I swear I have the winning strategy for a presidential
candidate, if he’ll just call me. I have the issues — highly
original issue proposals — all ready to go. I can advise somebody
on the types of things to do to win Iowa, even though I’ve only
visited Iowa once. For various reasons, I know New Hampshire a lot
better than the average Joe, although as a native New Orleanian my
affinity for the Granite State might seem a little out of place.
South Carolina is eminently doable. Finally, defeating Barack Obama
will be neither as easy as some conservatives seem to imagine nor
as difficult as many Beltway pundits seem to think. It will be a
hard task, but I can see the way clear to accomplishing it.
Keeping the mutually reinforcing, Reaganite, conservative
coalition together really isn’t as hard as so many people make it
out to be. Traditional values are not necessarily at odds with
libertarian economic policies or with constitutionally guaranteed
liberties. A strong defense in the national interest is neither
some sort of “neocon” apostasy nor is it unaffordable.
Communicating American conservative principles isn’t
rocket science. (Frank Luntz can tell you that!) But it can’t be
done unless the communicator is sincerely and deeply a conservative
(in modern terms, which really means a Madisonian liberal). If he
isn’t a conservative, he needs to vamoose anyway: He (or she) is
“not welcome here no more.”
To be clear, a conservative isn’t an ideologue.
Conservatism stands opposed to hard-line ideologies. It’s a
philosophy, not an ideology — which is not a “distinction
without a difference.” (Please read Eric Hoffer’s The True
Believer if you don’t know what I’m talking about.)
Conservatism is a philosophy of practical application of timeless
principles — with emphasis both on “principles” and on
“practical.” Human nature does not readily lend itself to
perfection, and our Madisonian Constitution does not readily lend
itself to rapid political change without a few compromises along
the way. Anybody who demands all or nothing in this system will end
up getting nothing — and is not a conservative in the first place,
because a conservative recognizes that no man and no man’s
political creed is infallible, including his own. Of course
some things are non-negotiable. Yet it is profoundly
unconservative to fail to make constant attempts to figure out
which few things are indeed non-negotiable, and to separate those
from the many things that are
semi-negotiable-but-worth-fighting-really-hard-for.
Any presidential candidate who doesn’t understand this
should get lost. So should any activists who don’t understand these
things. Such activists aren’t conservatives; they are
radicals.
All of that said, there is nothing wrong with pushing the
envelope on policy proposals, or on fighting hard for one’s
political desires. It’s not the clarity of, or insistence on, the
principles that is wrong; what is wrong is the “my way or the
highway” attitude toward implementing those principles.
Here’s why all of this is important: because most voters
sense whether candidates, at the core of their beings, understand
the differences between principles and mere bullheadedness, between
reasonableness and weakness, between clear policy preferences and
mere political calculation. The right candidate will embody the
better choices from among each of those above options. That
candidate will exude those qualities without having to think about
them, because he (or she) will genuinely live and breathe those
qualities. And if he does, the voters will respond well. They
responded to Reagan for just those reasons: because they rightly
sensed that he combined firm adherence to principle with a
reasonableness in pursuing it — that he was a man who didn’t mind
taking some risks for deeply held beliefs, but who wasn’t going to
lead us all off a cliff.
It is only such a man who could get away with the policy
proposals I will advocate — because nobody else will be able to
get beyond the initial conventional-wisdom response that the
proposals are just too extreme. What I will propose is no more
extreme — actually less extreme — than the Reagan-Kemp-Roth tax
cut proposals appeared to be when they were first floated in the
late 1970s and in 1980. But only the right candidate can sell
them.
Yes, there is a way to enact major tax reforms,
improve the financing of entitlements, stimulate the economy, and
move towards a balanced budget, all in almost one fell swoop. Only
the right candidate can sell it, but it is indeed eminently
sellable in a political campaign.
Sorry to leave y’all hanging, in terms of what the actual
substance is. But I haven’t been convinced I’ve seen the right
candidate yet, although a few of the potential candidates might
prove worthy. And if the wrong candidate tries to run with these
ideas, they’ll be discredited and become useless. Mystery is
therefore needed right now — but take heart, and hope: The answers
are out there, and they are achievable.
