DEL.ICIO.USPalin’s ascension shows GOP’s lack of interest in governing
Thursday, October 09, 2008
The Republican Party has held the White House for the last eight years, the House for 12 of the last 14 years and the Senate for most of that time as well. But if trends continue as they have, that run is about to come to an end.
With less than four weeks to Election Day, polls today suggest that Democrat Barack Obama will sit in the White House come January, enjoying enhanced majorities in both the House and Senate. And if that’s how things play out, John McCain is doomed to be cast as the scapegoat by his fellow Republicans, in part because they never really liked him much in the first place.
Sarah Palin, by contrast, will reign as the party’s crown princess.
You can already see the mythology beginning to take shape. Palin is being positioned by conservative media outlets as the stalwart defender of the faith, the true believer who is fighting the infidel with all her power but lacks a committed partner in McCain.
Palin’s the one making the arguments that conservatives most want to hear, such as accusing Obama of “palling around with terrorists.” When the McCain campaign decided to pull out of Michigan, it was Palin who repeatedly and publicly disagreed, insisting that the cause was not yet lost and that she could turn things around.
Palin’s star will shine even brighter in defeat than in victory, and that would not bode well for her party.
The GOP’s political problems have many causes, but distilled to its essence, it can be stated in one sentence: The Republican Party hasn’t taken seriously the responsibilities of governing.
In fact, if the Republicans could govern as expertly and as diligently as they campaign — if they simply cared as much about governing as campaigning — the country might today be reaping the benefits of great prosperity and global respect, and the Democrats would have gone the way of the Whigs.
But look around: That’s not exactly how things are.
The foundations of Republican success on the campaign trail have been appeals to tribal politics — “they” aren’t like “us” — and the easy answers of ideology. But once in power, tribal politics, fixed ideology and a disdain for the hard work of governance have proved disastrous.
Unfortunately, Palin epitomizes that mindset. Tribal politics, easy ideology and disdain for governance define her as a candidate.
In the wake of Tuesday’s debate, Joe Biden was making the rounds of the morning talk shows, chatting up his candidate’s performance, while Sarah Palin was nowhere to be found. Why? Because she is an icon incapable of conversing as an intelligent adult on the issues of the day. Yet the Republican base loves her anyway, as a symbol.
In response to such criticism, Palin’s defenders point out that Barack Obama is also short on experience. It’s a legitimate point — it is certainly fair to question whether Obama has the experience to do well as president of the United States.
However, there is no question whatsoever that Obama has studied the issues and knows them backward and forward. He takes the job seriously. You may disagree with the conclusions he has reached, but as the campaign has demonstrated, he knows the issues and has thought them through.
Palin can’t even make a good pretense of that.
This country needs a more effective Republican Party. The Democrats need a more effective Republican Party to protect them from their own excesses. But to become effective again, the Republicans have to change, and they show no sign of doing so. Quite the contrary.
If the GOP loses seats in the House and Senate, those losses are likely to come in more moderate districts, distilling the GOP caucus even closer to its ultraconservative base. If McCain loses, conservatives will explain his loss by the fact that he tried to repudiate rather than celebrate party ideology.
And if Republicans designate Sarah Palin as the face of the party’s future, as they seem eager to do, they will confirm the belief that they just aren’t serious enough to trust with power.
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