by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
Commentary Magazine<\/p>\n
First, some perspective is key. Romney\u2019s \u201c47 percent\u201d remarks and Hurricane Sandy probably turned an Obama one-percent win into the three-percent margin that he attained \u2014 especially considering Republicans kept the House and are doing well with governorships.
\n
\nThe Romney loss was not comparable to Barry Goldwater\u2019s 1964 blowout that nonetheless led, four years later, to a Republican victory in 1968. Nor was 2012 akin to the 1976 revulsion against Watergate and the Republicans that led to Jimmy Carter \u2014 and four years later to Ronald Reagan. Recall, too, that Bill Clinton\u2019s new middle way, the supposedly permanent Democratic antidote to Paleolithic liberals such as Jimmy Carter and Michael Dukakis, lasted just two terms.<\/p>\n
So Republican epitaphs are premature, and the natural pushback will come once Americans grasp the nature of an unleashed Obama & Co. The administration is at war against the middle and upper-middle classes (who lack the liberal panache of the hyper-wealthy and the empathy of the poor). Redistributionism and lead-from-behind foreign policy lead to stagflation at home and weakness abroad. The ongoing implosion of the EU and the erosion of blue states such as California and Illinois will offer steady reminders of policy failure.<\/p>\n
Nor will the Democrats in 2016 be running a young charismatic half-African-American candidate with an exotic-sounding name, whose emotional appeal to minorities and affluent white liberals trumped that of any prior candidate since John F. Kennedy. It was not so much that Obama is half-black, or that he is chameleon-like in his ability to adopt personas and patois that tickle white liberals and reassure minorities of his street credibility, or that he is young and cool, or that his foreign name hits all the right multicultural buttons, but that he is all that and more in a way a young, white, liberal second JFK, or a younger Jesse Jackson, or a top-schooled crossover candidate such as Cory Booker or Deval Patrick simply could not be.<\/p>\n
It certainly would be unwise to try to out-pander the Democrats. Latinos \u2014 to use that inexact rubric \u2014 will eventually follow the Italian-American model, but only if the borders are closed, legality is restored to immigration, and the natural forces of assimilation and upward mobility are allowed to operate. Ironically, the Washington conservative elite\u2019s sudden obsession with amnesty will not win Latinos over (consider Reagan and the disastrous 1986 Simpson-Mazzoli Act). Instead, conservative pandering will ensure the continued cycle of open borders leading to large pools of often poorly educated, non-English-speaking, unlawful immigrants, most without high-school diplomas who perennially look to amnesty and entitlements \u2014 and thereby probably ensure that the American Southwest will become permanently blue in the manner of California.<\/p>\n
Lost in all the post-election analysis was a much larger and more cynically brilliant Obama us-and-them campaign that created the image of a shrinking, geriatric white male plutocratic establishment forced to give way to the new age of the diverse \u201cother.\u201d Affluent Asians, blacks, Latinos, gays, women, etc., supposedly had beef with Republicans and were brilliantly united by Obama in vague resentment against \u201cthem.\u201d<\/p>\n
In this regard, Republicans have to focus on a more populist approach that ensures their message of smaller government, lower taxes, a strong defense, and more freedom appeals to those on the receiving end of government largesse. Free-market conservatives do best when they appear naturally as part of the working- or small-business class and can\u2019t be caricatured as elevator-owning grandees \u2014 and when they mix it up and take their licks in trying to appeal to those who probably won\u2019t vote for them.<\/p>\n
Nominating someone who naturally appeals to working-class white voters, and who attracts minorities, is important, but far more critical is focusing on policies that appeal to the middle class and small-business employers. Why protect the financial interests of a George Soros, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and the Hollywood elite, when there are ways to focus on estate taxes, income taxes, foundations, tax incentives, and agricultural subsidies that instead better protect the upper-middle-class and small-business person who are now the target of such demonization?<\/p>\n
\u00a92013 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Victor Davis Hanson Commentary Magazine First, some perspective is key. Romney\u2019s \u201c47 percent\u201d remarks and Hurricane Sandy probably turned an Obama one-percent win into the three-percent margin that he attained \u2014 especially considering Republicans kept the House and are doing well with governorships.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[31],"tags":[32],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-Z","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1360,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/romney-the-castor-oil-candidate\/","url_meta":{"origin":61,"position":0},"title":"Romney: The Castor-Oil Candidate","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 30, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Nominating Mitt Romney is sort of like taking Grandma\u2019s castor oil. Republicans are dreading the thought of downing their unpleasant-tasting medicine but worry that sooner or later they will have to. By any logical political calculus, the former Massachusetts governor is an ideal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Campaign 2012"","block_context":{"text":"Campaign 2012","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/campaign-2012\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":818,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/when-administrations-implode\/","url_meta":{"origin":61,"position":1},"title":"When Administrations Implode","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 23, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Administration meltdowns are hardly novel. In almost every presidency there comes a moment when sheer chaos, whether self-induced or the result of an outside crisis, takes hold. Vietnam had effectively destroyed Lyndon Johnson by 1967. Watergate unraveled the Richard Nixon administration, as the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Punditry"","block_context":{"text":"Punditry","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/opinion\/punditry\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":536,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/100-days-is-a-long-time\/","url_meta":{"origin":61,"position":2},"title":"100 Days Is a Long Time","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 6, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services The presidential election is less than a hundred days away. President Obama and Mitt Romney are roughly even in the various polls, with Obama holding slight leads in the key swing states. A lot can happen in a hundred days. Napoleon went from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election 2012"","block_context":{"text":"Election 2012","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/election-2012\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10692,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-never-trump-construct\/","url_meta":{"origin":61,"position":3},"title":"The \u2018Never Trump\u2019 Construct","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 26, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review \u00a0 The president\u2019s fiercest critics still do not grasp that Trump is a symptom, not the cause of the GOP\u2019s internal strife. For all the talk of a Civil War in the Republican party over Donald Trump, 90 percent of Republicans ended up voting\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Conservatives"","block_context":{"text":"Conservatives","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/conservatives\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11196,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-trump-rationale\/","url_meta":{"origin":61,"position":4},"title":"The Trump Rationale","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 22, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis\u00a0Hanson \/\/ National Review His voters knew what they were getting, and most support him still. Why exactly did nearly half the country vote for Donald Trump? Why also did the arguments of Never Trump Republicans and conservatives have marginal effect on voters? Despite vehement denunciations of the Trump\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Donald Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Donald Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/donald-trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9599,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/braver-new-world-for-now\/","url_meta":{"origin":61,"position":5},"title":"Braver New World \u2014 for Now","author":"Megan Ring","date":"November 11, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"The Corner The one and only. 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