We all know what every ad and campaign speech from McCain-Palin will say for the next four weeks:
McCain: Obama is black, scary black. He is also radical, scary radical. And he is a terrorist sympathizer. And he might be a secret scary Muslim terrorist himself.
Palin: Obama is black, dontcha know, scary black. Also he is radical. And doggone it, he's also a terrorist sympathizer, also. And yaknow, he also might be a Muslim terrorist himself, also.
That's what they have left. But what does that say about and mean for Conservatism going forward?
I was chatting with my wife yesterday, discussing how the history books my sons will read in high school a decade from now will characterize the period that began with 9/11 and ended with the defeat of John McCain. I think historians will look back on it as a time when the Conservative movement lost its bearings and made fear the centerpiece of its policies, made appeals to base instincts the core of its platform. Fear of immigrants; fear of poor people; fear of brown people; fear of creeping socialism; fear of gays; fear of whatever marginal group could be demonized and made threatening. John McCain's campaign at this moment embodies that policy perfectly. It appeals to the lizard brain exclusively.
I've got no love for the policies of Ronald Reagan, but I respect the man and think the state of his party today would appall him. If nothing else, Reagan put forth real ideas and appealed more often than not to the better instincts of voters (contrast "Morning in America" with McCain's current theme of "Black Manchurian Muslim is gonna getcha!"). Hell, compare it with Obama, whose rhetoric and policy prescriptions consistently appeal to hope, to the better natures of all of us.
What we're witnessing now and are about to witness in November is a tidal shift in American political sensibilities. FDR headed such a shift in 1932, after America had struggled under the policies of Harding/Coolidge/Hoover. Reagan headed a shift in the other direction, undoing much of FDR's New Deal, after America had struggled under the onerous tax and regulatory policies of Carter. Obama will head the next shift, now that America has struggled and been diminished by the policies of Bush Jr. Whether the shift will hold will be determined by how well Obama can rebuild the ruin of the Bush economy.
From the standpoint of Conservatism going forward, one of two things will happen. Either (as has been the case historically), Conservative intellectuals and opinion leaders will attribute McCain's defeat to the fact that he is not and never was a "true" conservative, in which case the party will become more dominated by its fringe, less and less politically relevant. Or they will take a hard look at the path their party is walking and chart another course. It'll be interesting to see which way it goes.
Obama '08.