It is a bad time to be a Republican
Not that there is ever a good time to be one, but the plague of scandals swirling around the GOP is really taking a toll on its constituency, as one might imagine. So just how bad is it out there?
Just when Republicans thought things could not get any worse, Senator Larry E. Craig of Idaho confirmed that he had pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of disorderly conduct after an undercover police officer accused him of soliciting sex in June in a Minneapolis airport restroom. On Tuesday, Mr. Craig, 62, held a news conference to defend himself, calling the guilty plea “a mistake” and declaring, “I am not gay” — even as the Senate Republican leadership asked for an Ethics Committee review.
It was a bizarre spectacle, and only the latest in a string of accusations of sexual foibles and financial misdeeds that have landed Republicans in the political equivalent of purgatory, the realm of late-night comic television.
Forget Mark Foley of Florida, who quit the House last year after exchanging sexually explicit e-mail messages with under-age male pages, or Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist whose dealings with the old Republican Congress landed him in prison. They are old news, replaced by a fresh crop of scandal-plagued Republicans, men like Senator David Vitter of Louisiana, whose phone number turned up on the list of the so-called D.C. Madam, or Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska and Representative Rick Renzi of Arizona, both caught up in F.B.I. corruption investigations. [Ed. note - that is one helluva list, no?]
It is enough to make a self-respecting Republican want to tear his hair out in frustration, especially as the party is trying to defend an unpopular war, contain the power of the new Democratic majority on Capitol Hill and generate some enthusiasm among voters heading toward the presidential election in 2008.
“The real question for Republicans in Washington is how low can you go, because we are approaching a level of ridiculousness,” said Mr. Reed, sounding exasperated in an interview on Tuesday morning. “You can’t make this stuff up. And the impact this is having on the grass-roots around the country is devastating. Republicans think the governing class in Washington are a bunch of buffoons who have total disregard for the principles of the party, the law of the land and the future of the country.”
Now I know that it is still way early in the election cycle but whoever wins the Republican nomination will not exactly have the wind at their back in 2008. These scandals will undercut any effort to wrap the Republican Party in their well-worn “family values” mantel. Furthermore, the old Gingrich tactic of vilifying Democrats as a bunch contemptible degenerates is going to ring hollow, what with all of the GOP’s dirty laundry laying about. With Bush and the war to defend, a demoralized base, a tanking real estate market, and monumental hypocrisy amongst their office holders, a conservative politician will find damn few arrows left in his quiver. As Nelson Muntz would say, "ha ha".
posted by joestrummerlives at 1:14 PM
2 Comments:
Hi again, Joe. I wish I could agree with your optimism here, but I feel a little cynical about the whole they-can't-bust-us-b/c-they're-so-busted on matters of misconduct. This administration--or, I guess, much of the public/MEDIA--during this administration has so ahdered to the emperor with no clothes (ex-cokehead? can't use words? loves having citizens killed?) that I feel there has been and will be more blanket acceptance of bad behavior. Even prior to this Ignorati's collective rise to power, Reps always seem to get more of a pass than we do. (Is it me or did no one flinch when Gingrich stepped down b/c of an affair (and this on the heels of Clinton's oval office BJ)?)Anyway, the fact is that Reps--in all their hypocritical glory--make WAY more of a stink at Dems' less than likable behavior (again, see: oval office BJ) than Dems do in the reverse case. We don't go touting how morally wrong some behavior is--e.g. homosexuality, let's say--b/c we don't think it's wrong...and neither do our voters. So, for us to bad talk too much against Rpes' gay acts would be to (1) act against our own morals (except, perhaps, that cheating is wrong) but also, and more politically disastrously, (2) eschew support of gay and gay-friendly voters. In this sense, Reps give us enough rope to hang ourselves with. They have proven time and again to be quite comfortable with their own hypocrisy, thereby feeling free as the breeze to blast us for "immoral" behavior while staying relatively mum in the face of their homegrown scandals (if they just admitted they're gay and that that's alright, it wouldn't even BE a scandal but I digress...(even more, that is).
2:43 PM
Thomas Frank’s terrific What's the Matter with Kansas argued that values voters vote Republican, often against their economic interest, because of the GOP’s perceived adherence to family values. If that perception is diluted enough, perhaps those value voters stay at home or even decide to vote for the Democrat.
And I don’t disagree with your larger point that the Reps always beat the morality drum harder and better than our side. That is sort of their gig and their voters actually care about that stuff. Plus, Bill Clinton was the perfect foil for that crowd to disparage.
The point that I was trying to make (and not terribly clearly, it seems) was that these scandals, one after the other, could have a corrosive effect on the Republican claim on the values voters. There is no doubt that conservative politicians will still make hay on values issues, especially in individual races. I just question how effective that is going to be in the current climate.
3:48 PM
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