Governing A House Divided

It's increasingly clear that even in the unlikely event that the GOP manages to hold on to the White House in 2008, the Democrats will probably expand their Congressional majorities and hold a commanding position on Capitol Hill. This is the context in which Reihan makes the tentative case for John McCain, and it suggests an interesting subtext to the GOP nomination contest. The various candidates are essentially competing to spend four years bickering with a Democratic majority, and it's safe to say they'll go about it in different ways. A vote for Mitt Romney, for instance, is probably a vote for Clinton-style triangulation, and a Republican White House that views bipartisan reform efforts (health care, anyone?) as the ticket to high approval ratings and second term. The same goes for McCain, most likely, given his track record in the Senate - unless he ends up engaged in a political war of attrition with the Democrats over Iraq. A vote for Rudy, on the other hand, is likely to be a vote for confrontation over triangulation - which is probably why so many conservative primary voters, a confrontational bunch if there ever was one, find him so easy to like.

My calculus here has less to do with ideology than with governing style. You could argue, based on his record as New York's mayor, that Rudy Giuliani is technically ideologically closer to the Democratic Party than most of his rivals in the field. But I'm nonetheless willing to bet that Washington would be a more polarized and nasty place with Giuliani in the White House than with McCain or Romney (or Huckabee or Thompson, for that matter) occupying the oval office.

Comments

Thanks for the moot point, Ross. None of the above will be in the White House. It would interfere with the poetic injustice of a Democratic President and Congress inheriting the Iraq occupation and the lion's share of the upcoming, no good options shit storm.

Posted by Bill | September 14, 2007 3:16 PM

I'm with Bill. Republicans should probably choose their candidate not on how he would govern but on which one of them it would be best to see crushed. That depends partly on the narrative.

If you want to claim the loss was due to abandoning traditional conservative principles, then Giuliani is the guy.

If you want to claim it was the because you nominated a candidate that people couldn't trust, then Romney is the clear choice.

If you want to claim it was because of fatigue from the Iraq War, try McCain.

If you want to claim it was because people still wanted to win the Iraq War, try Paul.

If you want it to be such a complete blowout that Republicans are forced to rethink their positioning, try any of the other candidates.

Posted by Bo | September 14, 2007 3:42 PM

Because ideologically speaking authoritarian nut cases and the Democrats go hand in glove.

Posted by Joseph | September 14, 2007 4:21 PM

A vote for Mitt is a vote for America

Posted by romney facts | September 14, 2007 4:53 PM

Romney Fact~

It's too bad America's not running. She decided to wait for 2012.

Posted by Steven Donegal | September 14, 2007 5:15 PM

But I'm nonetheless willing to bet that Washington would be a more polarized and nasty place with Giuliani in the White House than with McCain or Romney (or Huckabee or Thompson, for that matter) occupying the oval office.

Maybe. I’m still not convinced though, that, irregardless of the nastiness factor, a lot of what we see out of the Rudy campaign isn’t just plain old GOP primary politickin’ 101: run hard to the right until the nomination is sewn up, and then tack back to the center. Because, given his pro gun control/pro sanctuary/pro abortion rights/pro gay past there’s not all that much that Rudy can do when it comes to demonstrating his right-wing bona fides, he just snarls his way through the campaign on the issues of national security and Hillary Clinton.

Still, I agree with a lot of folks that there’s something faintly Nixonian about Giuliani, and he probably wouldn’t be greeted very warmly by a mostly Democratic Washington. On the other hand neither was Nixon, but, working with a Democratic congress, he actually managed to get a lot done, domestically.

Posted by Jasper | September 15, 2007 11:50 AM

Still, I agree with a lot of folks that there’s something faintly Nixonian about Giuliani

YA THINK???

I am completely confident in predicting that a Giuliani administration would recast Nixon's in a very favorable light for most liberals. Every presidential candidate is breathtakingly egocentric. But Giuliani is a thoroughgoing megalomaniac, with transparently authoritarian instincts. He's the only candidate that would be both as bad for unborn foetuses as any liberal and worse for America than George W. Bush.

Posted by Bill | September 15, 2007 3:36 PM