With twelve or more “potential” presidential candidates and
counting, the Republican effort is taking on the aspect of Yogi’s famous quote,
“It’s déjà vu all over again”. A dozen
is plenty to form another circular firing squad to produce “The son of
2012”.
Granted, the ratio of credible candidates in terms of
background and qualifications to the status seeking fringe dwellers is better
this time but attempts by the Republican National Committee to avoid the chaos
of the ridiculous number of primary debates in 2012 will be undermined by the
sheer number of candidates. “Debates”,
which are really hyped group interviews and which are hijacked by publicity
seeking moderators, simply can’t be organized around twelve or more
candidates. A two hour format with
breaks, would allow less than four two and a half minute questions and answers
per candidate.
Even avoiding the Gong Show
nonsense perpetrated by moderators in the past, the expectation of any serious discussions
on policy positions would be very low.
The post-debate panels of “theater critics” focus on style over
substance and alleged gaffes, to decide the “winners” and “losers”.
But that’s just the stylistic issue with this crowded
field. The more serious problem as
exhibited in the 2012 primary election season was the fratricidal demonizing of
the front runners even before the Democrats took their shots.
The primary campaign is a competition and it should
demonstrate the differences in approach to important national issues. The problem is that the inflated
multi-candidate competition can become a desperate campaign of personal and
hyper-ideological attacks to attract narrow interest group support which divide
and disgust the broader conservative voting constituency and which provide
fodder for the same kind of demonization by the Democratic candidate and “her”
Greek chorus in the media and blogosphere.
Some conservative columnists have lauded the fact that there
are “fresh faces” in this season’s stable of candidates, and indeed there
are. But fresh isn’t the same thing as
credible or electable and “old” faces whose political shelf life is near their
expiration dates clutter up the
landscape.
Among the newer possibilities, some do stand out in a
positive way. However, it would be a
mistake to take the response at Iowa’s recent “first in the nation” political
event, the Iowa Freedom Summit, as a reliable measure of electibility on a
national scale.
That the Iowa caucuses to be held in January, 2016 are
important because they are “first” is a media inflated assertion and they say little
about competence. Iowa voters are not representative of the national electorate nor reflective of Republicans
and conservative leaning Independents nation-wide. This is easily demonstrated
by the winners and runner ups in previous Iowa caucuses.
In 2008 the Iowa Republican Caucus winner in January, was
Mike Huckabee who dropped out of the race in March after winning only 278
delegates in several primaries. The
actual Republican nominee was John McCain who came in 4th in the
Iowa caucuses.
In 2012 the Republican Iowa Caucus winner was Rick Santorum
who dropped out in April after accumulating only 250 delegates; the Republican nominee was Mitt Romney.
Huckabee and Santorum are back. It remains to be seen if their messages are
different this time around but the narrow, faith based political orientation of
Iowa’s mostly evangelical Christian Republican voters is likely to remain the
same.
Huckabee, the former Baptist minister and Arkansas governor,
already seems to be trying to repeat his caucus winning appeal to religious
conservatives by criticizing gay marriage and sexuality of all sorts.
These positions might get him some votes in socially conservative states
as personal opinions but they don’t represent any viable legal or public policy positions and
stand in opposition to majorities in public opinion polls.
Santorum ran in 2012 as the anti-abortion, anti-birth
control candidate which drowned out his other positions on economic and
security matters. If he follows
Huckabee’s lead and tries to repeat a social issues victory in the
non-representative Iowa caucuses in 2016, he will split the religious
conservative vote with Huckabee and both will become early second time historical footnotes.
Rick Perry, quasi-“fresh face” former governor of Texas and
brief Republican candidate in 2012 is looking like he’s giving it another
try. If so, he can be expected to
combine traditional southern conservatism with emphasis on the vibrant Texas
economy in comparison with the slower and struggling economies of other
states. It remains to be seen if the
recent slump in oil prices and attendant lay-offs in the heavily energy
dependent Texas economy will harm this message.
He lasted only four months in 2012 and dropped out after saying in a
televised debate that he would cut several federal cabinet departments if
elected President but then couldn’t remember which ones.
He is not an exciting speaker but if he can
remember his positions this time he might last at least past the Iowa Caucuses
in January but it is hard to see that he would have much appeal in the second
primary in New Hampshire where Texas drawls and social issues don’t excite the
voters as much as economic issues.
Sarah Palin showed up at the Iowa Freedom Summit after
saying she was “interested” in running for
President. She isn’t. She is just trying to keep her name in the
media discussion to support her
dwindling speaking fees. She has no personal money raising ability, no
competent staff, and no desire to do the hard work to become conversant with
the important issues. That is a good thing since she would be embarrassing side
show as she was when she gave a cringe inducing, head shaking and incredibly
incoherent speech to the befuddled conservatives at the Summit.
Since her similarly rambling speech while
resigning from the governorship of Alaska in 2009, Palin has demonstrated the
same remarkable empty headedness and lack of intellectual curiosity that
contributed to the failed McCain/Palin campaign in 2008. She has has since limited
her public political pronouncements to ideological platitudes, semi-comical
attacks on the “lame stream media” and anti-liberal bumper sticker quality slogans.
It is unlikely that she would again subject
herself to a public test of thoughtfulness in a televised debate.
But what about the
“new faces” for 2016? At this
point are there is much talk about Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker who made his
reputation by taking on public employee unions, surviving a union inspired
recall election, and then going on to win a second term in the next general
election, all in the “blue” state of Wisconsin.
That history certainly has appeal to Republicans and will keep Walker in
the news, and the race unless he fails
to formulate a broader vision and specific policies that recommend him to a wide
segment of voters. As the current threat
to Hillary by virtue of positive poll numbers, his lack of a four year college
degree has been hyped by liberal foot soldiers in the media but is over
stated. He finished three years and quit
to go to work , and his lack of a diploma might not hurt him with the 74% of
the population who also do not have college degrees.
His success
will depend on his intellectual acumen and grasp of public policy issues which
will determine his fitness for office, but that is to come. Recently however,
he has been tempted to try for an early win by emphasizing
the positions on abortion and gay
marriage that appear to be litmus tests for Republican voters in Iowa. Once stated those positions become embedded
in a candidate’s public perception of
him and will harden opposition among
more centrist voters.
Chris Christy, the Republican governor of “bright blue” New
Jersey is indeed a “fresh face” with a fresh “say it like it is” personality
which has a certain appeal to those who see most politicians as double talking and unassertive. His early popularity in polls vs. Hillary
brought immediate attacks from the threatened liberal punditry but proved
ineffective. He is not the rigid social conservative
that Iowa voters like but he is emphasizing other issues and could be a
surprise player.
Rand Paul, the Republican Senator from Kentucky is an
interesting candidate since as a libertarian he doesn’t represent the typical
conservative politician who accepts certain levels of government as inevitable
and/or necessary, as well as greater
levels of foreign policy and military involvement. Paul has been trying to move to the middle
some, as well as adopting some positions traditionally found on the Left such
as criticizing the “security state” with regard to surveillance and
privacy. But an isolationist foreign and
trade policy is difficult to sell in a world immersed in globalization and beset
by economic challenges, instability, and terrorist threats. Still, Paul offers an interesting counter
point to international activism and appeals to voters who want the rest of the
world to solve their own problems.
Marko Rubio, Republican Senator from Florida comes across as
intelligent, articulate and compatible with traditional conservative
positions. He is also “Hispanic” in the
Cuban immigrant sense of the word, and has a political base in Florida which is
a very important electoral college state. He is also young (43) and may seem to some
voters as still relatively inexperienced and untested.
Ted Cruz is the junior senator from Texas. While a “new face” and an unrepentant social
and ideological conservative, he often appears strident and unrealistically
uncompromising, as his willingness to deny passing a continuing resolution to
fund federal government operations and avoid another politically disastrous government
shutdown has shown.
His focus on
repealing Obamacare has made him a popular figure among
those who see this program as Obama’s
biggest failure, but Cruz will have to broaden his appeal. He is a first term
Senator and at 44 also relatively young.
He sports an Hispanic name but while his father is Cuban born, his
mother, a natural born American citizen, is not and he was born in Canada, thus
his appeal to the mostly Mexican and Central American Hispanic voters based
simply on ethnicity is questionable.
That leaves the rest of the “fresh faces” with the exception
of Jeb Bush, which as a group fall into a category best described as
“clutter”. “Dark horses” have
occasionally emerged in U.S. national politics but the reality of the need for
huge financial support, experienced staff and the ability to capture a defining
issue makes these
candidates real underdogs.
Ben Carson is a soft spoken values candidate. His background, and only expertise as a neurosurgeon detracts from his
credibility as the potential “leader of the free world”. Following
a President who entered office with little on his resume’ to recommend
him as a competent candidate and then proving over and over that he wasn’t, will
be a tough sell for the surgeon.
He
currently seems to be adopting the role as the “conscience of the conservative”
movement and he will have to address the need for specific policies which he
can explain and justify if he wants to attract financial support and progress
past the social issue primaries in Iowa and mostly southern states, which seems
highly unlikely.
Carly Fiarino is this year’s “female Republican candidate”,
maybe. In 2012 it was former
Representative Michele Bachmann . Being
female wasn’t enough for Bachmann and won’t be enough for
Fiarino. While Bachmann suffered from
terminal goofiness, Fiarino enters the race, if she does, suffering from a
complete lack of political experience.
Nonetheless,
there is a quasi-strategy among some of the candidates who are governors or
former governors which touts their “non-Washington” background. Whether Fiarino could use this to her
advantage remains to be seen. What is
known about her is that she made a successful career in technology, rising from
an administrative trainee at AT&T in 1980 to CEO of tech giant Hewlett-Packard in
1997. Much was made of her being a
“first female CEO”, “most powerful female in business” etc. which could be a
slight asset in a presidential race but not a defining one. The downside of her background is the fact
that she was fired from Hewlett-Packard in 2005 after a dispute with its Board
of Directors.
Since then she has herself
made a career out of serving on numerous other corporate and non-profit boards. Her one foray into electoral politics was a
failed 2010 attempt to unseat Democratic California Senator Barbara Boxer in an
election which she lost badly. All in
all, besides being female and having a strong private sector and executive
background there is not much that separates her from most of the other
potential candidates and it will be a difficult task to excite and inspire a
political following sufficient for the job.
That leaves Jeb Bush who is either the “elephant in the
room” or the dark shadow of the former president, his brother George W.
Bush. He is smart, articulate, and was a
popular governor of Florida. He has been
cast as a “moderate” by both his supporters and his adversaries. Hard core conservatives denounce his public
stands on immigration and the “Common Core” education initiative. Independents and center Left voters might
like him but dedicated liberals see him as the heir to George W.’s presidency
which they condemn as incompetent and dominated by a “failed” war in Iraq. For
some voters three Bush’s in the White House might just seem to be “too
much”. However, compared to two Clintons
it might not seem too bad.
The
Republican “establishment” i.e. big donors, seem to be coalescing around his candidacy but it is very early in the process and he
will have to withstand the “too
moderate” criticisms from the Republican Right and the “too Bush”
criticisms from the Democratic
punditry for the long haul.
For Jeb, being a “moderate” isn’t good in the early
Republican primaries of Iowa and South Carolina which pundits like to
characterize as make or break contests.
New Hampshire which follows Iowa is conservative but less dominated by
social issues and that primary might be a launching pad or a “flame out” for Jeb. Mitt Romney was attacked for the same
lack of ideological rigidity but overcame it by simply appearing to be the most
electable, in no small part because voters outside the doctrinaire Right saw
him as more moderate. So far Bush’s
early poll numbers show him to be withstanding the “too moderate” narrative but
the primary season hasn’t yet formally begun and all the candidates will
eventually have to show that they have actual answers to the nation’s problems. Unfortunately, this effort will be clouded by
exaggerated ideological and personal attacks
as the candidates try to separate
themselves from their opponents.
Hopefully, this herd of candidates will dwindle to a number
insufficient to form the circular firing squad and the target will switch to
Hillary.
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