[img]1640|left|||no_popup[/img]Stanford Fellow and syndicated columnist Thomas Sowell recently attacked the Republican Party elite one more time as he ruefully reviewed 2012 in preparation for an apprehensive 2013.
Mr. Sowell quoted Bret Stephens of The Wall Street Journal from early January 2012: “The GOP deserves to lose.”
Mr. Sowell then delineated a litany of losing Republican Presidential contenders and conservatives candidates who coasted on platitudes and plaintive speech, refusing to get tough and punch back at their liberal and Democratic opponents. The most devastating loss was in 1986. U.S. Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork’s advisors became convinced that the liberal lies would discredit themselves. They didn't, and Bork didn't get confirmed.
A deeper strain defines the group of Republican candidates who are not winning: They readily assume voters out there know and believe:
- That free markets make free people,
- That government intervention hinders freedom,
- That equality in principle creates inherently unequal results at the expense of minorities and women.
Charles R. Kesler, a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute and editor of the Claremont Review of Books, reminded Beach City Republicans that second nature knowledge to a conservative is not necessarily well-known. While the rise of online learning is taking impressionable young minds away from the heated Marxist rhetoric of academic elites, too many are uninformed about individual liberty, limited government and Constitutional rule.
From Silent Majority to Silent Minorities
Not Republicans, but the GOP elites deserve to lose, those who follow the money instead of paying attention to policies and principles in the interests of the party and the country. The New England Elite of Nelson Rockefeller did not serve the GOP then or now. Not Wall Street elitism, or Goldwater extremism, but Main Street conservatism is what the Republican Party is about, a Reagan Revolution based on cutting spending and taxes, not just fighting against Communists.
Richard Nixon paid attention to the Silent Majority of 1968. Today, the Silent Minorities are waiting for leaders who will respect them for more than their color, but enhance in their midst a culture of respect and opportunity, like New York Jack Kemp's Enterprise Zones. Forget Pete Wilson. Forget Prop. 187. Bring out Condoleeza Rice, Bobby Jindal, and Nikki Haley of South Carolina.
Look Whose Record Is Better
The Republican Party has a better civil rights record than the Democratic Party, but not enough people know about it. It's time for the Republicans to stop waiting for people to figure out this truth for themselves. The first Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, championed the enslaved, announced the Emancipation Proclamation, ushered in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, which respectively granted freedom, citizenship and the vote.
“Radical Republicans” passed the first Civil Rights Act in the late 1860s and early 1870s. The Democratic Party remained “The White Man's Party” for decades, culminating in the ascension of the elitist, racist Progressive academic Woodrow Wilson, who resegregated the White House, purging the civil service ranks of all African-Americans.
“Return to normalcy” Republican President Warren G. Harding, despite his embarrassing induction into the KKK, reintegrated blacks into the White House, pardoned the socialist Eugene V. Debs, and cut taxes and spending so low that a roaring economic recovery returned to the United States during the Roaring Twenties.
Look at Eisenhower’s Record
Which President first withstood the backlash against desegregation in the South? Republican President Dwight David Eisenhower, who sent in federal troops to Little Rock. Which party resisted civil rights legislation in the early 1960s? The Democratic Party, even though they had their own President in the White House. Which party advanced the first African-American to the U.S. Senate by popular vote? The Republican Party, which gave Edward Brooke his chance to rise and shine in moderate Massachusetts, of all places.
Who finished the job of desegregation in the South? Richard Nixon. Which President coalesced a great deal of the minority vote along with the white vote for two elections, winning by stunning landslides? Ronald Reagan, who had gathered the respect of Hispanic voters to win two terms as governor of California.
Which President took on the tough task of advancing immigration reform that respected the individual immigrant, yet at the same time sought integrity for our nation's borders? George W. Bush.
Which Presidential candidate actively reached out to black communities in 2008 and 2012? Not McCain, but Mitt Romney. Even if his heart was not in the race, his head was in the right place.
For the past two elections, the Republican Party's 1 percent has stood by and supported middling moderates and wealthy technocrats who hoped to win the Presidency by repeating the same lines that elected Ronald Reagan in 1980.
The “Naughts,” Karl Rove’s braintrust, rehashed Nixon’s Southern Strategy, which benefitted George W. Bush and played through his two elections. The South has gone Republican, with black Georgia Democrats and Alabama Democrats joining the Republican ranks.
Now a Coastal-Northeastern Strategy is needed. Not the wealthy, but the willing and thrilling will win the next Presidential election. Not businessmen in the private sector, not Tea Party outsiders who say too much about the government doing much less, but tried-and-true executives in red or purple states with a demonstrable record of achievement for all Americans will inspire voters and take the White House in 2016.
Arthur Christopher Schaper is a writer and blogger on issues both timeless and timely; political, cultural, and eternal. A lifelong resident of Southern California, he currently lives in Torrance. He may be contacted at arthurschaper@hotmail.com, aschaper1.blogspot.com and at asheisministries.blogspot.com. Also see waxmanwatch.blogspot.com
