2008 is shaping up to be an interesting year for Republican candidates. How can any one candidate manage to capture the imagination of a conservative maelstrom that is floundering amid a growing spectrum of failed policy while being separated in a centrifuge of battling ideologies into its constituent parts?
Many hard-line conservatives are disgusted to varying degrees by the moderate go-to guys like Giuliani and Romney (nevermind McCaine, who we learned today is delusional). No amount of flipping on the hot button issues is drawing the support of the red meat crowd, who increasingly favor rock-hard Fred Thompson. He certainly can strike a pose and his conservative credentials are impeccable. Can he temper his message for moderates without turning off the base? Does he know all the secret code words to appear conciliatory while raising a middle finger behind his back? Perhaps.
But he has another problem. James Dobson. Christian though he may be, it is Dobson’s belief that Thompson is not Christian enough. Reaction on the right is interesting, ranging from assurances that Dobson will, soon enough, see the error of his ways, to outright anger that he forwarded any opinion at all. Most interesting is the complaint that Dobson, indeed anyone, should measure a candidate by their religion. Coming from the right, this is historical hypocrisy at its finest, but also another indicator of the increasing divisions inside the Republican Party.
Dobson’s ideal candidate is, of course, Newt Gingrich, about whom little need be said. It is unlikely, at best, that Newt will capture the nomination and Dobson’s interest in him is a bit mystifying. Perhaps all it takes to get the nod from Focus on the Family is a kiss of the ring.
I find it fascinating that the Christian Movement, once central to the Republican cause, can be so casually tossed aside now that public opinion chafes at its edicts. I always thought it was a marriage of convenience, but it turns out to have been an affair. The Christian Coalition will have to fight for relevance now, having taken themselves too seriously, while the Republicans gamble that they’ll show up at the motel just one more time.
Personally, I think a Thompson nomination is a pipe dream. Red-meat Republicans appear to view him as the leader Bush might have been: a lingering hope that they weren’t wrong after all. They go so far as to speculate that the left ‘fears’ his nomination, but I think that says more about their deranged view of Democrats than their support for any candidate. They have missed the memo about the country’s slow, inexorable swing to the left. People now know that a moderate Republican is their only hope, but the rhetoric on display today should worry the powers that be at the RNC. Is there enough support for a deep red conservative to sprout a third party hopeful? Can they tailor a moderate to appeal to the 30 percenters and Dobsonites without implying that they are running away from the George Bush Revolution? Can they make any of this work if they can’t get George Bush himself onboard, who seems unaware that the dead horse he is beating is the Republican Party. I don’t envy the poor bastards one bit. But I’ll laugh all the way to the bank.