Dissention in the (Republican) Ranks
“Screw you guys. I’m going home.” - Eric Cartman
Do you smell that? On Thursday actual non-media citizens expressed their preference for our leaders, on Tuesday it’s going to happen again and the country is going smell like democracy all week. What a refreshing change from the usual odor of contorted analysis and posturing outrage. I, for one, was quite pleased with the results of the Iowa Caucuses. The Democratic Caucus will probably turn out to be the more important in terms of who the next occupant of 1600 turns out to be for the simple reason that the Democratic nominee is more likely to win in November. But the Republican Caucus is more interesting because it’s exposed a potentially major fissure in the Republican Party.
Mike Huckabee and his cross of piousness won, and won big, over the moneyed interests of Mitt Romney, and therein lies the problem for the national prospects of the Republican Party. The Iowa Caucus has set up a clash on the Republican side between Huckabee, representing the salvation wing of the party, and Romney, representing the profit wing. Both men are straight out of central casting, Huckabee is a devout believer who became a preacher before he became a politician, and Romney is a businessman who started life rich and made himself even richer. They are both stereotypes to which their respective constituencies can easily relate.
Both of those constituencies could relate to George W. Bush, but he is no longer a candidate for office. In that sense though he did live up to his promise to be a uniter, not a divider. He united a Republican party that is otherwise quite at odds with itself. In 2000 he was trusted by the guardians of both sides of the Republican philosophical divide. He was a money man who went to both Harvard and Yale, a man with connections to the well propertied base of the party, but he was a also a born again Texan who sincerely believed in personal salvation and Jesus Christ. There is no 2008 equivalent to 2000 George W. Bush.
Romney and Huckabee are each half of the equation, but neither can ever be the whole thing. Moreover, each brings out the worst in the other camp, things that had previously gone unspoken. Huckabee’s populist (by Republican standards anyway) rhetoric has nakedly exposed the anti-tax, business-at-all-cost conservatives for the unfeeling plutocrats that they really are. Romney’s Mormonism has just as completely exposed the Bible thumpers as intolerant, religious bigots. With Bush around as a rallying point those ugly truths were subsumed to the greater good of the party; now they are out for all to see.
Reagan and Bush the Elder paid lip service to a socially conservative agenda, but neither one of them was very religious and neither one of them really cared about abortion, school prayer, evolution, or any of that other stuff. Bush the Younger, on the other hand, is religious and really does seem to care about those things. That’s all well and good as long as it lasts, but the social conservatives have tasted power now and they do not want to go back to being patted on the head every four years and pointed toward a polling station. They know that Romney, who was pro-choice until about two years ago, isn’t going to deliver anything they want.
Bush the Younger was equally giving to his fiscal base though. He embraced supply side economics with a fervency that would’ve made Reagan blush. His paymasters profited handsomely and love him for it, but those same policies have been disastrous for people making less than six figures. Those are the people to whom Huckabee appeals and the big money people know that even if Huckabee can be brought to heel he won’t be a great friend to them the way Bush is or Romney would be.
The problem, if you’re a Republican, is that George W. Bush won the presidency by a narrow margin, twice, with the unconditional support of both groups. Neither side can win if the other takes their toys and goes home, nor can they agree on a candidate. While there is certainly overlap between the two groups, the hard core of each sees disaster if their man doesn’t win the nomination. This is why John McCain is suddenly seen as a very real prospect again despite the fact that he is older than dirt and despised by a great many within his own party.
My hunch, and it is only a hunch, is that Romney will still be the nominee. If there is one thing in American politics that is indisputably more powerful than Jesus it is the dollar. The Republican Party was bought and paid for a long time ago and the Mormon from Massachusetts still has, despite his recent stumble in Iowa and faded poll numbers in New Hampshire, an enormous dollar advantage over Huckabee and McCain. Romney, who appears to have no scruples whatsoever outside of not compromising his faith or his family, will eventually unleash the full power of his considerable financial resources, personal and otherwise, and that will be the end of that.
Come November though, none of those men will have the enthusiastic and unconditional support of both the Wall Street Journal editorial page and the people who take their Sabbath days seriously. It’s not like this is the only issue dividing once united Republicans either. Immigration, and the racism, sometimes quite overt, behind a lot of GOP thinking on the subject, springs to mind as well. Only time will tell if this disunity has a serious effect on election results, and a lot can happen between now and November, but at the very least it’s a serious disadvantage in an era when even the tiniest things can swing elections.
