It’s interesting to read all of the commentary on the imminent demise of the Republican Party and to match that up with reports that came out of the Republican Governor’s Association meeting in Miami. What I’m interested in is how all of that impacts Florida politics.
The other day I admitted that I’m no big fan of the Florida Democratic Party, rather I’m concerned about how to create structures that support good government. What I’ve been thinking about for the past few days is how it might be possible to harness the dynamics of national and Florida politics to actually accomplish some beneficial goals.
Most of the things I would like to see happen are policies promoted by Common Cause. The most immediate of these would be to achieve redistricting reform by getting state constitutional amendments on the 2010 ballot and then passing them. (See the FairDistrictsFla.org website for more info).
So what does the implosion of the Republicans and the RGA’s conference have to do with all of this?
The NYT columnist David Brooks has an elegiac piece called Darkness at Dusk that lays out the major fault line of the Republican Party between the Traditionalists and the Reformers. His obvious conclusion (depressing to him if not to us) is:
In the near term, the Traditionalists are going to win the fight for supremacy in the G.O.P.
They are going to win, first, because Congressional Republicans are predominantly Traditionalists. Republicans from the coasts and the upper Midwest are largely gone. Among the remaining members, the popular view is that Republicans have been losing because they haven’t been conservative enough.
Second, Traditionalists have the institutions. Over the past 40 years, the Conservative Old Guard has built up a movement of activist groups, donor networks, think tanks and publicity arms. The reformists, on the other hand, have no institutions.
In short, the Republican Party will probably veer right in the years ahead, and suffer more defeats. Then, finally, some new [Reformer] will emerge.
The traditionalists are best represented by the Rush Limbaugh-Sean Hannity set who are chomping at the bit to promote Sarah Palin for president in 2012 (Slogan: You keep "The Change!"). Of course, we all know that would be a total flameout.
Jonathan Freeland wrote a piece in The NY Times called An English Lesson which talks about how the Conservative Party in the UK went through this exact same process:
REPUBLICANS looking for a friendly shoulder to cry on in the coming months could do worse than look up their ideological cousins across the Atlantic . For the Conservative Party in Britain knows what it feels like to be wiped out in a watershed election by a charismatic opponent whose victory brings jubilant scenes on the streets and heady talk of a new dawn.
[snip]
[H]eeding Britain ’s near-equivalents of Rush Limbaugh [the party chose] one Iain Duncan Smith [after being defeated]. He had none of Sarah Palin’s stardust, but the Tory base saw him the way hard-core Republicans now see the Alaska governor — as a true believer. Mr. Blair brushed him away like a crumb on his lapel.
Freeland then describes what the Conservatives finally did when reality backed them in a corner and forced then to confront their denial and actually try to make an attempt at being rational:
Only then, staring oblivion in the face, did the slow stirrings of recovery begin. A senior Conservative official, Theresa May, had already warned that the Tories had to shed their image as "the nasty party" with few women or members of ethnic minorities in Parliament. Now, at last, that message began to be heard. A younger, fresher face emerged and overtook more established rivals for the leadership: David Cameron.
Mr. Cameron’s candidacy was built on a simple premise: modernize or die. He told the Tories they had to look as if they actually liked the country they sought to govern, rather than wishing they could turn back time. They could not hope to form a winning coalition without appealing to the Britons whom Mr. Blair had made his own: women, suburbanites, the highly educated. Relying on angry old white men was never going to get the Conservatives much beyond 33 percent.
To that end, Mr. Cameron set about decontaminating the Tory brand. Central to that mission were forays into two areas of political terrain previously deemed forbidden zones. First, he signaled comfort with gay rights, ditching the party’s previous support for laws restricting sexual equality. Second, he championed environmentalism.
[snip]
Mr. Cameron’s efforts have paid off: recent polls suggest a Conservative victory at the next election. Of course, the lessons of one society can never fully apply to another. But the Tory experience suggests that a defeated party of the right has to move toward the center, abandon divisive social issues and elect a leader who looks as if he or she actually belongs in the 21st century. With Arnold Schwarzenegger ineligible for the presidency and no other accommodating figure on the horizon, the Republicans might have a bumpy decade ahead.
Well, that last sentence is where the RGA conference comes in, because there are actually a few others (besides Schwarzenegger) who might like to be considered. The LA Times wrote a sidebar on the RGA conference with the title Five Republican Governors to Watch. They named Charlie Crist of Florida, Mitch Daniels of Indiana, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and You-Know-Who.
The LA Times’ actual article on the RGA quoted some of these governors speaking like reformers:
During Wednesday's opening lunch, Pawlenty -- a finalist to join McCain on the GOP ticket -- dismissed one of Palin's signature lines by calling for an expansive approach to energy development.
" 'Drill, baby, drill,' is not, by itself, an energy policy," Pawlenty said.
"We cannot be a majority governing party when we essentially cannot compete in the Northeast. We are losing our ability to compete in Great Lake states; we cannot compete on the West Coast," Pawlenty said in his speech.
[snip]
Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who has charted a more moderate course, warned against focusing too much on divisive social policy.
"Those issues are very important, but there are a lot of issues people care deeply about that affect their lives in a real way every single day," Crist told reporters after he gave Thursday night's banquet speech. He had supported the same-sex marriage ban but declined to campaign on its behalf. "Right now, with this economy, there's no question in my mind those are pocketbook issues."
The Bayou Buzz blog had this to say about Jindal and the RGA:
Jindal and his fellow GOP governors argued this weekend that such an ideological stand [purging Republican moderates] is exactly the wrong course if the party wishes to regain power on the national level.
The Louisiana Governor often begins interviews with the press with the words, "Let’s not argue whether we need universal healthcare. Of course we need universal health care. Everybody needs to be covered. Instead, let’s argue the way in which we can do it."
This last post also said that Jindal had already booked a speech in Iowa in February, implying he was seriously going to seek the Republican nomination in 2012, as Palin assuredly will.
I think Crist, being very politically astute, understands that the 2012 Republican ticket is likely to be Palin-Jindal and that it will certainly go down in defeat. Crist is smart enough to know that his best chance is to wait until he’s completed his second term as governor and then spend his time running for the 2016 nomination.
But, here is where the interesting dynamic comes in. For Crist to be viable he has to do things as governor that bring attention in a way that will reflect positively on him to mainstream America . He has to become a "rock star" once again. Crist understands the need to become a media darling at the national level. And waiting until the 2016 election will give him plenty of time to get a lot of buzz going about himself.
The Sun-Sentinel recently reported the following:
Still, Crist has a clear vision for a new Republican national strategy, one that pushes divisive social causes to the side and embraces diversity. The party needs to do a better job reaching out to black and Hispanic voters, said Crist. He noted the Republican rhetoric on illegal immigration was "less than friendly, shall we say," an assessment that will hardly endear Crist to the party's right wing.
"As the grandson of Greek immigrants, I'm very sympathetic that we're more inclusive, that we embrace others with open arms and continue to lead with a caring heart," he said. "That's what the Republican Party — the party of Lincoln — should be all about."
The ever-optimistic governor said the bipartisan spirit he has tried to foster in Florida could be emulated on the national stage . . .
And on Wolf Blitzer’s situation room he sounded similar themes:
CRIST: It’s about having a more inclusive party, a party that works for the people, that utilizes common sense and makes certain that public service is something that is foremost and brought forth to the front.
BLITZER: So it’s not just enough to go and reach out to the base, the conservative base, the social conservatives, the religious conservatives, you really have got to find some middle ground, some moderates out there that will come back to the Republican Party.
CRIST: Wolf, there’s no question about it. Those other issues are very important but I think that it’s even more important as we go forward to be more inclusive, to be more open.
What I want to suggest to Gov. Crist is that in order to draw attention to his bi-partisan efforts he needs to join with CFO Alex Sink to promote the redistricting campaign as laid out at FairDistrictsFla.org. With their joined star power behind it enough petitions could be signed in a month or two and then the amendments would easily pass in 2010. This is definitely an issue that would bring national attention.
Then the two of them can jointly propose other good government initiatives that could become amendments. How about making permanent the changes to early voting used this cycle? Why not consider Instant Runoff voting?
A more fundamental change would be to add a true initiative process that would create new laws rather than constitutional amendments and would require only a 50% vote and a lower petition threshold. That would really be putting the people in charge, as Crist is so often talking about. It would also eliminate the bi-annual blather about how we’re filling up our state constitution with nonsense.
My favorite would be to make all state elections non-partisan. That would definitely get some attention for him.
Of course, Crist has to negotiate dealing with the Republican base here in Florida which already has a lot of doubts about him. Won’t all this maneuvering make him vulnerable at re-election time?
A recent St. Petersburg Times article about Crist had this to say:
"I'm very proud of how our administration has been able to bring people together in a bipartisan fashion — almost a nonpartisan fashion," he said.
Crist's centrist, hopeful style has kept his approval ratings strong even during a prolonged economic slump, but it has at times strained his support among conservatives in his own party.
Crist will reach the midway point of his first term in a few weeks, and is busy planning his wedding in St. Petersburg next month while trying again to figure how to close the latest state budget shortfall of at least $1-billion without raising taxes.
And then laid out these interesting facts:
He received 52 percent of the vote in 2006, in part due to the votes of Hispanics and a larger-than-expected share of African-American support.
Exit polls show both groups voted decisively for Obama in Florida.
The implication is rather clear—Crist is beatable if the Democrats can find the right candidate. Some are touting CFO Sink. I’d rather see her take on Senator Mel Martinez myself (She was the strongest Democratic candidate in hypothetical matchups). Plus, I doubt if she’d be willing to run against Crist. She could just wait until 2014 and then waltz into the position.
Let me make a modest proposal. If the Democrats want to find a gubernatorial candidate that could emulate Obama’s success they could do worse than consider Tallahassee Mayor John Marks. He has the same African-American crossover vibe that the president-elect projects. He would be able to fire up a lot of the same excitement and, being an early Obama supporter, could make good use of the Obama grassroots network.
I recently was at a public meeting where Alan Williams, the just elected representative for HD-8, was also present. Williams used to be an aide to Mayor Marks. At the end I went over to him and made this suggestion to him. He smiled and nodded his head and said he would pass it on.
But what if Crist wins re-election? Think of the possibilities that would then exist for him to make national news when he would no longer be constrained by the need to pander to the religious right. Certainly one of the best ways would be to promote state-wide civil union guarantees and make adoption legal for same-sex couples. That would definitely distance him from the Right-Wing Beast and bring enormous attention and goodwill. What a wonderful victory that would be.
I’m sure there are other possibilities regarding immigration and Cuban relations. Let’s get all the possibilities out there and start pushing Crist to keep delivering on his non-partisan good government pledge.
Cross posted from FlaPolitics.com.