photo by Pete Souza
Everyone is looking to 2012 in this post-Christmas, eve of the New Year week.
When you look at Iowa and Ron Paul’s power in that state, juxtaposed against his newsletter bigotry, it gives new meaning to what it takes to get nominated in the Republican primary fight and why in the Obama era Democrats are the real conservatives.
E.J. Dionne labels Pres. Obama “the conservative,” something I’ve been writing for 3 years now, though without a hint of irony:
Obama will thus be the conservative in 2012, in the truest sense of that word. He is the candidate defending the modestly redistributive and regulatory government the country has relied on since the New Deal, and that neither Ronald Reagan nor George W. Bush dismantled. The rhetoric of the 2012 Republicans suggests they want to go far beyond where Reagan or Bush ever went. And here’s the irony: By raising the stakes of 2012 so high, Republicans will be playing into Obama’s hands. The GOP might well win a referendum on the state of the economy. But if this is instead a larger-scale referendum on whether government should be “inconsequential,” Republicans will find the consequences to be very disappointing.
Pres. Obama has been moving our country’s politics and policies rightward for his entire first term.
When compared against Romney versus someone like Ron Paul or the character challenged Newt Gingrich, you can argue there’s a fight over American conservatism worth having in 2012. It will appeal to Obama fans trying to convince 2008 voters to come home again, which will work with the majority of Democrats, as it always does.
What won’t happen next year is a debate on progressive policy, at least not within the big two parties, which is really the story of 2012. Political austerity has hit the U.S., with a dryness to ideas in both Democratic and Republican ranks, which is one reason outsiders are daring to tread, even though they can’t really compete due to money.
What Dionne gets wrong is how he couches the 2012 election. He posits that Republicans will make 2012 a referendum on the economy. If they do they truly are dumber than a bag of rocks, which they may be; after all, Herman Cain was once leading the pack, which doesn’t say much for GOP primary voters.
If Romney prevails he should bolster his nomination with a Chris Christie vice presidential pick, then turn the campaign to the only way to have a chance of beating Obama in 2012.
Republicans must make the election a referendum on Pres. Barack Obama. People like him very much, but few think the country is going in the right direction. So, Republicans need to make the case that Obama doesn’t need four years to get the job done, because four more years will –fill in the blank with your tragedy du jour–.
Running on “a larger-scale referendum on government” is suicide for Republicans. In 2012, it’s got to be about Pres. Obama, his style of leadership and his stewardship of American competitiveness. It’s the only way they have even a remote chance of winning.
Pres. Obama, with all his faults, remains a formidable campaigner. What needs to happen to beat him is a tear down operation from Republicans, aided by someone blunt, un-Mitt like and with the conservative cred to rally the right. With Chris Christie on a Romney ballot Republicans would at least be hedging their bets if they lose, by setting up a politician who is the anti-Obama, which will be needed if the President wins a second term, still a 50-50 proposition.
Romney-Christie versus Obama-Biden is a worthy match-up. Add in the outsiders that make it on to ballots, the lesser of two evils and hold your nose choices may not become a voter cage of self-defeating political irrelevancy.
Because if it’s just between Republicans and Democrats, that’s really not much of a choice at all. A political race to the conservative bottom will only depress voters and turn out, mimicking what happened with Clinton v. Dole in 1996.
“If Romney prevails he should bolster his nomination with a Chris Christie vice presidential pick, then turn the campaign to the only way to have a chance of beating Obama in 2012.”
BWAHAHAHAHA! Oh please, PLEASE let Mit the clueless pick the bloated sack of gristle and lard Christie!
Chris Christie makes the perfect pit bull, the main requirement for a veep, and one of the characteristics the right wing desperately wants to deploy against Obama. It’s also his personality, something that doesn’t apply to Pawlenty, Daniels, Haley Barbour, et al.
Your quote above, sech, also leaves out the primary component to beating Obama, which isn’t a Chris Christie pick. It’s making the election a referendum on Obama, not just the economy or government, both of which won’t be strong enough.
Mitt Romney would never select Christie as his VP, it would cause a riot by the Tea Party. Apart from his personality, a cross between famous NJ celebrities Tony Soprano and the ‘Situation’ from the Jersey Shore, he is already hated by the Tea Party. And with good reason. When he nominated a Muslim to the Appeals Court in NJ, Tea Party activists protested his nominating a Mulsim to the Apeals Court, in a statement in front of the courthouse he insulted the Tea Party lunatics who were calling for NJ to ban Sharia Law in NJ court cases, he dismissed the Ta Party ”It’s just crazy, and I’m tired of dealing with the crazies.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y83z552NJaw
He also promoted and passed into legislation a law that permitted illegal immigants to qualify for NJ state colleges NJ resident tuition which is half the tuition for an out of state student attending a NJ public University. That’s what got Rick Perry in trouble with the Tea Party caucas.
On Sean Hannity’s program he was for gun control because of the high gun associated murder rates and drug related crimes. Hanitty told him ‘bad idea’.
Climate Cange? Here’s what Christie had to say about Climate Change “when you have over 90 percent of the world’s scientists who have studied this stating that climate change is occurring and that humans play a contributing role, it’s time to defer to the experts.” He said that just last August.
Mitt Romney has no choice but to nominate a Tea Party acceptable running mate.
I think he’ll talk Rubio into taking it, and that Virginia, North Carolina, Nevada, Colorado, Indiana and Florida will flip. This will be a razor-close election and it WILL be a referendum on Obama. If the Unemployment rate is down to 8.3% or so, he’ll probably win. If it’s above 8.5%, he’ll probably lose. I don’t think that there will be a conservative third party, but Rocky Anderson on the left could give Obama some headaches in the tightest states, IF he can get on the ballot.
I am convinced that if Obama wins, he will be the first President to win re-election by a smaller margin than he won election since Woodrow Wilson in 1916.
“I think he’ll talk Rubio into taking it,”
Rubio….the guy who lied through his teeth about his origins?
“ He posits that Republicans will make 2012 a referendum on the economy. If they do they truly are dumber than a bag of rocks. “ They may or may not be dumb but they are more than anything ideologues. Ideologues see only the goal, what it takes to get there is inconsequential. I am so sick of Iowa and it’s undeserved status of canary in the coal mine. Iowa and New Hampshire mean nothing no matter how many historical polls may or may not say differently.
Christie is a big fat hypocrite and the people of New Jersey are beginning to realize it; however, you are probably correct when you suggest that the American public are drawn to toughness in their leaders. During the never ending argument that went on yesterday about Obama’s experience not once did the experience of George W. Bush come up. A one term governor of a state where the legislature has all the power; A man who had never visited Europe or even the Johnson Space Center in his own state. Experience means nothing in American politics, toughness means everything. Bush and his people were able to get almost everything they wanted out of congress because they remembered Charles Colsons’ adage, “ When you have them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow.”
Yea – now we can openly look for a liberal Democrat to run against this blue dog Democrat living in the WH. I have three predictions regarding the 2012 election: 1. 2008 was the last two-party election in America; 2. A third party will be born in the 2012 election; and 3. There will be four candidates receiving at least 5% of the popular vote.
Get ready for the Obama administration beat to death the reelection of Ronald Reagan comparisons next year. Well, there was one tailwind Reagan had that Obama must run without – American nationalism. The 1984 summer Olympics was held in Los Angeles, California. The country was so pumped up after waving the stars and stripes all summer long, and rightly so, that “the Gipper” won 49 out of 50 states. There is a pop cultural dimension to every political contest. The 1996 summer Olympics was held in Atlanta, Georgia followed by “the Big Dawg”‘s reelection. For the summer of 2012, there will wall-to-wall coverage on the tele of the Union Jack of Great Briton during the Olympics while the local news will show OWS protesting the Democratic Party’s convention for holding it in a non-union state.
Long live the Queen.
No surprise that I am so glad to see more use of the word “liberal,” and no surprise that you use it
. Maybe we can even recover something of what it once meant.
And no surprise that I’m of the opinion that new / third parties are essential. For me, that happened well before Obama, but if the Bush and Obama presidencies haven’t made that clear, and we continue Oligarchy business as usual, then I don’t know if we’ll be able to reclaim and rebuild a democracy.
J.A., I watched in the 1970′s, after the civil rights movement in which the right was against, the Vietnam war in which they were for, and Watergate, which embarrassed their party and our nation run from the conservative label. And a guy by the name of Ronald Reagan, who as Governor, single-handedly fucked up my beloved state of California, made every conservative drop using the the label moderate. Reagan said it loudly and proudly – I’m a conservative.
We need someone on our side to say loudly and proudly – I’m a liberal.
May “I’m a liberal” return, loudly and broadly.
I read the piece this morning and had to laugh at Dionne’s characterization of Obama as if he were “conserving” the FDR/LBJ social/economic policy legacy. Ass-backwards.
I agree to this point: neither party should want to be talking about the economy right now. Both have contributed to its decline, and both have been in power while it declined. Neither has given us any hope for a change in that trajectory, either.
Whether discussing Obama’s record is a good idea, I’m not so sure. The more you look at it, the more it looks conservative. I don’t think that’s likely to help Republicans very much, either. In addition, Obama’s still polling far better in favorability polls than I would have thought possible, given his generally miserable record.
While most of us would probably agree that Obama’s done a lousy job, there’s still a large portion of the population who haven’t figured that out, yet.That doesn’t bode well for making this about Obama.