It is old hat by now that the Republican Party is in a sorry state of disrepair. In just four short years, the same party that was busy charting its way to a permanent Republican majority finds itself staring at 40 Senators, a major deficit in the House, a highly popular Democratic president, and a not-too-favorable election field in 2010. Meanwhile, Republican self-identification and congressional popularity have reached near all-time lows, even as a deeply unpopular and divisive radio host climbs to supreme power in the disjointed vacuum that is the GOP leadership.
At issue, however, is not what has happened to the once great Republican Party, but why it has happened. What lessons can be learned from the GOP's fall from grace? What errors should the Democrats avoid? And what path does the GOP take to relevance from here?
The Polls
The simple and usually expressed answer as to why Republicans are unpopular is simply this: Americans don't agree with Republican policies. A quick visit to Polling Report shows that the issues are an overwhelming landslide for Democrats. From a recent email I sent to a conservative friend (slightly edited):
On guns, Every recent poll shows Americans favoring stricter gun laws and an assault weapons ban.
On the environment, every recent poll shows that Americans by overwhelming margins think global warming is real, is a concern, and that government can and should be doing something about it--including 75% who say emissions should be regulated.
On energy, we have huge support for subsidies and tax breaks for alternative energy. Yes, there's support for offshore drilling, too, at least as of middle of last year. But no question that the public wants to government to "pick winners and losers" when it comes to energy.
On abortion, every poll shows clear majorities favoring abortion being legal in all or most cases. (by the way, i might add that the 37% of pro-lifers who nonetheless support abortion rights in case of rape or incest put a lie to the idea that most republicans actually believe the fetus is a real human being--it's totally about sex and consequences for all but the most dedicated 10% of the crazy electorate).
On healthcare, 49% of Americans want major, fundamental changes to the healthcare system, while 38% of Americans want it completely rebuilt from the ground up. Only 12% think it works pretty well with only minor changes necessary. A majority of Americans believe that government providing healthcare to all citizens would either help the economy or have no impact on it. Most Americans would pay higher taxes so everyone could have healthcare. The numbers are pretty damning.
On immigration, while people do favor border fences (just barely) and stricter border enforcement (wide margins), huge majorities favor amnesty/guest worker plans over deportation, with most of those leaning toward amnesty.
On taxes, 61% of Americans feel that their own income taxes are fair, and more Americans feel their taxes are about right than feel they're too high. Wide majorities feel the rich and corporations pay too little in taxes. People feel the jury is still out on the stimulus, but that jobs right now are more important than debt down the road. And on workplace issues in general, 80% approve of raising the minimum wage. If we ignore the recent Fox News poll which doesn't jibe with any other data and go with the Gallup poll from 2007 instead, we find that labor unions have a 60% approval rating, and that people like teachers and firefighters much, much better than they do business executives, bankers and stockbrokers.
I could go on and on here: the numbers are simply devastating in the aggregate.
However, this is simplistic thinking. The fact is that if you scroll down the page on each issue, you will find similar margins for Democratic victory on the issues even back in 2004. Simply being right on the issues doesn't mean Americans will vote for the candidate they agree with on the issues.
This has led some intelligent conservatives to argue that the root cause of Republican decline lies in the fact that voters stopped believing Republicans were competent to run the government--not because the voters rejected their policies per se. From RedState founder Joshua Trevino, hitting back at Michael Grunwald's devastating article in Time Magazine:
Why, then, is the Republican brand so tarnished? Had Grunwald allowed data, rather than supposition and anecdote, to drive his reporting, he would have focused narrowly upon the actual causes of Republican decline, which have everything to do with pragmatic outcomes, and little to do with ideological content. Going through old Gallup data again, it’s noteworthy that (as noted here) Republican political fortunes displayed their first sustained downward movement around the end of 2005 — that is, after the twin blows of public disenchantment with the Iraq War, and Hurricane Katrina. The theory-driven proclamations of left-wing commentators and politicos aside, these were failures of competence and honesty, rather than ideology per se. This — not its ideas — is the root of Republican decline.
Trevino ignores the economic collapse, which is arguably more important and gets onto considerably more uncomfortable ground for Republicans. Still, there's no question that he is at least partly right: current Republican misfortunes are directly tied not to their positions on the issues necessarily, but the triple failures of Iraq, Katrina, and the economic meltdown.
The Problem
But the central question this raises is: do Americans see those failures as a question of competence, or a question of ideology? If the former, all Republicans need do is distance themselves from Bush and the leadership of the time. If the latter, their goose is cooked for a long, long time, and the Party will find it necessary to triangulate and moderate considerably to remain a relevant force on a national scale.
Unfortunately, there are no easy answers to this question. No poll that I have seen has ever directly asked whether the American People feel that Republican ideology of small government and deregulation was directly responsible to the Katrina failure. About 45% of Americans, depending on the poll, consistently believe that race was a factor in the slow relief effort, and that a rich white area would have been assisted faster. While this reflects poorly on Republicans in terms of being racist, it does not necessarily reflect on their ideology as a whole.
Similar problems beset us on Iraq. The body of polling on Iraq is immense, but no poll that I've seen directly asks whether failures in Iraq are the product of incompetence or ideology.
Turning to the economic crisis is only slightly more helpful: while Republicans take the heat for causing the economic crisis and bankers and Wall St. traders are seen as greedy and irresponsible, few if any polls have dealt directly with questions Republican ideology per se as it relates to the crisis. Yes, the American people want greater regulation of the financial sector, but it's unclear if they believe that greater regulation would necessarily have stopped the current crisis from unfolding.
Lessons
It's an old saw that there is opportunity in crisis. One of the greatest opportunities for leadership in times of crisis is the arrival of teachable moments: circumstances in which the public is primed to listen to messages that they would ordinarily be too distracted to hear.
It is clear that Americans understand that Republicans are somehow to blame for the triple disasters of Iraq, Katrina and the economic crisis. It is clear that Americans now believe that Obama is putting the country on the right track, and are willing to give him some time for his economic policies to bear fruit.
It is not clear, however, that despite the American voters' clear preference for progressive policies and distaste for Republicans in the wake of obvious disasters, that Americans have put 2 and 2 together in linking the bad policies to the disasters themselves. I believe that they have--but that belief is unconfirmed as yet by the data. Circumstantial evidence suggests that this is so, but we have no confirmation.
The GOP's failure to find fresh faces to headline their party and media leadership only exacerbates this confusion: without being given the chance to see new faces running the GOP, it's impossible to know whether the public distrusts Republican ideology in general, or the competence and good will of those who run the Republican Party.
They key to future progressive victories lies not only in our ability to make good on our promises to enact popular legislation, but also in tying the triple failures of Iraq, Katrina and the economic meltdown to Republican ideology, rather than Republican politicians.
Unfortunately, part of Obama's appeal is his focus on cool, collected competence. Making the direct partisan ideological accusations necessary during this teachable moment might shake some of the confidence he has received from the American People.
As progressives, it is our task to make that connection clear to the American people again and again. It is our task to ensure that congressional Democrats not bound to the same universalist appeal as Obama make that case repeatedly.
Otherwise, if the connection is or remains unclear, it may well be only a matter of time before Republicans latch onto some Democratic mistake, find a new set of faces, and reinstate the same policies that have led to the disasters in which we currently find ourselves.
In the meantime, it would be a good idea for pollsters to start asking deeper questions about whether ideology or competence was the key issue at fault in the Bush Administration. Knowing the answers would help guide the messaging for both parties a great deal.