I didn’t go to the California Republican Party convention this past weekend, but I did read Governor Schwarzenegger’s already-notorious speech. You can read it here.
I don’t think any serious Republican disputes the Governor’s assertion we need to bring more independents into the party. That’s not exactly a revelation. We are losing folks to the DTS column.
But it’s hard to take the Governor’s prescription seriously, in no small part because it comes from the Governor.
Let’s take this line for example:
But being a Republican is important to me. This party is important to me.
Really, Governor? The moment Phil Angelides won the Democratic primary, it was crystal clear you were going to be decisively re-elected. If the party was "important to you," expending serious resources to help elected other Republicans to statewide offices would have been a concrete way of showing that. The reality is Arnold is all about Arnold.
The Governor then goes on to employ a Hollywood metaphor for GOP registration losses
In movie terms, we are dying at the box office. We are not filling the seats.
Cute, but we aren’t trying to fill seats in a movie theater. We’re trying to enlist citizens in a political movement. This metaphor explains much of the Governor’s approach to politics: changing views and colors every year in order to give the audience what he thinks they want this season, and worry about next year next year. This is the mentality that judges political success in terms of poll numbers, rather than translating a principled agenda into policy.
Judging from his speech, the Governor retains some awareness that political parties have core principles:
The real opportunity for Republicans is that independents generally agree with our core principles. Like us, they believe in limited government that is not wasteful. They believe taxes should be as low as possible, because the more you give government the more it will spend. They believe in individual freedom and the responsibility that goes with that freedom. They believe in the importance of public safety. And they believe that economic prosperity comes from the energy of the marketplace, not from the heavy hand of the state.
A "core" principle is one beyond which there is no retreat. That’s why it is a core principle. What I want to know is in defense of which, if any, of those principles Governor Schwarzenegger would be willing to draw a line in the sand and say, "This far and no further," because I yet to see anything like that out of the Schwarzenegger Administration.
The Governor went on:
Our party has lost the middle, and we will not regain true political power in California until we get it back. I am of the Reagan view that we should not go off the cliff with flags flying. I did that in 2005.
And which of those measures that the Governor championed in 2005 were out-of-step with the above principles we Republicans share with independent voters? Was is the fair redistricting reform? Or the paycheck protection initiative? Or maybe requiring that parents be informed if their teenage daughter was going to have an abortion?
Funny, I thought the Governor was fighting for some core principles back in 2005. Like Governor Reagan did in 1974 when he championed Proposition 1 tax limitation measure. Reagan lost that fight 54% to 46% — but Reagan didn’t respond
by embarking on a statewide Apology Tour and promising to never again fight for lower taxes and smaller government. And Reagan went on to change the course of this nation.
But Arnold is smart enough to attempt to sanctify his call to disarmament with a quote from a speech then-Governor Reagan gave to the California Republican Assembly in April, 1967:
"We cannot become a narrow sectarian party in which all must swear allegiance to prescribed commandments. Such a party can be highly disciplined, but it does not win elections. This kind of party soon disappears in a blaze of glorious defeat."
Unsurprisingly, th Governor and his staff omitted the very next passage from that speech:
The Republican Party, both in this state and nationally, is a broad party. There is room in our tent for many views; indeed, the divergence of views is one of our strengths. Let no one, however, interpret this to mean compromise of basic philosophy or that we will be all things to all people for political expediency.
Ouch! It’s like the Gipper was writing that one especially for Arnold.
Governor Schwarzenegger continued to display an impaired grasp of recent political history in this passage:
We are the party of President Eisenhower, the moderate military man who understood the need for logistics and infrastructure and created the Interstate Highway System–the largest public works project in American history. The majority of Republicans understand the need for investment. I believe we should be listening to the majority of our party.
This example makes me wonder if the Schwarzenegger people do any research at all. The Interstate Highway System was a great accomplishment, but somebody needs to remind Gov. Schwarzenegger that the GOP shrunk under Eisenhower. After 8 years of Eisenhower’s Me-Too Republicanism, the GOP went from controlling both houses of Congress in 1953 to suffering one of its worst drubbings in history in the 1958 off-year elections.
I hope Governor Schwarzenegger isn’t surprised be the hostile reception he received at the CRP convention. The malaise affecting the Republican Party isn’t adherence to principles — it’s the disconnect between principles and action. Why should voters join a party that preaches smaller government yet spent the last several years making the federal government bigger than ever?
As they say in the legal world, Governor Schwarzenegger lacks "standing" to lecture Republicans on core principles, since there are none he has not violated. When the Governor demonstrates the capacity to fight for a set of principles through both victory and defeat, then he’ll have my ear in a conversation about making the GOP more attractive to non-Republicans.