The leading GOP contenders skipped last night’s Morgan State
debate focusing on the African-American community. A number of
explanations were bandied about — it is the end of the fundraising
cycle where finance events get top priority, limiting the subject
matter to issues affecting African Americans was thought to be
unfavorable ground for Republicans, and moderator Tavis Smiley is
generally viewed as unsympathetic to conservatives, having written
a book entitled Hard Left: Straight Talk About the Wrongs of
the Right. However, some commentators and potential candidate
Newt Gingrich thought the decision unwise for a party that has
great difficulty getting support from minority voters.
But there is a broader issue and campaign phenomenon at work
than just this debate. The GOP candidates don’t just avoid Tavis
Smiley. With the exception of the omnipresent John McCain and Mike
Huckabee (who never met a talk show host he didn’t like), the
presidential contenders do not frequent the Sunday talk shows, go
on network news or subject themselves to interrogation by CNN or
MSNBC reporters outside the few debates they have done.
This is a mistake. Simply put, GOP candidates are ignoring
Willie Sutton’s advice. Sutton of course was the prolific bank
robber who was said to have replied “that’s where the money is”
when asked why he robbed banks. Likewise, the GOP contenders would
be wise to go where the voters are, especially voters they are
losing.
The latest Gallup poll painted a dismal picture. Gallup
pollsters explained: “Between 2002 and today, the percentage of
Americans with a favorable view of the Republican Party fell from
54.7% to 38.7% — a 16-percentage point decline. (This was after a
sharp rise in Republican Party ratings between 2001 and 2002
following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.) Over the same period, the
Democrats’ average favorable rating barely changed, falling by 1
percentage point (from 54.0% to 53.0%).” That’s not all: 54% of
those polled now think Democrats will do a better job keeping us
prosperous compared to only 34% who favor Republicans. On national
security, a longtime winning issue for Republicans, Democrats are
favored 47-42%.
These figures should also be viewed in the context of the 2006
election in which independent voters voted approximately 2-to-1 in
favor of Democrats in elections for governors, senators and
congressmen. This occurred even in formerly red states like Ohio
where the Democratic candidates for governor and senator swept the
independent vote. In short, the GOP is losing popularity and is no
longer viewed by most Americans as the party of fiscal sanity and
strong defense.
It is perhaps natural in such times to go into a defensive
crouch and stick to the safe confines of Fox News and friendly talk
radio hosts. Particularly in a heated primary it makes perfect
sense to seek out venues which have large numbers of politically
active conservative listeners and viewers. But over time it is
limiting and self-defeating for several reasons.
First, GOP candidates need to recapture independents and
convince moderate Democrats they offer an attractive platform, not
the cartoon positions attributed to them by their Democratic
opponents. Explaining why the Bush tax cuts are worth keeping
whether you are “rich” or not is a worthwhile and essential
exercise not only to getting elected but building support for the
policies they advocate.
Second, it is good practice. Debate moderators in the general
election and the Washington press corps are not renowned for their
sympathetic take on Republicans and conservative policies. It is
helpful to practice answering the loaded question and disarming the
questioner — as Rudy Giuliani did in the Iowa debate when he
questioned the reporter’s premise that higher taxes would bring in
more revenue. If you don’t practice in the primary. it makes the
general election that much tougher.
Finally, Hillary Clinton this past weekend showed that it is not
so difficult for a prepared and polished candidate to survive even
the toughest inquisitor on Sunday morning, Tim Russert. Having done
so she can claim that “they threw everything at me” but didn’t draw
blood. She reached a huge audience and showed she is calm and
collected under fire.
Now, it is not a good idea to go into the lion’s den unarmed or
unprepared, but for candidates with solid debate skills, defined
policies, and a decent sense of humor it doesn’t pay to hide in the
safe confines of the conservative media. For individual candidates,
the benefits of venturing out into the MSM world can be
considerable. And if the GOP is going to start gaining back ground,
showing their faces is one way they’ll begin to convince the
American people that they do not deserve to be banished to the
political wilderness.
