Radical!

A year ago I would have said that the Republican party could not possibly move any further to the right.  After all, here was a party that had invented the individual mandate for health care in the 1990s, and now believed it to be akin to fascism.  A party whose leader in 2001 refused to blame Muslims for 9/11, but was now in fierce opposition to the building of a mosque two blocks and around the corner from the WTC site.  A party that had a nearly maximalist position on abortion.

But then the 2012 presidential primaries started, and I found out I was wrong.  Think about the new positions being staked out, not by fringe candidates, but by the frontrunners for the nomination:

• Rick Santorum isn't just against abortion, he's against contraception.
• Mitt Romney's new tax plan calls for a 20% tax cut on top of the Bush tax cuts
• Rick Santorum's tax cut is even bigger
• Santorum's criticism of Romney's tax plan is that it borrows too much from Occupy Wall Street, presumably because the top 1% still pay something.
• Supporting Israel isn't enough anymore; now Republicans are expected to absolutely support every policy and practice of the Israeli government, unless they can figure out a way to be even tougher than the Israeli government wants to be.

I've said this before; the Republican party has turned so far right that it's just staggering.  And this isn't about "polarization" in a neutral sense- Democrats have not made a similar turn to the left.  I've challenged some Republican friends to come up with one issue on which Democrats are now further to the left than they were in 2000 other than gay rights/gay marriage.  I've never heard an answer.

"Obama Derangement Syndrome" seems to have overtaken the right.  Hell, as soon as Michelle Obama began her campaign against childhood obesity, much of the Republican establishment started criticizing her while proudly eating high-fat foods.  These guys are crazy!

"Moderate" Doesn't Mean What You Think it Means in the GOP

It occurs to me, in watching the Republican race for the presidential nomination, that the framing of "conservative" candidates (Gingrich, Perry, Bachman, Cain) and "moderates" (Romney, Huntsman) isn't really very precise.  For starters, we now have two ostensibly arch-conservative candidates (Gingrich and Perry) viciously attacking Romney from Left on his history as a "vulture capitalist" (to use Perry's term). We have Romney displaying foreign policy positions that are as right-wing as can possibly be imagined, and Huntsman's economic platform is as conservative as anyone's.

Romney's history is certainly not as conservative as the others in the race, but he's been running as fast as he can away from those old positions.  Yet he still can't seem to break into the Conservative Club no matter how hard he runs.

So I think that's because being a conservative today isn't really about policy positions, it's about style.  Gingrich has this thing nailed down perfectly- he's caustic, hyperbolic, and choked with rage all the time.  Perry has a less angry way about him, but his Texas Good Old Boy shtick, so reminiscent of George W. Bush, signals "conservative" to voters. 

Mitt Romney just doesn't speak to the Tea Party id, much as he tries.  Mitt is hyperbolic like Newt, but he can't carry it off with quite the same snarl that's really the hallmark of the Right these days.  And of course Mitt comes from the old Eastern establishment elite wing of the Republican party- he has so much of the patrician about him he just can't shake it.  It looks like he'll win the nomination anyway, thanks to superior organization and money, but he just doesn't seem to fit the Republican party any more.  The party is now dominated by the South and mountain West, and they like their policians "down home".  George W. Bush is the model for that party now- you don't have to be a regular guy (both GWB and McCain were very rich), but you're supposed to come off like one.  Romney just doesn't, and I think that's really why the party is holding their noses while voting for him.

Vote for Moonbats Because We Don't Trust Democrats? (Updated)

Last night I was talking to a new acquaintance about politics and he said, as many I encounter do, that he's independent but doesn't trust the Democrats to be fiscally responsible.  Here in Massachusetts there are lots of "Bill Weld Republicans" as I call them- socially liberal, fiscally conservative people who cringe at the southern Republicans' fundamentalism but fear the liberals' tax policies.

So many of these people are unhappy with Obama because he's a Big Taxing Liberal.  Now I'm unhappy with Obama too, but he's not a Big Taxing Liberal.

So we start arguing about the budget, and this guy says that he's in favor of tax increases being part of the solution for balancing it.  Yet he still might vote for a Republican. 

So I have to ask: why?  At the debate a few nights ago in Iowa, a moderator asked for a show of hands from all the candidates- would you refuse a budget deal that was balanced 10-1 spending cuts to tax increases?  Every candidate raised a hand to indicate he/she would refuse such a deal.  So you have every candidate from the opposition party insisting on balancing the budget in a way that is completely impossible to accomplish.

Again, I'm not happy with Obama, and if he loses in 2012 he'll richly deserve it.  But at least he's not trying to repeal the laws of Mathematics in his campaign platform.  Anyone who calls himself a fiscal conservative has to vote Democrat.

UPDATE: A correspondent writes:

Keep in mind that the candidates who raised their hands are all trying to win a primary election, and that anyone not raising a hand will have a hard time reaching the general election. They might answer differently if they were trying to win the general election. Or is that too cynical?

Well, nothing is too cynical in Washington, but nevertheless I think we have to consider the promises made by politicians as having some force.  I think Mitt Romney, being a smart guy with an understanding of mathematics, realizes that balancing the budget without any tax hikes at all is impossible.  And as Massachusetts governor he showed himself to be open to different ideas and willing to do things like raise taxes when necessary. 

But if President Romney agrees to raise taxes in 2014, he will be primaried in 2016 by the True Believers in the GOP.  He must know that.  Above all Mitt Romney has shown that he will say and do whatever is necessary in order to be elected (and presumably re-elected) president.  Does he really believe in the Norquistian refusal to increase taxes?  Maybe not.  But will he have the political wiggle room to defy the anti-taxers?  Almost certainly not.

So when every Republican candidate raises his/her hand in the debate, I think we as voters have to take them at their word.  They're all fiscally irresponsible.  The deficit will continue to explode if they're president.  If you care most about lower taxes, by all means you should vote Republican.  If you care more about deficits, you have to vote Democrat.