Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Victory, oh Victory!
The most common form of contemporary conservative electoral argument is flawed in its premise. They argue that we don’t win elections because we don’t follow their advice (give up on social issues / double down on social issues / the same for fiscal issues and/or foreign stuff / use stronger language / use more moderate language / educate the public on abstract issues / stop talking about abstract issues / talk about gaffes more / talk about gaffes less).
In fact, we win elections. We run the legislature in most states, reaching a level of (small d) democratic control rarely seen in American history. We have most governor’s mansions, again, right at the edge of the historical record. We have the House; after decades of suffering from Ike’s neutrality and Watergate, we got it back in 1994 and we’ve mostly kept it. We have the Senate. Even presidentially, we’ve lost just five out of the last twelve races, with the “always losing” argument often resting on the last two. If you decide on the basis of receiving two tails after tossing a coin twice that the coin must be faulty and have no heads on it, you’re probably excessively predisposed that belief.
When people tell you that we’re losing and the only way to win is to buy their snake oil, whether classy snake oil like Arthur Brooks’ or off-brand oils like Mike Murphy’s or Mark Levin’s, they’re wrong in two ways. Firstly, we’re winning, and secondly, many of those who are winning are not from their faction of the party. Ron Johnson and Pat Toomey win in blue-purple states while being unapologetically socially conservative, whatever Murphy might prefer; while Graham, McCain, Murkowski, Capito, Cochran, and Alexander can win in red states despite Levin’s assurances that their path is doomed to fail.
Allied to this is the claim that we don’t win on the issues. Sometimes this is specifically aimed at McConnell and Boehner. In the comments, I’d like people to suggest a Senate leader and speaker who have been more effective at stopping the legislative agenda of a post-war President. I don’t believe that such a man exists. Bush got what he really wanted from Daschle and Reid. Clinton got a bunch of what he wanted from Dole and Newt. Anyone who wants to argue that Reagan and 41 failed to leave a legislative legacy has a tough case to make. And so on. From tax cuts to gun rights to trade agreements to partial birth abortion to bankruptcy to the surge, the Democrats never united in the way that McConnell and Boehner have kept the party together in opposition to Obama, so time and again Bush could peel off enough Democratic moderates to get his reforms passed. Today, pro-choice Republicans refuse to vote for pro-choice bills. Pro-union Republicans don’t vote for pro-union bills. Obama has been reduced to acting through executive orders by the most effective and courageous Republican party leadership in a half century. Obama did pass radical reforms, but only while he had a supermajority; a supermajority that was kept brief between the death of Ted Kennedy and the election of Scott Brown. It’s the united efforts of moderates and less moderate Republicans that has won us our position.
At some level, most of us are aware of this. Over and over again, I speak to closeted McConnell fans who will not admit it in public (some, like James O’Keefe, are open about it if they’re asked, but don’t raise the topic). It’s not cool, and it’s bad for fundraising, to declare that affection. I’ve spoken to people who were coming off a panel discussion angry because they didn’t get to demonstrate their bona fides by attacking McConnell on a point irrelevant to the discussion. Our pundits have overwhelming incentives to bad-mouth our leaders. There’s sometimes almost as little respect for the achievements of our governors and state legislators, although the Constitution gives them the scope to go on the offensive even when there isn’t a cooperative President. Our states are popping and fizzing like mad, deregulating labor, protecting electoral integrity and self-defense rights, closing abortion clinics, cutting taxes, reducing recidivism by expanding religious charitable access to inmates, expanding school choice, shoring up the Constitution with anti-Kelo laws and the like, and finding many other ways of expanding Americans’ freedom.
It’s my belief that America, and the world, were in a precarious state in Reagan’s first term, but that we are in a better position now, and that we were in a precarious state when Ted Kennedy died, but that we are in a better position now. I outline why in posts addressing each of the three legs of the conservative stool and comparing our position to Reagan’s first term and to what one could refer to as the B.M. period of American history (“Before McConnell,” the period of supermajority).
I’ll conclude with a post on the stakes for the upcoming election. We can fix entitlements to make them affordable, but not every party is likely to do so, and even four years would make the problem much harder. We can restore American leadership to the world, but we would have to choose to do so. Almost all the regrettable Court decisions are 5-4, so we can revive our Constitutional fidelity to unprecedented levels, but the good decisions are also mostly 5-4. It is merely likely, not certain, that the shining city on a hill will illuminate the world even more brightly than before.
Published in Domestic Policy, Politics
Television didn’t widely exist before Kennedy. Radio didn’t widely exist before Wilson. Both offered similar societal change. Neither impacted the case I laid out.
There is no chance that Trump is the nominee.
Me, too. And I am prepared to bring up the subject of another time when the United States government acted as debt collector for favored entities, and the abuses that accompanied the practice. This would be in the treaty negotiations with Native Americans.
Frank,
Why wouldnt Trump be?
His negatives are 70%. That those who like him really like him is not enough.
Not in two last polls
Let’s clarify our terms. If the polling is of the general public, his negatives are almost 70%. Among GOP voters, they are in the low 40’s. Of course, among GOP voters, most of the other candidates have negatives less than 20%.
That he is winning the current polling is unimpressive with so many candidates in the race. He has never to date polled as high as Herman Cain did in the lead up to 2012.
Qunnipiac from 2 days ago of all voters shows Trump 36% Favorable and 54% unfavorable. This is bad for him but not 70%. By comparison the same poll shows Clinton 31% favorable, 51% unfavorable. and Bush 32% Favorable 41% unfavorable.
That’s a bit of an outlier. ABC still has him almost 70%. Several others as well.
I have not seen this poll. The last CNN/ORC poll of head to head match ups showed Clinton 52- Bush 41. Clinton 52- Trump 43. Clinton 52- Walker 44. Clinton 55- Fiornia 40. To the extent that he has the highest negatives he is not suffering compared against other Republicans.
To me this seems clear case of reading a policy disagreement into a strategy disagreement. I can see both arguments.
Repealing the medical device tax might make the point that this law is not untouchable. That it can be repealed. It would say to Americans that Democrats pass bad things like the medical device tax, and Republicans get rid of them.
Maybe it would make Obamacare more popular and repeal harder, but not necessarily. If President Walker/Rubio/Cruz gets elected and has a majority, it’s pretty clear they intend to repeal Obamacare. They do have plans. Having or not having the medical device tax included will make very little difference. Squishy senators will be more concerned with the political impact of the replacement.
If they don’t get a majority… or if Clinton wins… the country is better off without the medical device tax than with it. If the political effects are too complicated to clearly predict, sometimes just put in place the best policy you can.
In a variety of ways, but no, the bank was a profit making entity. For instance, in the most minimal form, it would sell insurance against the risk of buyer default because if it purchased the debt it would then be better at enforcing itself. The insurance was valuable in two ways. Firstly, it might keep you from going bankrupt, and second, governments are less likely to default on debts to you if they believe that the debt will be (essentially) sold to the US government and then collected on.
Not fully (though pretty substantially), and it’s not a done deal yet. The broad outlines are there, but it’s still possible for things to fall apart or for the final version to be less good. The Democrats really want more “accountability.”
But there’s a very real chance that they will pass a bill that Obama will sign that undoes much of the worst of NCLB and ends Duncan’s rule-by-mandate (including Common Core), without doing much new substantial harm.
Do you have a post on this in the works too, or do I need to find time to write it? I am amazed at how completely under the radar this is flying.
I couldn’t write a post like you could. I’d be a very bad moderator if I in any way inhibited the post we’re all looking forward to.
You flatter me… somehow I suspect hardly anyone is waiting with baited breath for my take on the latest attempt at ESEA reauthorization.
But I really have been intending to write it, and will really try this weekend. And will try to make it readable and as little deadly boring as possible.
Hey, here’s a plan:
In 2012, House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan explained that (with a Democrat Senate) that “what I tell people at home is I think we can get 85 percent of (Obamacare) for sure repealed in reconciliation.”
Cool, why don’t we do that?
A Medical Device Tax Repeal? Sounds like another magical unicorn like the Keystone Pipeline — used for show and fundraising only.
So homosexual marriage, but not polygamy, and forcing people to buy things are what James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay were talking about when they wrote The Federalist Papers.
“Established by the state” is a term that could mean almost anything, just as long as it is most harmful to freedom.
Wow! I just never knew any of this.
Ryan, who is absolutely serious about repealing Obamacare and is one of the biggest reasons it might actually happen, was obviously referring to a future when we had a president who would sign actual repeal. Ryan doesn’t deal in unicorns.
The difference is that they have Democratic votes to repeal the medical device tax — probably enough to override an Obama veto. So, unlike the law as a whole, it actually could be gone now. The only reason not to is if you think the politics of it would hurt future repeal efforts, but that’s a dangerous game to play — unnecessarily leaving bad policy in place in the hope that it will let you get rid of more bad policy later if you get more power.
The Cloaked Gaijin:
Leigh:
Mark: 2) The Medical Device Tax Repeal. Word is that GOP leadership will be making a push this fall to get this through.
It will hurt repeal efforts and the GOP leadership knows it. The Dems had a good strategy around passing Obamacare. Unlike HillaryCare which attacked interest groups in the healthcare industry, Obamacare gave everyone a “little taste” only hammering those who would not fall into line. The Republicans will be whittling away at support by passing this, along with helping Democratic senators, like Warren out, and who will turn around and criticize the GOP for being in the pocket of big business.
By the way, I agree about the sequester.
“… the Chief Justice said (Obamacare is) a tax, and taxes are clearly what we call reconcilable. That’s the kind of measure that can be pursued with 51 votes in the Senate, and if I’m the leader of the majority next year, I commit to the American people that the repeal of Obamacare will be job one.” — Mitch McConnell, 2012
“Well, it would take 60 votes in the senate. No one thinks we’re going to have 60 Republicans, and it would take a president, presidential signature. No one thinks we’re going to get that.” — Mitch McConnell, October 28, 2014
As hotair.com stated, “Follow the bouncing ball. … His 2012 comments about the mandate being a tax and therefore susceptible to a simply majority vote were made before the election that year… McConnell would rather stick to the 60-vote threshold and let Senate Dems filibuster an O-Care repeal bill. It’ll be over quickly and he can say he gave it the old college try before moving on to more serious business.”
Congress’ constitutional power of the purse is to be a big imaginary dream to bankruptcy…
But the 2014 quote was before that year’s election, too. In 2012, he was speaking about the possibility of a Republican president to sign that repeal, and in 2014 that option wasn’t on the table.
If he has a serious Republican president actively pushing a serious repeal/replace plan, McConnell will go along. If not, that hotair comment may be correct. Which is why I’d rather elect someone like Walker, who would have the credibility to convince a Republican Senate that a fight like this is winnable and worthwhile.
You need the presidency to do that. If you can get part of it repealed before that, however small, do that too.
So Congress’ power of the purse has always been a Constitutional lie.
We have all these Republican legislatures around the land, but they are all useless as the greatest Republican leaders in history cannot stop President Obama. (Suddenly the glass doesn’t seem so half-full.)
And I thought we lived in a republic and not an automatic, autopilot, unstoppable spending dictatorship.
It sure doesn’t mean what you think it means.
This is all due to the cowardice of the Republican leaders. They have to be able to sustain an attack from the media blaming them — and them only — for the “shutdown.” This is the essential disfunction in our government today — the inability of these leaders to fight a protracted and righteous battle to its conclusion.
Cowardice.
I’ll buy that and given we have checks and balances it’s probably the best we could do but it’s not necessarily a huge conservative victory. More telling would be the size of gov’t with respect to inflation. I’d like to see that.
James- the main point of any contention is that the ground floor is ‘flooded’. So we are now in charge of the maintenance of the building and are holding the second floor and keeping it safe?
When we take complete ‘ownership’ of the building we are going to somehow recover the first floor or is that just the way it is and we must deal with it?
The determined efforts by both parties over the years aren’t designed for undoing or metaphorically; pumping out the water. Winning elections is a base to start from not a success in and of itself.
To use the phrasing- ‘Rhino squish’ the process seems to be “We are squishing ourselves to success!”
I’m opposed to the decision in Windsor, but it’s a federalist decision, supporting states’ rights against the Federal government. I’m also opposed to Obergefell, but it’s an individual rights case, not one involving states rights in any sense other than McDonald’s support for the Second Amendment involved states rights. Not every bad decision is against or even relevant to federalism.
I don’t understand. Do you want more action or less action taken on polygamy?
Sebelius was a states rights supporting case. It limited the Commerce clause and empowered the Tenth Amendment, giving states the ability to refuse the Medicaid expansion. There may be an individual right not to suffer the mandate, but, again, a decision being a bad decision doesn’t mean that it’s anti-federalist.
You’re right about that, but that would be true whichever way the Court had ruled.
Is your argument that King v. Burwell is a states rights case? Could you explain that?
State legislatures are useless when it comes to stopping Obama from doing stuff, for the most part, yes. They’re very good at passing right to work legislation, cutting state taxes, providing school choice, reducing abortion, and stuff, though. Just because your car doesn’t do laundry well doesn’t make it a bad car; that’s not what it’s for.
The people who are stopping Obama engaging in federal reforms are Congressmen. There’s a degree to which Federal law has an autopilot function (budgets change slowly), but the direction the budget has been changing has been positive.
Not necessarily. A key element of Walker’s Obamacare repeal and replace plan, for instance, is that the legislation can be passed through reconciliation, which means that it has to be budget neutral. That’s a lot easier if you’ve already removed the Medical Device Tax. I believe that this is true of Rubio’s plan, too, and will likely be true of all GOP proposals.
I’m sure you can see why we can’t talk about this, too, but there are often motivations behind policymaking that aren’t cowardice.