1 For 50, and Roved Up

Leave it to the Grand Planner to retroactively make George McGovern look good.

(An Aside: I uttered this line, as a bit of levity, during a morning-after-the-election radio appearance; it played well, so I decided to begin this piece therewith. I was forced by extraneous circumstance to delay further work hereon, and lo and behold the Democrats have in that interim named to their ad hoc unilateral Congressional Iraq Study Group none other than the aforementioned Mister McGovern, who is charged with devising a plan by which we completely disengage from Iraq by June the next.

Serving as Exhibit AAAAHGFOIHJOI that nothing raises one’s Democrat stock quite like failure. The more triumphantly futile your result, the higher you are subsequently held in the esteem of your Donkey colleagues [See: Shrum, Bob; See Also: Carter, Jimmy and Mondale, Walter and … ]. Whatever salary the South Dakota Nightmare culls for his invaluable work here, he should kick a portion of it to Rove, who’s just transpired uber-failing made McGovern’s inevitable next possible.)

Rove’s entire ongoing reelection strategy, both for his employer and his Party, has been patterned nearly in totality on the Richard Milhous Nixon (RMN) Approach, which was and is to take repeated nibbles at the policy Middle in order to pick off enough of its mercurial, nearly chimerical members to sway the vote your way.

Nixon was ostensibly a Conservative prior to his rise to the highest of ballotory heights. But he then incepted such egregiously bad policy as wage and price controls and the Environmental Protection Agency; the former were finally, fully dispatched by the then newly elected Ronald Reagan in 1981; the latter to this day still stands athwart (especially Western) United States fiscal advancement, yelling “Stop!”.

Founded and Funded

More fully, it has been said that Lyndon Baines Johnson may have created the Great Society, but it was Nixon who funded it.

Seeing RMN’s 1972 520-17 Electoral College reelection rout of McGovern as a bellwether, Rove, in full “Imitation is the sincerest form of Campaign Managing” mode, sought to recreate this model immediately following his successfully running George W. Bush as an alleged Conservative in 2000.

In this emulative thinking exists problems aplenty, both in formulation and execution. Let us begin with the execution.

One need only look at but a small fraction of the Rovian legislative primrose paths taken to see that not only is this not a Conservative Administration, it is one not interested in even pretending to be on any given day in any month that does not begin with the letter “N” (in, of course, alternate years).

More Coin, Less Votes

The prescription drug and transportation bills, the earmarks and general spending too innumerable and innumerous to name and number contained both within and without these particular acts, and even the Harriet Miers slip-up sandwiched between two decent Supreme Court nominees are no mere nibbles, and they are taken from the Left rather than the Middle.

Resentment amongst actual Conservatives grew with each successive Rove trip to the electoral well; in 2006, he finally found it anhydrous.

Turning to the formulation portion of this deconstruction, the situation on the ground these days, and especially this year, is markedly different than that ever faced by Rove’s Electoral Godfather.

First and foremost, the Conservative Movement which Rove counted on being able to repeatedly take for granted is thirty five years more mature, fully developed and confident than it was when Nixon was profiting from the Antediluvian given.

Too Easy, Unless Self-Vacated

It is today the dominant ideological force in politics, with the self-assurance that comes with the major victories it achieved in 1980, 1984 and 1994 (as well as the several additional minor ones along that way).

The only win the Movement had attained by the Nixon Epoch was the 1964 Presidential nomination of Barry Goldwater, which the general election showed to be then solely Pyrrhic in nature. Still stinging from that beating, they were more than willing to take whatever little they could get from RMN.

Second, today’s Conservatives have the means of fast and mass communication of their disdain for Rove’s actions that those opposed to Nixon’s ideological misdeeds were decidedly lacking. Direct mail has nowhere near the rapid response capability as does e-mail, and the multitudinous blooms of the World Wide Web proffer more information and rant-space than the members of the Movement can ever possibly use.

Which brings us to specifically this year’s debacle.

The Democrat Perspective, Then and Now

RMN and his GOP had very little in the way of a Conservative history by which to be held accountable. That dearth, combined with Democrat opponents steeped too deeply in the Age of Aquarius for Middle America to take, was wiggle room enough for two successful elections.

By this, the Year of Our Lord 2006, Republicans have established a long and storied record of running as Conservatives, and have to varying degrees of success governed accordingly. As of last Tuesday, however, they had meandered far too far astray, and were therefore rightly sent on their way.

As we have said before, when Republicans act like Diet Democrats, the electorate will choose the Real Thing every time.

One similarity does exist between the Ages of Nixon and Bush (and, crossing the aisle, Bill Clinton); these titular heads of their Parties ensured their Third Way two terms at the grievous expense of their down ticket brethren.

However, Nixon brought down his ménage through personal failings. Rove brought down his via ideological ones.

Go Right, Young Men and Women

The solution remains the same; Republicans need to distance themselves from the apostate in their midst, now as they did then. Electing Conservatives to Leadership positions, and undertaking a broad, less government agenda, even as a Minority Party, is the surest way to delineate themselves from Rove and his Approach.

And it will put a tremendous strain on a Liberal Democrat Command that ran and won on nothing resembling that which they will now invariably try to implement.

Back On Top Soon, If Played Rightly

The American people ousted Republicans, not Conservatism; the Caucus, in fact, is more conservative now than it was on November 6th. Should the GOP again offer them a demarcated ideological choice, they will again make them the Majority.

As go all things Geology, all it ever takes is pressure and time; in this case, with force properly applied, about two years.