Cultural Moderates And The Republican Coalition

Is it possible to be less than conservative on social issues and still be a part of the Republican coalition? Of course it is. Many voters, such as myself, vote GOP for the fiscal conservatism the party has traditionally espoused. The last several years has shaken that somewhat, but fiscal conservatives are not going to bail on the party for the sins of one administration.

Culturally, the public’s focus regarding the Republican Party is on the Religious Right and a series of hot-button topics such as abortion, gay marriage and stem cell research. One area that gets very little truck these days is civil liberties – particularly the notion that government ought to stay out of our lives. The notion that the individual knows best in terms of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Civil liberties is one area in which true conservatives and libertarians have been largely in agreement.

That was shaken a bit with some of the post-9/11 policies, such as governmental inroads into the right to privacy and the suspension of habeas corpus. These policies run completely against the grain of conservative thought, and although implemented with the best of intentions, have done some damage to the GOP brand. A brand that previously celebrated the individual over the state. I believe this is an area where right-leaning independents and Republicans will once again come together.

If nothing else, I have the feeling some Republicans who decided there was no problem with a GOP administration poking around in their personal affairs – how many times since that day in 2001 have you heard, “If you aren’t doing anything wrong what are you worried about?” – will have a change of heart now that we have a Democrat-controlled White House, Senate and House. Some principles may have been misplaced after a shock to the nation, but those principles will be easy to find once again.

Make no mistake, the GOP is standing at a political crossroads of sorts. Right-leaning independents are not a given at the ballot box at the moment and need to be courted.

The Republican image has taken a beating. I’m no fan of overemphasizing polling numbers, but this is one tough message – trust in the GOP brand is at historic lows:

Just 23 percent in a new Washington Post-ABC News poll said they trust Republicans more than Democrats to handle the main problems facing the nation, the lowest level reached by either party in surveys dating back to 1982.

Not to bear even more bad tidings, but here’s the aftermath of the 2008 election cycle. I’m sure most supporters of the Grand Old Party have read some version of this news, but it bears repeating. Problems need to be faced head-on before moving toward solutions.

And this is the takeaway from 2008:

Republicans face a Democratic president whom a large majority of Americans are rooting for, and a Democratic majority in Congress that has rolled back the gains the GOP had made since its stunning 1994 "Contract with America" takeover. In 2008, Republicans got trounced among America's fasting-growing voter demographics Ñ younger voters and Hispanics.

And for only the second time since 1979, they control neither the White House nor a chamber of Congress.

"We got whomped with single men, we are losing young voters, we are losing Latinos," McInturff told reporters at a post-election Christian Science Monitor breakfast. "Those are structural troubles now, and they are not just one bad (election) cycle, one bad economy."

More troubling for the GOP: They have been pushed back to a regional base in the South and in the depopulating plains. Congressional losses in 2008 all but wiped out Republican House representation in the Northeast. Republican presidential candidates have not been competitive in the Pacific Rim of California, Oregon and Washington for two decades. Once-staunchly GOP Virginia and Indiana went to Obama.

Solutions? I’m reading some great stuff out there on the right at places like Secular Right, Culture11, and now here at NewMajority.

What I’d love to see is a strong return to the core small government principles of the GOP. That doesn’t mean incompetent government where it does, and will, exist. Lower taxes, more emphasis on civil liberties and less government are all steps in the right direction.