Another Bad Primary Night for the GOP
Tuesday's primary results show that Republican voters are still more interested in “sending a message” than in less important matters like... winning elections.
The only good thing I can say about yesterday’s primaries is “It could have been worse.”
The biggest news is the self-destruction of the once mighty Florida Republican Party. The party was already facing a challenging future. Besides the fact that hundreds of thousands of retired Northeastern liberals keep moving into the state, the Castro brothers will soon be dead and the Cubans will start voting more and more like Puerto Ricans. In order to survive and thrive in a changing environment, the Florida GOP needed to foster party unity, broaden its appeal to centrist voters and, in preparation for future re-election battles, try to fill the most important elected offices (especially those near the top of the ticket - such as governor and senator) with experienced mainstream politicians with a demonstrated ability to win statewide elections and attract independent voters. On each and every one of these counts Florida Republicans chose to do exactly the opposite. And not only do they now face a very real chance of losing easily winnable races for both governor and senator, but the future looks quite bleak.
It is still unknown who won the senate primary in Alaska, but the numbers do not look good for Murkowski. I doubt Miller is in much danger of losing the general election (although re-election in 2016 may be a different story). However the problem with Tea Party backed candidates is not just that they are less likely to win (which they are), but also that they may drag other candidates down as well as damage the GOP’s ability to govern. Miller is already being attacked by Democrats for wanting to privatize Social Security, phase out Medicare and abolish unemployment insurance. Republican candidates in other states may find themselves being asked time and again whether they share these positions.
The Democrats already promised to run as defenders of Social Security, and that issue may become potent, given that: (1) besides Miller, some other Tea Party backed candidates for Senate (Angle and Buck) are on record advocating the abolition of Social Security (even if they may now be backpedaling) and (2) the Republicans are talking a lot about deficits without ever getting around to actually offering a plausible plan to cut spending dramatically -- leaving them open to charges that they have a secret plan to cut entitlements (which just happen to constitute the biggest part of the federal budget – not to mention that it is in fact mathematically impossible to balance the budget without reforming entitlements). Some Democratic candidates may in effect start running against Miller, Angle and Buck rather than against their actual opponents.
Furthermore, quite a few Republican candidates may find it expedient to pledge not to touch Social Security, and such a pledge might seriously limit the ability of the party to govern in the future, since Social Security will indeed have to be cut sooner or later – perhaps a lot sooner than we think. I can easily imagine a scenario: the real estate bubble bursts in China, their banking system faces imminent collapse, the government desperately tries to raise cash for the rescue and sells off almost a trillion dollars of U.S. debt that they hold, the bond market repercussions are unpleasant, the rating agencies threaten to lower the U.S. credit rating within weeks unless the government cuts future deficits dramatically and voila! – Congress starts discussing raising the retirement age and lowering the benefits for younger workers).
About the only bright spot in the primaries (and the reason I classify them as merely a disaster rather than a catastrophe) is McCain’s decisive win. The last thing the GOP needed was a birther running for Senate. Still, all in all it looks like the Republicans right now are more interested in “sending a message” than in less important stuff like, you know, winning elections.