Republicans Must Change To Win

These have been a terrible few weeks for the Democrats - so bad that Republicans are feeling faint flickers of hope.

Damaging revelations about Barack Obama - and his own and his wife Michelle's ill-chosen words - have opened the way for John McCain to rerun the Republican presidential campaign of 1988. That year, George H.W. Bush mauled Michael Dukakis, his Democratic rival, as a hopelessly feckless liberal. Mr. Bush seized on three symbolic facts about Mr. Dukakis: he had vetoed a law requiring the pledge of allegiance in school. He described himself as a "card-carrying member of the American Civil Liberties Union". And he furloughed Willie Horton, the rapist-murderer. Lee Atwater, Mr. Bush's campaign manager, is supposed to have chortled: "By the time we are finished, they are gonna wonder whether Willie Horton is Dukakis' running mate."

Can the controversial comments from the pastor, Jeremiah Wright, Mrs. Obama's statement that she had never before felt pride in her country and Mr. Obama's description of white working-class voters as "bitter" achieve the same effect in 2008? In spite ofconcerns from Democrats, who fear victory is slipping away amid the rancorous contest, the best guess? Probably not.

The anti-incumbent mood is stronger in 2008 than in 1988. Ronald Reagan's approval rating was almost 60 per cent in 1988 against George W. Bush's 30 per cent rating today. Mr. McCain's campaign is much less focused and determined than the elder Bush's.

Yet there are deeper reasons we will not see a replay of 1988. Atwater's attacks on Mr. Dukakis were not plucked at random, but carefully chosen to resonate with Democratic weaknesses and Republican strengths: patriotism, religion and public safety.

Today, however, Republican conservatism is tired and confused. Once the party of limited government, now it is the one that enacted the largest new social programme since the 1960s: the prescription drug benefit. Once the party of law and order, it now offers amnesty in all but name to illegal immigrants. Once the party that ran against Washington's special interests, it is now run by lobbyists. Once the party of sound management, it is now tarred by the managerial disasters of the Iraq war and Hurricane Katrina.

Those Republicans who imagine that the party can regain its strength by returning to the core conservative doctrines of the 1980s are making a serious mistake. They are like tourists who believe uncomprehending locals will understand them if only they repeat their message louder and slower.

The country has changed since 1988. Polls capture a shift to the left on economic issues. The once decisive tax issue has faded altogether, and no wonder: 80 per cent of Americans now pay more in payroll taxes than in federal income taxes. Americans care less about taxes than healthcare and fuel prices, issues where Republicans offer few solutions and speak with something less than passionate urgency. Americans are expressing a new pessimism about upward mobility and their children's chances of leading a better life - an understandable reaction to the stagnation of median wages since 2000. Even on the signature issue of the war on terror, Americans are turning away from Republican ideas. The proportion of Americans who believe that terrorism can be defeated by military force has sharply declined since 2002.

So, 2008 is not 1988. The problems are different and so must the solutions be. The Reagan themes do not carry the power they once did. The conservative voting majority is not a majority any more. To compete and win this year Republicans have to adapt and change, not revert and revive.

Mr. McCain could be the perfect candidate for this new mission. He is less bound by old orthodoxies than almost any other national Republican. He fought Mr. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld, the former defence secretary, on Iraq strategy, and has been proved right while they have been proved wrong.

Unfortunately, Mr. McCain has been a maverick on issues that matter least to voters: campaign finance reform, tobacco, climate change. On the ones that matter most to voters - healthcare, economic management, immigration - he has positioned himself with party orthodoxy and against the voters.

This is Mr. McCain's error, but it is not his error alone. If he is a bad candidate, at least some of the blame attaches to a party that will not allow him to be a better one. Our Republican crisis is a crisis of followership at least as much as a crisis of leadership.

Successful institutions are always reluctant to change and the Republican party of Richard Nixon, Reagan and Newt Gingrich has been a very successful institution. Many conservative leaders have quietly accepted the likelihood of defeat in 2008. They point out that past defeats have led to greater triumphs: 1992 to 1994, 1976 to 1980.

But what was true for conservatism on the way up will not necessarily be true on the way down. If the Democrats win the presidency in 2008 (as most polls suggest) and gain seats in both houses of Congress (as most experts predict), they will have scored their most decisive victory since 1964. In 1992 the Democrats won the presidency but lost seats in Congress; in 1976 they won the presidency but gained only one seat in the House and none in the Senate.

A Democratic victory on this scale would be a 1980 in reverse. The Democratic defeat in 1980 was not exactly a harbinger of liberal triumphs to come. This is going to be a tough election for Republicans. But it is not too late to avert the worst - and not too early to begin rebuilding for a comeback.