Struggle for the GOP

National Review, Dec 31, 2006 by Duncan Currie

The Elephant in the Room: Evangelicals, Libertarians, and the Battle to Control the Republican Party, by Ryan Sager (Wiley, 256 pp., $25.95)

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WHATEVER one thinks of him, President Bush is a polarizing figure. His faith, his malapropisms, his cocksure strut--each is sufficient to drive certain folks batty. But the polarization of the Bush era contains a deep irony: While most liberals seem convinced Bush has governed as a right-wing partisan, many conservatives treat him as a profound disappointment, if not an outright phony.

Prior to the 2004 election a parade of books diagnosed the roots of liberal "Bush hatred." Today the new publishing phenomenon is the anti-Bush conservative. Bruce Bartlett struck first with Impostor. Now comes Ryan Sager, a youthful New York Post columnist who rails against spendthrift Republicans generally but saves his fiercest ire for Bush and Karl Rove. Sager is out to torpedo the edifice of "big-government conservatism," a pseudo-philosophy he believes has guided the Bush White House and led it astray from the values of Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater.

The "elephant in the room," Sager tells us, is this: "George W. Bush has been a tremendous mistake for the Republican party; and if the GOP hopes to remain the party of limited government, its next presidential nominee will have to repudiate, not extend, the Bush legacy." Under Bush's stewardship, he says, the GOP has become "more southern, more religious, and more working-class, and all the time more friendly toward expanding the size and scope of the state."

His book has much to recommend it for political junkies. It is briskly written and draws on an impressive array of interviews and data. There is no question that the "Republican Revolution" of 1994 has petered out, leaving behind a trail of corruption and legislative sclerosis. There is also no question that the GOP is the party of social conservatism. As for "big-government conservatism," Sager is correct that Republicans have tried to have their cake and eat it--that is, continue cutting taxes while cranking up federal spending on education, Medicare, farm subsidies, and sundry pork projects. In the process their reputation for fiscal sobriety has suffered.

Sager proposes a "renewed fusionism," with a hat tip to the late conservative icon (and NR literary editor) Frank Meyer, to "revive the best traditions of Ronald Reagan and update them with the most important insights behind the Ownership Society." While accepting the permanence of the New Deal, this initiative would also boost individualism and recognize that "libertarian means" can serve "traditionalist ends." He suggests various "fusionist" policies the Republicans might adopt: placing "a greater emphasis on civil liberties in the War on Terror"; promoting school choice; and embracing a regime of "cultural federalism," i.e., deciding issues such as marijuana legalization, gay marriage, and stem-cell research on a state-by-state basis.

One may quibble with bits of Sager's agenda, but on balance his cri de coeur is fair-minded and sharply argued. He convincingly documents the ascendancy of social conservatives and big spenders within the GOP. He is less convincing, however, in his evaluation of George W. Bush, and in his prescriptions for electoral success.

A quick scan of the 2006 map indicates that Democrats did not win Congress with social libertarianism or Cato Institute economics. They won it by blending economic and (in some cases) cultural populism with criticism of an unpopular president, an unpopular war, and an unpopular party. The chief swing voters in 2006 were not conservatives angry over the new Medicare entitlement but rather centrists, independents, and former Reagan Democrats anxious over Iraq, incompetence, corruption, and economic insecurity.

That last point is crucial. Despite robust growth and low unemployment, Americans seem increasingly worried about a panoply of pocketbook issues, including income volatility, health insurance, savings, and the consequences of globalization. Republicans must come to terms with this new landscape. Like Democrats, they must find a way to address heightened economic-security qualms without sacrificing their core principles on economic freedom.

What about social freedom? As Sager admits, "Any observer of the [109th] Congress will quickly recognize that many of the most socially conservative members are among the most economically conservative, and vice versa." But he insists the Christian Right is alienating libertarians. That's true. It's also true that on certain issues--Terri Schiavo, evolution, stem-cell research, condoms--religious conservatives may alienate the general public. They can at times be obnoxious and blinkered, as can their detractors.

That said, the most important electoral shift of the past three decades was the migration of evangelical Protestants, ethnic Catholics, and blue-collar populists into the Republican tent. These are the voters who made Reaganism and the Gingrich-Armey Congress possible. While their views on morality may repel libertarians, social conservatives also gave the GOP sufficient political muscle to cut taxes, reform welfare, and balance the budget. Such tradeoffs are the lifeblood of politics.