Welcome Instapundit Readers! While you’re here, you might want to see some of our other posts, including my thoughts on how Sarah Palin’s public image suffers because the MSM gives short shrift to her actual accomplishments, choosing to focus instead on the sensationalist aspects of her story.
In the past month or so, as polls have shown increased public dissatisfaction with President Obama’s policies, revealing that the American people have a predilection for the small government ideas the Republican Party ostensibly champions. I say “ostensibly” because in the past few years (as many have noted), the GOP has lost sight of its principles and signed on to the ways of Washington.
Yet, at a moment when conservative ideas are in the ascendancy (at least in terms of public opinion), conservative politicians seem not to be. What has been a good month for conservative ideas has been a bad month for conservative politicians, with a principled small government Governor disgracing himself by acting like a geeky teenager suddenly discovering that girls really like him, a responsible moderate conservative losing a Senate seat to an irresponsible name-calling left-wing former comedian and an (up until yesterday) up-and-coming Governor with a a natural charm and stage presence, stepping down.
While people may be flocking to our banner, there seems to be fewer and fewer people ready, willing and capable of carry that banner into battle. We may be winning the ideological battle in the public square, only doomed to lose it at the ballot box. Ideas may rally the troops, but they can’t win election to office.
Tea parties continue to draw large crowds. They have clearly tapped into something, an idea which resonates across the country. But, who is going to harness the energy unleashed at these rallies?
This could be the very nature of the Republican Party- a party built by people not liking big government may have trouble finding big leaders in government. The party that loves power and elitism (Democrats) has no problem finding elite powerful politicians. And besides- there is an obvious leader to the Republican party, we just all have to get behind him- Romney in 2012.
No Sarah Palin, clearly.
It would be nice to find politicians both normal and politically savvy. Unfortunately, if you’re normal you get hounded out of politics. And if you’re politically savvy, you’re probably a kleptocratic vampire.
Polling shows that people are moving away from conservative ideas. For instance, polling consistently shows that 60-70% of the public support a government health insurance plan instead of what we have now.
Wrong, homo. Polling shows there are twice as many self-identified conservatives as self-identified liberals (40% to 21%). And the New York Times had to over-sample Obama supporters by a huge ratio to get the result they wanted on their health care.
Meanwhile, 70% of Americans oppose gay marriage. 70% want the borders secured. 60-65% consistently want less government. 41% and rising don’t buy the Global Warming hysteria. 51% identify as pro-life. (Links to polls here).
You don’t get out of the libhomo ghetto much, do you?
(I posted this on the “Palin’s Intentions” blog three spots below this one.)
The leaderless, cowardly, wandering Republican Party may just have been co-opted by Joan of Arc. Sarah Palin will pick the candidates to back and bring her crowd drawing presence to their campaigns in a way that the rubber chicken and cold peas campaign dinners have never seen.
The problem with conventional wisdom is that by definition it can’t think out side of the box.
I will guarantee that Palin has been deluged with political make over artists who want to make her into their version of a Washington insider.
Palin is no quitter. She was not driven from office. She is not hiding from Letterman of Vanity Fair. She is a woman scorned by the effete elite and as Governor, she had to measure her response. Now she can stand outside of the Ed Sullivan Theater with Trig in her arms and Willow at her side and invite David Letterman to come out of hiding and have a discussion girlie man to woman. She will win the news and enormous respect. Any bets on which one will break down and cry like a sissy?
Naturally, I am projecting, but I do believe that Sarah Palin is now free to confront those who think they can pull a tiger’s tail and walk away unscathed.
This business of Palin needing to finish her term ignores the powerful force she can be in the 2010 elections. If she takes hold of the groundswell that is rising against Obama and the Democrat Clown Car Congress, she will have created a base to be reckoned with.
She can take a life of action and conviction into all manner of neighborhoods and promise to fight the good fight for those who live on the fringes of society. She knows the value of government that works and the waste of government that promises ands diddles.
Her line that “only dead fish float downstream” about says it all.
It would not surprise me to learn that a sugar daddy or two have set up financing for her career move. She is now free of all the gnats that kept her batting and dodging as governor.
She is a very smart, very tough and very determined woman. Look out, Margaret Thatcher, your “Iron Lady” title may be taken over by a younger contender.
First of all, V the K is right on. The public never really swung to liberal ideas in 2006 and 2008 so much as it became disenchanted with the Iraq War and Republican scandals. The Democrats rallying cry in 2006 was “culture of corruption” much more than it was a rallying around liberal policies. In 2008, the theme might have been much more “aren’t you tired of George Bush?” rather than corruption, but it was in any case much more a campaign against Republicans rather than conservative ideas. If liberal ideas were so popular, Barack Obama could have been unapologetically pro-choice rather than saying the question of when life begins was above his paygrade; he wouldn’t have had to limit his “I’ll sign the Freedom of Choice Act right away” pledge to a barely publicized meeting of abortion rights diehards. If liberal ideas were so popular, he wouldn’t have had to promise that he won’t raise taxes on 95% of Americans and paint John McCain as a tax-raiser for promoting an idea that his administration is now open to. He wouldn’t have had to say you can keep your current healthcare plan if you like it. He wouldn’t have had to say he believes marriage is between a man and a woman. He could have been proud of analysis showing him to be the most liberal member of the Senate. But the reality is that his campaign was all about painting John McCain as a continuation of George Bush, not a denunciation of conservative ideas and an embrace of liberal ideas. This is not to say that the electorate is as committed to conservative and libertarian ideas as I’d like, but rather that the last two elections were a lot more about specific personalities and specific scandals rather than ideology.
Anyway, I’m not sure Republicans really need a “leader” for 2010 so much as they need good candidates to run in next year’s statewide races. In 2006, Democrats took back both houses in fairly dramatic fashion, but I wouldn’t really say they had a true leader to rally around at the time. It wasn’t important then to have a nationally prominent person to focus around so much as it was important to run candidates that could beat the unpopular incumbents of the Republican party. This is not to say Republicans wouldn’t benefit from having a popular person to rally around coming into the midterms, but rather that I’m a lot more concerned that we have a lot of candidates well-known and well-liked in their own states than I am concerned that we have a strong national leader.
Good article. Wish I had thought of that. You’re entirely correct. There’s a huge dichotomy going on in the GOP: Our ideals are more popular today than 6 months ago, yet our leaders are dropping like flies, and nobody is stepping up to take their place.
I’m honestly baffled. Hope we get some answers soon.
Chairman Steele? Can you give us some reason to hope, please?
Even Colin Powell is beginning to have doubts about The Dear One.
Plugs Biden says surrender is still an option in Iraq.
LOL, yeah, keep telling yourself that. Isn’t that the old Karl Rove permanent-majority refrain? Hah. It’s going to be a LONG, LONG decade for the repugnant republicans.
Funny, the only person who keeps repeating things over and over again is you, buckeye.
Having trouble rationalizing how your affirmative-action idiot Obama is desperately backpedaling as evidence continues to pile up of his illegal firing of Inspectors General, how he lied to the country about his “stimulus”, how he’s quadrupled our debt in just a few short months, how his corrupt band of tax cheats in the Cabinet continue to foul up, and how his party of puppets like Rangel, Reid, Pelosi, and others continue to backpedal away as every day comes a new revelation of their bribery, kickbacks, and corruption?
You seem to think Americans are stupid fools who will sit back while a corrupt oligarchy of bigots who look upon them with contempt levy tax after tax while taking away liberty after liberty. Pity public schools don’t teach anything but anti-Americanism these days; you might have learned what happened the last time an arrogant government tried that on Americans.
Hint: It’s why everyone but liberals celebrates today.
Funny, the only person who keeps repeating things over and over again is you, buckeye.
Because chanting is what cultists do.
Just wait.
Lots of new faces will be elected to Congress in 2010. And if we retake the House, someone who is there now will end up in a leadership role — likely someone we wouldn’t expect.
For that matter, Dick Cheney seems to have been doing a fairly reasonable impression of “opposition leader” on the talk show circuit, explaining how President Obama’s policies are wrong.
And Senator McCain has been surprisingly good in that respect as well — for example, on Iran. If only he could have been more like that during the campaign.
And I still think General Petraeus would make a phenomenal candidate for President or Vice President in 2012.
While I do not care if the present members of Congress of either party get re-elected and keep their private jet vacations to St. Maarten, I am sure they do, and so I have some hope that they will rein in the Current Resident before he does too much damage to the country. Only the useful fools on the periphery have not yet gotten the memo that Obama is failing because his schemes are neither workable nor be affordable.
The old game worked because their corruption only cost millions and the occasional billion and a robust private economy could carry the cost. Obama opened with a trillion dollar ante, then moved on to universal health care, while proposing to replace private markets with the equivalent of sclerotic state industries. Congressional Democrats knew they had a good thing going and are getting nervous about the new stakes. What Obama is spending now will make it harder for them to spend later — not politically, but financially — and the game that has been so good to them in the past is thrown at risk. Whether Obama is an ideologue or not, I suspect most members of Congress care more for their self interest and keeping the good thing they had.
And always remember, despite a perfect storm filling the sails of the Democrats, 47% still voted for the Old Guy.
Sorry Fukuyama, Liberal Democracy is evolutionary, and we are in the advanced stages. The current function of politicians is to connect the voters needed for election & power with the financial backing needed to win elections. Changing parties merely exchanges one set of special interests for another. Issues, candidates are like breakfast cereal…advertise effectively and you can sell anything. All it takes is enough money.
It might be nice if Palin came up with something new – a new country, Alaska? A new constitution? A new party? All fanciful, all highly unlikely. I’m sitting the next dog and pony show out.
Heliotrope said exactly what I’ve been thinking. Sarah Palin is not gone. Or as Kurt Schlichter put it: Remember when Darth Vader faced off with Obi-Wan Kenobi? “If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine?” (via Instapundit).
Marco Rubio will lead the revolution from the inside. Sarah Palin will lead it from the outside.
Palin / Rubio in 2012.
This will give you an idea of why Republican politicians almost always get co-opted:
http://www.fff.org/freedom/0498d.asp
The Republicans cannot win without ‘Big Agriculture’, which feeds out of the government trough just as much as any earmark recipient.
And once you give in once to special interests, you lose the whole philisophical argument for limited government.
Governor Sarah Palin “The Easiest Way To Win At Tug of War”
Sarah Palin is resigning as the Governor of Alaska. I know who is going to miss her the most, the left leaning Mainstream Media. Who will they use for a Punching Bag Now? No more PDS, Palin Derangement Syndrome, to try and bolster their lousy ratings, and dismal newspaper subscriptions . When many of her detractors, go on one of their many irrational rants, about the soon to be late Governor of Alaska, they can expect the response to be: So What, and Who Cares? Sarah Palin isn’t part of the Government anymore, she will be a private citizen.
http://youhavetobethistalltogoonthisride.blogspot.com/2009/07/governor-sarah-palin-easiest-way-to-win.html
“In the past month or so, as polls have shown increased public dissatisfaction with President Obama’s policies,”
Telling yourself fairy tales again?
This morning, Gallup tracking shows Obama approval at 62 – disapproval, 31. A nice 2:1 ratio, and exactly where it has been for 4 months now.
Take off your loony wingnut lenses and try to get in touch with the mainstream of your fellow citizens. We really like Obama and his policies.
True conservative/libertarian ideas mean less power, money, tenure in office, prestige, perks, and authority for politicians. How can you expect them to favor that outcome? They may talk a good game back home, but the corruption (the scandal is not what is illegal, it is what is legal) and pernicious influence of The Beltway is simply more than they can stand – and that presumes that they were telling the truth back home, which I doubt.
Tano:
Don’t confuse personal popularity with support for programs. People can still like Obama personally, but think his health care proposal sucks.
Don’t believe those phony polls you see in the MSM. They are weighted to favor the ‘Dear Leader’. The only one that is objective is at the website below. You may have to scroll down to see the Presidential Approval Chart.
The Rasmussen poll was also the most accurate during the last natural election.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/daily_presidential_tracking_poll
First off I’m new here. Great Blog. A few thoughts. The standard model in politics is that leaders need money and are therefore beholding to their financial backers. Right now most of the BIG money (Soros et al) is behind a larger nanny state (regardless of the general public’s wishes.) The Tea Parties will definately have a large influence on this and the “victor remains unclear.
Who the new “leaders” will be does not matter at the moment. Hillary had been around forever. It only took Obama one great nationally televised speech and BOOM! he became a candidate overnight. The leaders are out there they just haven’t fount their “stage”yet.
Congrats on the Hot Air link!
Comment by Tano @ 10:45 am:
“Telling yourself fairy tales again?
I think you should look at these numbers:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/daily_presidential_tracking_poll
and then reconsider your own personal fairy tale
Why should we want professional politicians of any stripe to “carry that banner into battle”? Legitimacy? In what way are the members of the present ruling faction– by which I include people involved in ANY party as a method of advancing a career in government– suitable for fairly representing ideas which run contrary to the very “ideals” that make them seek positions in government then spend the majority of their efforts securing their tenure?
I do not believe it will be possible to fix what is wrong with our government at any level by doing more of the same. Starting a new party will be as ineffective as trying to “use” any existing party. What then shall we do?
Great article…you are totally correct about the void of leadership. That’s the reason Palin still lingers as a possible candidate…I love her but she can’t get it done when it comes to laying out new solutions
How many republican politicians are really small government conservatives? I mean, not their rhetoric, in their heart of hearts?
People become politicians because they want to exert power. It’s hard to find a Cincinnatus who is willing to invest ten years into being a politician, to have his wife and children become targets for jokes, attacks and threats, to get to the point where they can relinquish power. And if someone does get there, who would work on his staff? Who would be his ally?
It isn’t surprising that this Libertarian Awakening we’re experiencing is terrible for conservative politicians. First, they’re vulnerable; they depend on the lip service they give to the movement being believed. Second, they’re vulnerable to attacks from the other party and the media. Finally, for the movement to be effective, it must seize control of a political instrument; the GOP is the obvious choice, which means displacing the current leaders.
What’s interesting is that this is a true grass-roots movement, with all the attendant flaws of one. No central leadership will cause the movement to fracture when it tries to actually accomplish anything. It leaves the astroturfers room to move in to paint the movement in a bad light. It makes coordination difficult. I’m not sure how much the tea partiers can actually accomplish, but if its only effect is to permanently break the power of the MSM, it might have been enough.
This flocking sounds nice in theory, but nothing will happen until more people are active in the process. This may be harsh but sometimes I think that GOPers are the laziest of constituencies. I know that a lot of the people that read this blog would probably say that they’ve worked on a campaign, gone to a tea party, fundraised, etc. but what about the other 98% of GOP voters? Think about this: McCain got (ballparking) 55M votes in Nov but had to go on public financing of his campaign? If every voter had pitched in $10 that would have been a $500 M warchest. Yes there were a lot of fence sitters who wouldn’t give but I gave a lot more than $10.
Several helpful things to vent your anger (at the right people and place):
1. Cancel all newspapers and cable (propaganda).
2. Attend TEA PARTIES or organize one in your area.
3. Avoid purchasing non-essentials.
4. Save as much money as possible.
5. Attend local government meetings and FORCE them to stop accepting matching Federal Funds for projects they can’t afford.
6. Call your Senators and Representatives EVERY time you are mad about something. Tell them we don’t need them if they let OBAMA run the country.
7. Tell all your friends and relatives to do the same.
8. Subscribe to power organizations like NRA and Heritage Foundation.
9. Vote Independent and Republican (where you can stomach the candidate). Vote with a HEAVY BIAS against Democrats and LIBERAL Democrats especially.
10. Contribute money to defeat Pelosi, Dodd, Frank, Waxman and their ilk in 2010.
11. Learn about the Climate Change HOAX and GREEN SHOOTS HOAX being foisted upon us. Challenge everyone you meet to become informed. Google Milankovitch Cycle.
12. Avoid buying union made products, especially cars.
13. Pressure your state government to FIRE UNNECESSARY employees BEFORE RAISING TAXES. Get citizens to review what is going on or not going on.
Who would want to run as a Republican after the way they treated not only Palin but her entire family? Not me. When I was young and stupid I thought I might run for public office some day. Now I know better. Not only must you endure the most horrible slander but now your family is fair game too. No thank you. Combine that with the BS at the local level where you must run for every local office first before they’ll even consider giving you a shot at statewide let alone national office. Again, no thanks. Lastly, until term limits (2 max for any national office) are in place nothing will change in Washington. Corruption is directly proportional to time in Washington irrespective of your party.
Don’t wait for a leader.
Don’t look for a Great Leader.
Be a leader.
There are two paths for Palin. One is to spend more time with the lower 48 voters and get away from the guerilla war the national Democrats were waging with phony ethics complaints. They drove Gingrich from Congress with the same tactics. NOT ONE of the complaints thus far has gotten any traction but they all cost money and time to fight. Now she is no longer vulnerable to that tactic.
IF she really wants a career, this may be her plan, just as you suggest. Do fund raising events for Congressional candidates and not run for anything herself.
Next, she is an energy expert from her experience in Alaska. That is a perfect position to attack the absurd Obama energy plan. By 2010, if there is any economic recovery at all, gas will be $6 per gallon and, if Waxman/Markey passes, electricity will double or treble. Obama’s policies just don’t make economic sense.
While she is fundraising and making loyal allies in the party, she can be getting a personal think tank education like Margaret Thatcher did. I think Cheney would be a good man to set it up for her.
The other path is to make some money and retire from politics.
turtle,
McCain chose to stay on public financing even though Obama broke his pledge to use public financing — McCain crippled his campaign.
I would really like to see some top level gay conservatives run for Congress. I’m not gay, and am dead against what is known as the gay agenda, but am in favor of equal treatment under the law. Having gay conservatives run for office would be good for the country, and it would make leftie heads explode.