Sen. John McCain is putting together a major economic plan that will be structured, in some ways, off of Newt Gingrich’s famous Contract With America.
In an email obtained by the Huffington Post, the Arizona Republican’s chief of staff, Marc Buse, asked an outside adviser for help with a “ten principles” program that the senator could use as a “definitive” platform.
McCain and his party are completely devoid of ideas. Actually, that’s not completely true — they have one singular idea, and it’s been the basis of the party line for about four decades now:
Buse doesn’t offer specific suggestions of his own, save “NO TAX INCREASES.”
I understand all the Republican arguments against tax increases, even if I disagree with them. But doesn’t a major political party have to be based on a little more than just NO TAX INCREASES? The world is complicated these days. It demands more than one singular idea as the answer to our problems. If McCain really wants to help his party, he would do well to come up with some new ideas.
Some Republicans have ideas even today. They just aren’t heard. Moderate and thoughtful Republicans lost control of their party during the Reagan revolution. People like Roger Ailes figured out that a certain segment of the population responds very predictably to appeals to emotions rather than ideas. It has been a downhill slide for the Republican Party since that time. It could be argued that the Contract with America had some new ideas but, unfortunately, the philandering of Bill Clinton gave credence to the Moral Majority and restored the power of the right wing of the Republican Party.
The base of the Republican Party today is conditioned to respond only to feelings. They fear we will take their money, their religion, and their guns and make them vulnerable to outsiders like illegal immigrants or Islamofascists. They fear the power of Big Brother even though in a democracy Big Brother is us. They cannot abandon their fears because fear is not rational. This is a monster created by cynical political manipulators and no amount of cajoling or appeals to rational thought will change that. Fortunately they are a little monster.
The thoughtful Republicans, like Tim Pawlenty, Norm Coleman and John McCain, who have courted the irrational right out of political ambition, are now paying the price. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Bill O’Reilly, who have privatized fear mongering, are the torchbearers of the Party today. People like Arlen Spector, Chuck Hagel, and perhaps Lindsay Graham will bear the burden of trying to bring the Republican Party back into the mainstream.