact them. Talk to them and find out all the ways the government is making their jobs harder and cutting into their bottom line. Develop a platform aimed at giving the small businesses in your district relief.
You need to distinguish yourself from the Democrats and the Democratic incumbent, but you also have to accept that the people of these regions actually prefer Democratic policies and they don’t trust the national Republican Party. You can win the election by neutralizing mistrust. You have done this by:
1) Presenting as a strong environmentalist who is interested in energy reform.
2) Making clear that you are running for office to make the government do a few things very well, including food, drug, and product safety.
3) Making clear that cultural issues are not why you are running for office and that you will not legislate your beliefs.
4) Not bashing gays or racial, ethnic, or religious minorities.
5) Showing strength, but also a degree of flexibility, on tax cuts and defense spending.
You distinguish yourself by your commitment to the concerns of the small businesses in your district and your ideas on reforming education policy. People already know you are a Republican, so they know that you are likely to be a booster of the Pentagon, of Big Business, and of cultural conservatism. Whatever benefit you get from that, use it. But don’t run too much on it, because it won’t win you an election in these regions of the country.
Now, if you follow this advice and you get elected, make sure to maintain an independent voting record on exactly the policies that you ran on. Once enough of you get elected in the Northeast and the Mid-Atlantic, you’ll be able to form a caucus in Congress that can defend itself and start to influence the national party.
One last piece of advice: you can go negative on Democrats for ethical shortcomings. Rough campaigning is expected around these parts.
One additional strategy that I should have mentioned has to do with civil liberties and preventing the federal government from invading privacy. These issues are more salient in the west than in the east, but genuine opposition to Big Brother policies will help peel off a portion of the progressive electorate if the Democrat doesn’t have a good record on civil liberties.
Yes, the now vanished libertarian wing of the Republicans. The libertarians I know are Democrats these days, but they would jump ship given a chance.
Great advice, but the problem for any gooper with the above attributes is that they’d be mercilessly pounded in a state primary by someone more insane, who would likely appeal to the base more than them.
Frankly, if I was a gooper in the NE I’d sriously consider switching to the dem party. They could always switch back when the tide turns.
I find it hard to believe that anyone who calls themselves a Republican would actually go for that platform. Consider the converse – Democrats circa 2002 in the South. The appropriate advice for an aspiring Southern Democrat would be:
In fact, John Arthur Eaves tried exactly that playbook in Mississippi – didn’t fare so well, though. Truthfully, no platform would have worked for him – he was running against a solid incumbent in a solidly Republican state. The same will be true of Republicans in the Northeast for a generation – it will take a major screw-up by the Obama administration for the GOP to get any traction as an opposition party. Until then they’re FUBAR, no matter what they do.
If not for Katrina, the implosion of Iraq, and the financial meltdown then we might be in the same position now…
One thing to keep in mind is that politicians make mistakes regardless of what party they belong to. There will be more Rod Blagojevich’s in the futute. When Democrats stumble, the Republicans can take advantage. But we saw Nick Lampson lose after one term in Tom DeLay’s seat because the Democrats just aren’t popular in that district and we saw Tim Mahoney lose after one term in Mark Foley’s seat because he was almost as ethically-challenged as Foley.
It won’t be easy for Republicans to hold onto the seats they gain, but it will help if they share the values of people of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic on the environment, and they don’t adopt Southern values on cultural issues.
Valuable advice, sure to be disregarded. That is true not only due to jdw’s advice, but also for reasons of money. Republicans attract financial support on the basis of their alliance with the business community. When they adopt populist positions it is with the tacit understanding that this is an election promise. But food and product safety is particularly unappealing to the Chamber of Commerce.
Booman, I find your contribution here valuable because we do need an opposition party. This is what I would like the opposition to look like when I am faced with a corrupt Dem. I cannot imagine a Republican succeeding with this platform in the current Republican party.
Not hopeful. For the time being I will savor the good news on our side.
I would advise they become classic conservatives which means, a non-interventionist foreign policy, sound currency and fiscal responsibility, and champions of civil liberty. You know which Republican I’m talking about because there aren’t many of them.
Of course, in their current form Republicans have zero credibility on all these issues. And their fundamentalist base demands wars abroad and patriot acts at home.
So they are even less likely to take my advice than Booman’s.
As the economy weakens, so does the electorate’s trust in the party that brought us a doubling of the national debt in eight years, two foreign wars, unmatched involvement of the national government in the affairs of ordinary people and a crunching banking crisis that can be laid right at the door of wall street plutocrats.
Your advice is sound, Booman, but I doubt whether the GOPeers will heed it on the way to their own political Armageddon. Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad.
Psst… the best meat is in the Rump!
The republican party’s formeost spokespeople are Rush Limbaugh, Joe the Plumber (who’s not actually a plumber) and Sarah Palin. That pretty much says it all, in my book! I mean-words fail me!
A functioning democracy needs a functioning opposition and as this economic war comes to be seen more and more as the the Democrat’s war there will be no shortage of things to oppose. It doesn’t take a genius to oppose higher deficits, taxes, cutbacks, prices and lower jobs – all of which the USA is likely to get for the next few years even if Obama does a good job.
In fact, opposition in such circumstances is likely to be the easiest job of all – especially for newer Republicans who can’t be tied back to the Bush regime.
But my question is, why should Democrats support such a role for the Republicans – who as the party of and for the wealthy are always going to have an inbuilt advantage with natural business, media, military, nationalist, religious fundamentalist and individualist allies?
Why not seek to move the Overton windo so far, that the natural opposition to Obama – who is bound to be compromised by institutions and circumstance – comes from the left and not from the right?
As FDR is reputed to have said – “I agree with you, now MAKE me do it”. Obama needs an opposition from the left to enable him to do centrist things. If anything “progressives” should be adopting populist oppositional stances which compete with Republicans for the anti-incumbent, anti-establishment vote as Obama is more and more blamed for the unavoidable economic catastrophe which we will see over the next 5 years.
If anything, Booman, you should be advising radical progressives on how to oppose an increasingly establishment Democratic elite – and to compete with the Republicans for the opposition vote. The republican’s don’t need or heed your advice. True progressives do. Why leave the field open for Republicans to capture the alienated vote?
Why not split the Right rather than the left? This battle isn’t going to be fought across a simple centrist front-line. It is also going to be fought by political commando raids way behind enemy lines.