Some on the right are unhappy about the news that a group of major Republican donors led by former Bush strategist Karl Rove is organizing an effort called the Conservative Victory Project to fund mainstream candidates running against extremists in GOP primaries. According to Politico, leaders of the Club for Growth and the Senate Conservatives Fund weren’t impressed by the prospect of party heavy-hitters parachuting into local races and preventing right-wing outliers from losing winnable elections against vulnerable Democrats:
Club for Growth spokesman Barney Keller essentially responded by pointing to the scoreboard in recent primaries in which conservative insurgents have prevailed and emerged as influential GOP leaders.
“They are welcome to support the likes of Arlen Specter, Charlie Crist and David Dewhurst,” Keller said of the new Crossroads group. “We will continue to proudly support the likes of Pat Toomey, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz.”
He has a point. It’s easy to fault Tea Partiers for foisting on the GOP crackpot senatorial candidates like Todd Akin, Christine O’Donnell and Sharron Angle–whose victories over more moderate candidates in Republican primaries cost the party all-but-certain wins in the last two election cycles. More to the point, Akin’s astoundingly stupid remarks about rape and abortion not only led to his defeat but helped sink Richard Mourdock in Indiana and tarnished the brand of the party everywhere. But not every insurgent is a loser, and not every establishment type is likely to win. The party’s problem is not only that it is not always easy to predict who is the better candidate but also that these top-down efforts are band-aids on a broader dilemma that must be addressed. The question is not just who should be running but what does the Republican Party stand for. The Victory Project’s Steven Law defended the initiative as nothing more than an effort to do what William F. Buckley always advocated, to pick the most conservative candidate who can win to face off against Democrats.
If, the group can in some way help prevent people like Akin, O’Donnell or Angle from winning primaries they will be doing the Republicans a service. But there is also good reason to be skeptical about the process by which this determination will be made. If this amounts to an incumbency protection plan it will only infuriate grass roots activists who will rightly resent the effort. It’s also true that sometimes, as was the case with people like Toomey and Rubio, it is not just that the insurgents are more faithful proponents of conservative ideas than their moderate rivals, but that they are also better candidates. Moreover, the prospect of national groups being able to override local sentiment in the name of victory is doubtful, as is the assumption that throwing more money at a race can determine the outcome.
The test case appears to be the upcoming 2014 race to pick a successor to retiring Iowa Senator Tom Harkin. This ought to be a great chance for a Republican pick-up but if, as appears likely, Representative Steve King wins the GOP nomination, the party may be setting itself up for another Tea Party disaster that leads to victory for the Democrats. King has a long record of incendiary remarks that his conservative fans don’t care about but which could sink him in a statewide general election. But persuading Iowa Republicans to do as Rove tells them to do will require more than an investment in campaign funds in the primary. As the party discovered to its sorrow last November, GOP moderates are also capable of losing Senate elections that seemed like sure bets.
What Republicans need is not so much a new civil war in which moderates wage war on Tea Partiers but a focus on ideas that will help the party regain its footing and confidence. If the GOP allows itself to become a loose collection of opportunists who are only capable of offering the public a faint echo of Democratic promises minus 10 or 15 percent for the sake of fiscal sense, all they will have done is to recreate the old pre-Ronald Reagan and Republican Revolution GOP that was only fit to be a polite minority. But by the same token, it cannot allow itself to be painted as only being the party of austerity. In 2014, the GOP must offer a positive vision of economic growth and defense of freedom abroad along with a sensible advocacy of entitlement reform that will save the country from impending fiscal doom.
If it can do that, then the candidates will sort themselves out. Republican winners come in all shapes and sizes — moderates as well as Tea Partiers. So do losers. But without the ideas that can swing the nation back from President Obama’s push for a revival of big government liberalism, it won’t matter whom the big donors or the activists are trying to nominate.
These right-wingers must learn to be innocent as doves and wise as serpents. The laziness and overall indifference of these folks toward the nuts and bolts of politics is greatly responsible for these disasters. Left-wing activists even took advantage of their gullibility by running ads encouraging them to vote for Akin and Angle in the GOP primaries! All they had to do was pay a little attention.
I am getting tired of the revisionist history that suggests Sharron Angle was a "crackpot" who couldn't win. She was in fact leading in the polls going into the final weekend, and frankly anyone who knows Harry Reid should find it easier to believe he was able to "find" his winning margin where he needed it from those who know how to jump when he barks. If the vaunted "moderate" had won that race, you can be damned sure the outcome would have been the same when it came to the final outcome. n nThe ultimate disgrace of 2010 Senate races overall was loser Lisa Murkowski butting her way back in after losing a primary and preventing the real conservative from winner. n nAnd I wouldn't sell Steve King short from the get-go. He did quite fine in a tough House race where his district was redrawn for the express purpose of giving Christie Vilsack a chance at beating him and in the end, King won easily. This kind of advance carping by "conservatives" who don't exactly have much of a track record of helping the party or conservatism in general has long been one of the biggest problems I've seen that's stopped our momentum and it's a problem that goes back decades. I for one have had it with the days when I have to see the likes of phonies like John Warner stabbing Oliver North in the back to keep him from getting elected to the Senate while the Democrats stand behind their wacky extremists who disgrace the Senate by their presence (Al Franken, Barbara Boxer etc.) and make sure these extremists become tenured for life in DC culture. n n
Sharron Angle was the choice of the left-wingers—who even ran ads to help her win in the GOP primary. Sue Lowden would have built a double digit lead over Harry Reid—and won easily on Election Day. Pay attention when lefties are creating ads to promote a "real conservative" candidate. it should make you think twice.
I am suspicious anytime Leftist and Democrats offer advise to the Republican party.
Oh yes “the revisionist history that suggests Sharon Angle was a crackpot”. Sorry to have to tell you this, but the lady from Tonopah is a crackpot. When you have links to scientology, accuse Canada of letting the 911 terrorists in, and repeatedly refer to nonexistent cities in Texas, you are a crackpot. She has a long record of kookiness that anyone familiar with Nevada politics would be able to tell you about. Honestly I thought Christine O’Donnell, a clear flake, was a better candidate, but then I have a hard time voting for someone who claims no seperation between church and state and has publicly mused about banning alcohol.
She was leading in the polls going into the final weekend. And I would rather have Sharon Angle than some squish head moderate who stands in line waiting to become the next Charlie Crist or Chuck Hagel.
I am surprised anyone still takes Rover seriously. He is a contributor to giving the party a black eye and Fox should dump him. I don't know of any Republicans or Conservatives who like this opportunistic party hack.
Tod Akin was NOT a Tea Party candidate. The Missouri Tea Party also disavowed him after his stupid rape remarks.
Angle almost won. Period. To liken her performance to those of O'Donnell or Akin is denying reality. Reid benefited from his shady connections, and if there were "Republicans" willing to play John Warner instead of line up behind Angle, then that speaks badly of them and not Angle. n nI recall a time in 1980 when Ronald Reagan was the choice of left-wingers who thought he was an easy pushover and the easiest guy Carter could beat. If we'd followed your formula back then, I guess Bush 41 (the guy who singlehandedly destroyed the vaunted "lock" the GOP had built in the Electoral College over a 20 year span) should have been nominated to go down to defeat!
You are conveniently over looking the fact that left-wingers ran ads to help Sharron Angle to capture the GOP nomination! They rightfully perceived her to be the weaker candidate. I am also very knowledgeable regarding the destruction of Bush 41's presidency. Once again, cynical Democrat media experts created ads to weaken his support among conservatives. They were thrilled when Pat Buchanan challenged him.
So? Leftwingers are not always right in their instincts, or else they wouldn't be leftwingers to begin with! This blanket attitude doesn't wash because by default you would have been against Reagan in 1980 for the same reason as some doofus bombthrower who cost Ford the presidency by invoking the same logic. Angle was leading in the polls and I would have preferred a narrow honest victory from a real conservative which was eminently doable in that race but for Harry Reid's chicanery. n nAs for Pat Buchanan in 1992, all I can say is: Bush invited that when he decided to govern like a RINO who treated conservatives as the enemy. I have no kind words for him or his Presidency at all.
Pat Buchanan is not a conservative. He is a Jew bashing and anti-free market reactionary. Bush 41 was not a perfect man—but he was significantly better than Bill Clinton. The Republican president never treated conservatives as the enemy. That is a gross exaggeration. He did try to mend fences. Are you also implying you are glad Clinton won? n nRonald Reagan proved he was a political winner long before he ran for president. His victories in California were convincing evidence.
You missed the point again. Bush 41 made the Buchanan challenge possible because he was a lousy president who stabbed conservative principles that he glommed off of in 1988 to get elected in the back, in spades. I didn't care for Buchanan either, but I understand full well just WHY he was running, because four years of Bush 41 with the likes of Richard Darman as OMB director (the guy who was busting at the seams to get taxes raised from the get-go) had betrayed every last principle of Reaganism. n nBush 41 never treated conservatives as the enemy? I guess you were asleep during the 1990 Budget Deal when Bush kissed the butts of Tom Foley and George Mitchell and had more nasty things to say about Newt Gingrich when he came out against the budget deal (and Gingrich was right!). I also remember a Bush Administration that was already anti-Israel under the leadership of James Baker at the State Department, and I also remember how the "realism" of Bush, Baker and Brent Scowcroft had them trying to preserve Gorbachev and the USSR and making them last in the pecking order to recognize the independence of the Baltics!