Pushing the Envelope

Howard Fineman notes that all the energy and excitement in the GOP field is being generated by the more heterodox candidates – Paul, Huckabee and arguably Giulani – rather than by “Mr. Conservative” candidates like Romney, Thompson and (arguably) McCain, and argues that this is bad news for the GOP, because it makes the race seem "formless and chaotic." He writes: "The nomination is very much worth having. But to grab it, someone is going to have to step forward on the stage to play Ronald Reagan with a script by Karl Rove."

Well, maybe: I suppose it would make Fineman's job easier, at least, if every GOP race followed the same precise and predictable script. But when a party has just endured a crushing rejection at the polls, when its de facto leader has approval ratings in the thirties, and when its brand has never been more unpopular with voters, maybe a little formlessness is preferable to perfect "Ronald Reagan with a script by Karl Rove" order. This is basically why I’ve enjoyed the rise of Huckabee and Paul: Not because I agree with them on an issue-by-issue basis, but because they’re willing to push the envelope a bit, and expand the definition of what a conservative can stand for in ways that I think are ultimately healthy for the party. Paul, for instance, is far too non-interventionist for my taste, but he’s serving a valuable purpose even so, by highlighting – in a field where the front-runners seem to be competing to see who can yell “Islamofascism” the loudest – how cramped the intra-party foreign policy debate has become. Huckabee, similarly, is pushing a variety of bad ideas, but he’s willing to at least address a set of issues – jobs and health care, the environment and inequality – that would otherwise be entirely absent from the debate. Without the two of them, you’d have a field whose ideological spectrum runs from Steven Moore to Grover Norquist on domestic policy, and from Michael Ledeen to Norman Podhoretz on foreign affairs. There would be greater party unity, sure, but sometimes unity’s just another word for self-marginalization. I don’t think Huckabee and Paul are the ideal candidates to jolt the GOP out of its ideological rut, but they’re better than nothing.

Admittedly, all of this assumes that Huckabee doesn’t end up delivering the nomination to Rudy Giuliani (a possibility that seems to be keeping Ramesh up at night), whose own unique blend of envelope-pushing and orthodoxy would create a Republican Party that I would have great difficulty supporting. Which is, of course, the great danger with rooting for a GOP shake-up – you never know whether you’ll like how things actually end up shaking out.

Comments

This post is right on the money.

Posted by Dilan Esper | November 29, 2007 1:24 PM

Completely agree. Last night's debate was the most entertaining Presidential debate I've ever seen, partly because the questions were brutally direct, but mostly because the candidates didn't let each other off the hook. I was especially impressed with McCain -- he may not be in tune with his party, but you have to admire his courage.

Posted by Kit Stolz | November 29, 2007 3:21 PM

"Crushing defeat"? Are you kidding? The Democrats won a worthless election in 2006. They've accomplished nothing since then and have ben rolled over by the guy with the "approval rating in the low thirties" consistently. With victories like that you don't need any defeats.

Posted by Captain Marvel | November 30, 2007 2:53 AM

Close, but you annoyingly (and elitistly) leave out immigration in restricting the breadth of the field to your Moore-Norquist range.
Some of the backbenchers (and most Americans) are outside those open borders goons' parameters on the issue.

If you focus on the leading candidates you might be on safer ground, but since you mention Paul, you obviously weren't doing that.

Posted by Alex | November 30, 2007 5:45 AM

"Without [Paul and Huckabee], you’d have a field whose ideological spectrum runs from Steven Moore to Grover Norquist on domestic policy...."

Except, that is, for abortion, immigration, gay rights, gun rights, trade, torture, global warming, campaign finance reform, and education.

Posted by Blackadder | November 30, 2007 5:08 PM

Neither party has a coalition that makes sense right now. The Democrats are ignoring that fact because the last 7 years have made them absolutely focused on winning this election. The Republicans are sufficiently fractured by the compromises of the last 7 years that things are wide open.

Depending on who wins, this could be the election that fractures the GOP coalition.

Giuliani loses the social conservatives and economic conservatives.

Paul loses the defense conservatives and neoconservatives.

Huckabee, Romney, McCain, and Thompson all lose the economic conservatives and libertarians.

There is no candidate out there that is even basically acceptable to the major GOP factions. The only hope for things to remain static is if the dems put up Clinton which will unite the factions in hatred.

I'm hoping that doesn't happen so that we can at least have a chance of cutting the Gordian knot our political system is tied in.

Posted by Crouton | December 1, 2007 5:12 PM

The reason Ross's post is correct is that the real powers behind the GOP - and I include the top-ranking SuperChristian superministers here - do not give one steaming turd about saving fetuses or shaming homosexuals when you compare those issues to their real concern, which is maintaining power and influence and continuing the massive transfer of wealth to the rich. The only real GOP wild card is Ron Paul - Huckabee and Giuliani would be A-OK for the real powers.

Posted by MoeLarryAndJesus | December 2, 2007 12:55 AM