Tuesday, November 04, 2008

How to fix the Republican party and win a landslide in 4 years.

So as I write this, Virginia just went for Obama meaning it is virtually impossible for McCain to win, which means we are probably about to experience a huge lurch to the left- a solidly liberal house and senate, combined with a president that has a very non-centrist record.
America will soon see what an unchecked liberal agenda looks like. While there is a small chance that Obama may deliver on his promise of governing as a centrist and restraining a heavily democratic congress, the odds are he will follow the pattern of his career and govern from the left.

This presents the Republican party with an opportunity that it hasn't had for decades. It finally has the political cover to discard some of its more unsavory positions, and toss out its more unsavory politicians (see Stevens, Ted). Voters in red districts who may have been nervous to vote for the new guy in a primary can now do so without fearing a loss and swinging congress more to the left. The party can rid itself of divisive positions on immigration, gay marriage, abortion, and many others, in favor of more centrist (but still conservative) positions. A few examples:

Immigration
Hispanics are going for Obama in a landslide. Why? To listen to the anti-immigrant rhetoric of many republicans, you'd think that we as a party don't even think they are human but are in fact, aliens. In my opinion, the republican party should be the party of immigration. We are the party that thinks of America as the shining beacon, the hope and envy of the world, the city on a hill, etc. Why not translate that into our immigration policy? We are also the party of the rule of law. The law must be followed, therefore illegal immigration must end, period. So I propose that the party adopt the following platform (party leaders: are you listening?): First, that legal immigration quotas be radically increased. Make it so that if you want to immigrate, it is realistically possible to do so legally. Second, end illegal immigration. End. No more. People say a wall doesn't work. Go tell that to the communities on the border that have walls- border crossings are basically non-existent there. Plus, with the new immigration quotas, who would want to risk a life and death crossing if it is relatively easy to immigrate legally? With these two policies, current immigration levels will probably stay the same, the only differences being that we now can track everyone coming in, there will be much more cooperation in the hispanic community with law enforcement, and also, most Hispanics will be republican, breathing new life into the party.

Race
Specifically, relations between blacks and the Republican party. With Obama as president, maybe, MAYBE, blacks will feel that they are now included in national politics, and will feel more willing in the future to vote for republicans, especially if there are more black republican candidates. I think the republican party is the natural home of the vast majority of blacks (in terms of the majority of blacks being religious, and socially conservative). The republican party can help them do this if: a.) we start actively recruiting more black candidates, and b.) actively campaigning for black votes. It might seem foreign to republicans to include elements of affirmative action in its recruiting and campaigning efforts, it might be a necessary, temporary step to bridge the huge racial divide. If the black republican candidates lose, oh well, at least blacks will start seeing that we are making an effort to include them in the party.

Foreign Policy
Simply put, return to the traditional conservative republican position of non-interventionism. Keep the policy of aggressively pursuing terrorists and the countries that harbor them, but as we learned with Iraq, intervention is other states is kinda costly, so there better be a reason to go in on the order of Hitler invading Europe.

Fiscal Policy
Can we please reclaim the mantle of fiscal responsibility? Please? Lets return the balanced budget amendment to our platform.

Abortion
Can we please just get rid of people who want to ban all abortions in any circumstance whatsoever? That is just silly. If someone wants that, then we don't even want them in the party anyway. Lets just limit our abortion bans to people who are just doing it for birth control. I realize that this is tricky to legislate and trickier to implement, but at least get it on paper that the republican party does not want to force women who have been raped to have the baby.

Gay Rights
Many of the arguments I hear from pro-traditional marriage people against gay rights is that it is a slippery slope. I say, the stone is already sliding down the slope, so lets run ahead of it and set up a brick wall to stop it. Lets as a party advocate for sweeping gay rights laws that include things like hospital visitation rights, civil unions, anti discrimination laws, the works. Demographic trends are going to win this issue in the end anyway, so lets own it before it ruins the party. We can still oppose gay marriage, but lets be out in front on everything else.

The republican philosophy of self reliance and hard work is better than the democratic worldview of victimhood and handouts and reliance on government for, well, everything. It is better for prosperity to allow people (yes, even rich people) to invest their money as they see fit rather than redistribute it to others. Low taxes and sensible regulation produce prosperous nations. So over the next 4 years, all the adoring masses and hysterical young people are going to jarringly realize that Obama is: Surprise! A Politician! He will inevitable disappoint, and in the worst case scenario, will recklessly endanger. In four years, if we can make sensible platform changes, and actually nominate someone of competence, charisma and intelligence, then this hiccup to the left can be shortlived. If we don't, we can only blame ourselves for future elections losses.

13 comments:

Julie C said...

I think I can join your personal political party. :) It is hard to support one party 100% when neither ones really has my point of view on the issues. I know I'm morally and socially fairly conservative, I care about our effect on the environment, and I prefer less government instead of more.

And as I am staying up watching the speeches and doing a little work, I'm also enjoying watching the Proposition 8 results. Right now 23.2% of the precincts have reported, and the vote is 54.5% Yes, 45.5% No.

I'm also watching our state governor race - it was the ugliest race I have ever seen, bar none. Both candidates ran 99% negative attack ads. The Democratic incumbent Christine Gregoire was attacked a lot on the state budget, on the possibility of introducing a State income tax (we rely on sales tax instead I think) and of course somehow some of the blame for the current economic problems belongs to her. The Republican candidate Dino Rossi was the same person who ran 4 years ago and lost by 133 votes in a very controversial series of recounts (he was announced as the winner twice and even after the final count more irregularities were discovered). The ads against Dino have been equally negative - saying he would lower the minimum wage, take away a woman's right to abortion, and making statements like "who is he to decide this moral issue for me". So far it looks like Gregoire is winning by 18,000 votes, but I guess I'll wait until the final counts to be sure.

Julie C said...

PS It looks like we might have the lady who claimed to have a degree in economics from Harvard but really has a degree in computer science with an area of specialization in economics is going to win. Also, you can now choose how you want to die in WA if you are terminaly ill. Fascinating.

Julie C said...

PPS The 8th District in Washington state is approaching 90% voter turnout. NINETY PERCENT.

Nick said...

Oh, you're right, I left out environmental policy. Thats something else we can get out in front on in many respects. Our laws still need to be business friendly, but there is not reason business friendly policies can't also be environmentally responsible.

We can get out in front by, first, start actually talking about it (have you ever heard a republican really talk about environmental issues? Like, more than a token nod here and there). We can end our foolish support of ethanol and shift all that money to true green technology like Solar (as someone who knows the technology, I can basically guarantee that it will be our major energy source in just a few decades).

We don't need to get irresponsibly wacko on environmental issues, but if we can at least adopt policies that promote sensible stewardship, we would be in line with like 90% of Americans.


And: Uggh. Gregoire won.

apyknowzitall said...

Yeah the governors race wasn't pretty. I have to admit though, Rossi's ads were less irritating than Gregoires "Dino Rossi voted against children's healthcare? That's not right" ads. And it was amuzing for Rossi to pull a page from Jon Stewart by playing her voice in the ads contraindicating her self. Blek. As irritating as she is, and oddly reminiscent of Butthead (see link)I considered voting for her but swung towards Rossi. Sales tax is already at 9% and he would move to get rid of the WASL in favor of a better standardized test (if there is such a thing). The WASL is such crap that I'm hopefull.

My ten-year-old brought up a good point though. "How come all the women running for something sound like Hillary Clinton?" They may not sound like her really but for whatever reason both GC and DB voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard to me- and apparently to my daughter as well.

One thing I think we can all agree is that hopefully the high voter turnouts will continue to get people to vote each year.

I am curious, what would be the Nickitarian party's stance on those pesky aliens that have resided here for 5+ years? Massive back taxes? I would assume immunity if they've been acting as upstanding citizens (aside from the major point they're here illegally.

apyknowzitall said...

oops forgot Buttheads pic. Sorry I'm not crafty enough to make it a hyperlink.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008351683_weblocal04.html

Nick said...

I'm shocked and proud that you voted for Rossi.

On the illegals here already, we might have to bite the bullet and just do one last amnesty- I mean, they are here and they are not going away, and to round all of them up would be incredibly hard and expensive. I guess if the immigration quotas were radically increased, we could also pass strict anti-illegal immigrant hiring laws and other stuff to make sure that illegals come out of the shadows and apply for citizenship. Back taxes might be an option. But the main thrust would be to a.)End new illegal immigration, b.)End the current "in the shadows" status of a huge portion of the latino community, so they feel comfortable talking to the police, going to the hospital, etc., and c.)Get so far ahead on this issue that the republican party becomes the Latino party.

Nick said...

I almost left out: the republican party leadership needs to hold a highly publicized press conference calling for the ousting of Sen. Stevens (which can only occur now by a vote of the senate). If we are going to reclaim the mantle of being the party of ethics and values, we need to remove our own cancers- we can't wait for the democratic senate leadership to do it for us.

(Though in the same press conference, they should also call for the removal of Democrat William "freezer cash" Jefferson)

JonF said...

I like it. Of course there are a lot of details to work out, but I think this is a workable framework.
The thorniest one might be foreign policy. I like the idea of less intervention, but non-interventionism doesn't mesh well with the war on terror (that dang non-proper noun keeps refusing to surrender), NATO, or much of the U.N.'s operations (e.g. opposing possession of nuclear technology by, um, volatile states). That will be a hard sell for many. I also think that along with non-intervention we should drop unconditional support of Israel (i.e. only supporting them when they do good things).

Nick said...

I guess I didn't really mean NON-interventionism, just LESS-interventionism, as you said. Definitely no nation building, which I recall was what George Bush campaigned on originally.

One thing that must be changed, and I'm thinking Obama may do this, is that restrictions on travel to Cuba must be lifted. Yeah, the government is oppressive and persecutes many of its citizens. Well so does China. I'm not suggesting direct diplomacy or talks, but if Cuba was opened up to tourism, trade, and American culture, it would have a huge effect on their society- kind of like what has happened to China over the past 20 years. Eventually, both China and Cuba will transition to complete democracy of their own accord- but not if they are closed off to our influence.

apyknowzitall said...

As much as I like reading your Republican party posts and by saying what I'm about to say I know I'm going to open up a can of worms. But earlier this week, I read this article on Yahoo how the Republicans are trying to recruit Bobby Jindal to run in 2012. "Quick! Someone find us a non-white young ivy league school graduating Republican to save us!" But I don't really think he's the "Maverick" type.

Nick said...

Consider the can opened-

You see, the big difference between our non-white young ivy league school graduating politician and your non-white young ivy league school graduating politician is that ours has actually accomplished something besides convincing a bunch of white-guilt ridden liberals, clueless young people, and blatantly racist black people to vote for him (95% of blacks voting Obama? Thats not racist?). Go check out his resume before you jump to silly conclusions. Our guy accomplished more by the age of 36 (Secretary of Louisiana department of health at age 25, president of University of Louisiana system at age 28, assistant secretary of the US dept. of health and human services at age 30, congressman, and governor at age 36.) than your non-white guy, who, by the age of 36 only had "community organizing" to his name- he hadn't even been elected to the Illinois senate yet.

Not that I want him to run in 4 years. I still prefer Romney, but if he (Jindal) keeps his current trajectory I'd love to see him run in 8-12 years, regardless of his skin color.

apyknowzitall said...

Yeah but I bet he doesn't collect Spiderman comic books!
(Or maybe it was Batman...)