From John Wayne to Ronald Reagan, from the Ford Mustang to
Coca-Cola, Americans seek and appreciate authentic and “real.”
While authenticity is rarely spoken of regarding our politicians —
in much the same way that unicorns and jackalopes are rarely spoken
of in zoos — it is nevertheless an important undercurrent in
American electoral politics. In 2012, the American appreciation for
authenticity will spell disaster for Democratic electoral
hopes.
Because of the horror that is the Obama Administration and
because so many Americans have short memories, most political
reminiscing over the water cooler doesn’t go back before the 2008
elections in which Republicans were swept from power in the
political equivalent of what happened at Fukushima, Japan, earlier
this year.
But it’s not 2008 that Republicans should be thinking
about, even as we go into a presidential election year. Instead,
the focus should be 2006. That was the real tsunami. In the 2006
elections,
• Democrats picked up 31 seats in the House of
Representatives, turning a 232-202 Republican majority from 2004
into a 233-202 Democrat majority. (Socialist U.S. Senator Bernie
Sanders (VT), a registered independent, left the House in 2006 and
Democrats picked up that seat as well.)
• Democrats picked up six seats in the U.S. Senate,
turning a 55-45 Republican majority into a 51-49 Democrat majority
(counting Sanders and Joe Lieberman (CT) as Democrats.)
• Democrats won governorships in six states which had an
open seat following a Republican administration or had an incumbent
Republican governor, while losing no governorships where a Democrat
was the incumbent or prior office holder, flipping the balance of
governorships from 28-22 Republican to 28-22 Democrat.
• Democrats gained more than 300 state legislative seats,
with a 21-19 Republican lead in controlling state legislatures (the
rest split or non-partisan) flipping to a 23-17 Democrat
advantage.
• In addition to holding every already-Democratic
governorship, Democrats won every seat the party already held in
both the House of Representatives and the Senate, the first
time either party has done that in our nation’s
history.
Yes, there were particular issues which focused peoples’
minds in 2006, including the war in Iraq and the terrible
performance of the federal government following Hurricane Katrina.
But I suggest to you that there were two over-riding factors:
Corruption and authenticity, not necessarily in that
order.
In 2006, the Democrats ran on a message of a Republican
“culture of corruption,” after a series of scandals surrounding
people like Congressmen Duke Cunningham, Mark Foley, and Bob Ney
put an even greater than usual taint on politicians, especially GOP
politicians.
In the last two years, we’ve seen scandal after scandal on
the Democrat side of the aisle:
Anthony Weiner,
David Wu, and
Eric Massa all had sex-related scandals.
Charlie Rangel, who would have gone to jail were he not Charlie
Rangel, was
censured by the House of Representatives for
failure to disclose and for tax evasion while Maxine Waters’ ethics
charges, related to getting favorable treatment for a bank that her
husband was involved with, has been “punted
to outside counsel.”
It’s not that the Republicans have been paragons of
virtue. But with the scorecard since Obama’s election decidedly
against Democrats on issues of ethics in Congress, corruption will
be the proverbial double-edged sword, cutting Nancy Pelosi’s
remaining troops in 2012 after she so spectacularly failed to
“drain the swamp,” if I may mix Nancy’s metaphor with my
own.
The bigger problem for Democrats, one that is wholly
outside their area of comprehension despite its being the primary
lesson of 2006, is authenticity.
Earlier in the 2000s, Republicans ran — as they always do
— on a platform of conservatism, including a desire to limit the
size and cost of government. Their behavior however, belied those
statements of principle, with government spending increasing
rapidly during most of the Bush years due to a Republican
legislature and a Republican executive unwilling to discipline each
other. Some have said that comparing Republican spending to that of
a drunken sailor is insulting to the drunken sailor, so instead
let’s say that the Republicans spent like Democrats.
And therein lies the authenticity issue: In 2006, the
voters decided that if they’re going to support a government that
is going to increase spending and involve itself in every aspect of
our lives, they might as well go with the pros. Given a choice
between a real Democrat and a Democrat-lite member of the GOP,
voters will follow Coca-Cola’s marketing lead, choosing “the real
thing.”
Think about this for a minute: There are few companies
with a more iconic brand and more expertise in marketing than
Coca-Cola. Since 1969, Coke usually has a new marketing slogan
every one to three years. In 1969, we got the legendary “It’s the
real thing.” In 1974, “Look for the real things.” In 1985,
“America’s Real Choice.” In 2003, “Real.” And in 2005, “Make it
Real.” There is a lesson here, one that politicians never learn, or
at least never remember once in office: Americans crave “real,”
with the best marketer in the world betting billions that Americans
will buy their product based on its real-ness.
In 2006, and to a lesser extent in 2008, Republicans were
no longer real. They were Republicans in Name Only (RINOs). They
were unworthy of the support of voters, particularly of independent
voters and those “Reagan Democrats” whose somewhat conservative
views might occasionally allow them to vote for a Republican
despite generations-long affiliation with the Democratic Party and
industrial unions.
The motto of 2006: If we’re going to vote for a big
spender, give me a real big spender.
But quoting the wisdom of Ted
Striker, “the foot’s on the other hand
now.”
It’s not big spenders the people want; it is
spending-cutters. It is not bureaucratic “green” regulators people
want; it is deregulators, or at least regulators who understand
cost-benefit analysis and the human impact of their actions. We do
not want politicians who think that government is the answer; we
want politicians who know that government is much or most of the
problem.
A
Gallup poll released Monday substantiates of
what those who are paying attention already know: “A record-high
81% of Americans are dissatisfied with the way the country is being
governed, adding to negativity that has been building over the past
10 years.”
The chart is dramatic and instructive.
Key findings of the poll include that “57% have little or
no confidence in the federal government to solve domestic problems,
exceeding the previous high of 53% recorded in 2010” and “53% have
little or no confidence in the men and women who seek or hold
elected office.”
And here is my favorite: “49% of Americans believe the
federal government has become so large and powerful that it poses
an immediate threat to the rights and freedoms of ordinary
citizens. In 2003, less than a third (30%) believed
this.”
I hereby anticipate, accept, and stipulate to the many
objections that will be made regarding how little Republicans have
done in recent years to protect our fundamental rights and
freedoms. Nevertheless, at least the GOP suggests an interest —
and seems to be backing up that suggestion in the past two years —
in thinking about the Constitution and the proper role and
authority of government. This is in stark contrast to then Speaker
of the House Nancy Pelosi (whose gavel possession was perhaps the
most painful outcome of the 2006 Democrat tidal wave) responding to
a question about the constitutionality of the health insurance
mandate in Obamacare by asking “Are
you serious?” A Pelosi spokesman later reiterated
their view that “that’s not a serious question.”
Yes, Nancy, we’re serious. And when half of the American
public believes that government cannot solve our problems and poses
a threat to our rights, the public will look for the authentic
believers in limited government to put our out-of-control federal
government back in its cage. We won’t look to Democrats who are
magically newly respectful of the 10th Amendment (or any other
Amendment), no matter how pretty their words. We won’t believe that
someone of the party of the real big spenders can have an
11th hour conversion to faith in the limited government prescribed
by the Founders.
All of this applies particularly to President Obama. It
takes a special kind of spender to make George W. Bush and the last
Republican Congress appear frugal. It takes a special kind of liar
to say with a straight face, after performing that particular feat,
that he now cares about deficit and debt reduction. And it takes a
special kind of gullibility to believe that President Obama has, or
even could have, a plan to work in that direction. Given the
existence of Berkeley and Boulder, Manhattan and San Francisco, I
can’t say that Barack Obama isn’t fooling anybody. He surely is
fooling plenty of people. But the vast majority of American voters
are fed up with ersatz politicians of all stripes. We’re ready for
authentic, real budget cutters, people who have actually read (and
hopefully carry) a copy of the U.S. Constitution. In 2012, and
despite all their past and future failings, this means
Republicans.
Americans seek and appreciate authenticity. The political
mood of the nation is for real restraint of government, its cost
and intrusiveness. So while they may have been the flavor of the
month for some time, in 2012 the Democrats will find that they are
Pepsi in a nation of voters thirsting for “the real
thing.”
