Lost in the wilderness

What passes for a sage in Maine, Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe, observed, “Ideological purity is not the ticket to the promised land.” Someone neglected to inform the Israelites who bowed to golden calves, punching a ticket to 40 years in the wilderness, where Republicans now trudge and fear they will remain unless they listen or expand their tent, ditch their ideals (whatever those are), twitter or, like, something.

A proven method exists for parties dispatched by voters to the hinterlands. It’s called waiting. Do that a while in Washington and partisan control – like the weather – invariably will change. Conservative lion Barry Goldwater was thought to have felled the Republican Party in 1964. Then came Richard M. Nixon. And then came Watergate, after which it seemed sure America wouldn’t have the GOP to kick around anymore. Then came Ronald Reagan. Republicans could use a man like him again.

Lacking as much, it is all the rage among leftists to wax triumphant over the death of the so-called Party of No and among Republicans to wring hands, a practice in which the GOP is especially practiced. Time magazine heralds the moment – ostensibly accentuated by Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter’s defection to the Democrats – with a story accompanied by a photo illustration of an elephant sitting alone staring across the ocean. May as well jump in, big fella. It’s a one-party show now.

If only that were so, America might see a resurgence of genuine, healthy clashes over ideas rather than the latest partisan angst, this one over “brand.” What might happen if the need for party loyalty vanished?

Instead, Republicans are left, until a better alternative emerges, to hope for what is likely, Democratic overreaching, which President Barack Obama is racing to provide, and what might happen but we hope does not, continued economic malaise. Fretting while they wait, Republicans predictably slip into an old habit, wondering whether they should veer right or center, and into something new, initiating listening tours so somebody else can tell them what to do and augment the cacophony. Teenagers hoping to land prom dates are less insecure than the modern GOP.

But just as surely as George W. Bush tarnished the party brand, so too does the image now, of pathetic politicians craving voters’ affections, promising amid pleading to do better this time.

Strength allures. Obama appeared to have this and got elected and projects it and still maintains popularity. His policies, we suggest, are policies of weakness, oriented around diplomacy with thugs abroad and spending madness and unrivaled government expansion at home. But Obama strikes Americans as a man sure of what he believes. Until the evidence overwhelms that what he believes and what he does will produce no tangible economic benefit, Obama is a leader likely to be followed.

Republicans might learn from this. They also might consider what doomed the Bush legacy and the party with it, at least temporarily. True conservatism is oriented around the preservation and promotion of individual liberty in an ordered society, a concept traditionally applied to foreign as well as domestic policy. The approach resonates with many Democrats as well as Republicans. Reagan abided it not perfectly but better than most and soared politically. Bush defied it, spending wildly, trampling liberties and casting off prudence for a war in Iraq that soldiers’ valor won but at a steep political price for Bush and his party. And the latter pays still.

Ideological purity is not what has fallen the Republican Party, rather it is what has been lacking. If there yet remain Republicans who understand it, they might start by explaining what true conservatism is and how it differs with the actions that stained Bush and the party. Then they might show how the philosophy will be applied when they govern. And then – behold! – they might actually do what they say. That’s the kind of change we believe might lead us all to the promised land.