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Is there a sea change afoot among the conservative intelligentsia?
As the Republican Party wrestles with how to reinvent itself to appeal more broadly to an increasingly diverse electorate after its two-straight presidential losses, a handful of conservative thinkers are calling upon the GOP to cast off some of its most well-worn proposals and elements of the party’s identity.
Former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles and former Republican Sen. Alan Simpson modified their budget reduction plan. Politico's Jim VandeHei discusses.
These intellectual leaders are arguing that the GOP must embraces changes in policy. That’s significantly different than what the official organs of the Republican Party have said, which is that the party needn’t change its core policies and positions so much as frame them in a way that’s more appealing to more voters.
Take, for example, a post on Monday by Jim Pethokoukis of the American Enterprise Institute, who argued that Republicans should abandon their pursuit of a flat tax, a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution or the gold standard – three ideas that have long found advocates on the right.
“Today, the top marginal tax rate is 40 percent, and inflation is 2 percent. Health-care spending and the debt have both risen by nearly 80 percent as a share of output. The average American is 37 years old,” wrote Pethokoukis on National Review Online. “Economics and demography require a reworking of the conservative policy portfolio. But center-right politicians in Washington keep offering same-old, same-old stale solutions.”
Recommended: Obama warns looming sequester would devastate economy
That’s a sentiment similar to the one voiced by Ramesh Ponnuru on National Review in an op-ed Sunday for the New York Times. Republicans, Ponnuru wrote, should be more willing to move beyond the policy prescriptions offered three decades ago by President Ronald Reagan.
"They slavishly adhere to the economic program that Reagan developed to meet the challenges of the late 1970s and early 1980s, ignoring the fact that he largely overcame those challenges, and now we have new ones," wrote Ponnuru.
Michael Gerson and Peter Wehner, both veterans of the most recent Bush administration, argued in a new piece for Commentary magazine that the GOP should learn from the centrist examples of President Bill Clinton, and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, whose election signaled a new era for the UK’s Labour Party. They argued that Republicans’ sweeping victories in the 2010 midterm elections were an “aberration” rather than a catalyzing moment for the GOP.
Gerson and Wehner prescribed a four-step process for the GOP: Republicans, they wrote, must first renew their focus “on the economic concerns of working-and middle-class Americans;” second, “welcome rising immigrant groups;” third, “express and demonstrate a commitment to the common good;” fourth, “engage vital social issues forthrightly but in a manner that is aspirational rather than alienating;” and fifth, “harness their policy views to the findings of science.”
They wrote that many of the existing Republican presidential frontrunners in 2016 are equipped to deliver that message.
But: “Their challenge is both to refine and relaunch the Republican message, to propose policies that symbolize values and cultural understanding, to reconnect with a middle America that looks different than it once did, and to confront old attitudes, not from time to time, but every day.”
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The Republicans were not going to come to the Table on anything about the Debt Ceiling without these Draconian Cuts, this is what is getting lost. Both the Gang of 6 from Both Sides, thought this was one way to keep each other from going over the top in their demands, so this is what they came up With.
I truly believe the Democrats and the President did not think the GOP/TEA in Congress would be willing to DESTROY the Economy to get their Way. They had not a clue how much this HATRED of President Obama Went and how he beat them so SPECTACULARITY to win a Second term with GOP Money Game.
Karl Rove almost had a Mental Breakdown on Air.
Both Sides of Congress need to be fired, especially the GOP/TEA who are so unreasonable and TOTALLY RECKLESS with the Debt Ceiling and Budget Negotiations about anything and the Democrats for being afraid of their INSANENESS and letting them get away with this TOTAL STUPIDITY. Paul Ryan’s Budget should be an excellent Clue as to HOW RECKLESS THE GOP/TEA is willing to be with the Economy. The sad part about all of this is that ALL OF THEM KNOW IT.
It will take the Business Community to beat them into SUBMISSION, because our Congress Can NO LONGER GOVERN THEMSELVES, Especially the House while the Senate Holds Vendettas and Grudges on People DISAGREEING with them on Bush/Chaney DEBACLE - Iraq War.
Then Woodward went on to say that "everyone has their fingerprints" on the package of cuts -- which is true to a large extent. The idea was the Obama administration's brain child, they proposed it, members of both parties in both houses voted for the 2011 debt deal (in which the sequester was embedded), and the president affixed his signature to it. He also threatened to veto Republicans' attempts to make the cuts more responsible and targeted. But now, as Obama tells it, America faces a sequester-induced apocalypse, and it's all the GOP's fault. Criminals will run free. Airport delays will get worse. Fires will burn unfought. Puppies will go uncuddled. All because Republicans are willing to allow the president's own proposal to go into effect. Has Obama offered a detailed plan to offset sequestration? He has not, but he's hitching his wagon to Senate Democrats' plan -- half of which is paid for through new tax increases, while the other half remains heavy on defense cuts. Obama refers to these tax increases as "tax reform," because they would reduce and close loopholes and tax subsidies for certain families and corporations. This would include gimmicks like the Buffett Rule and corporate jet depreciation tweaks. But the genuine tax reform that Republicans have agreed to in principle refers to cutting out clutter in our tax code by closing loopholes and deductions in exchange for lowering tax rates. This approach tracks closely with the recommendations of Obama's own fiscal commission, which he promptly ignored. Indeed, Obama just raised tax rates on families and small businesses, and now he's demanding that Uncle Sam come back for another big bite. He insists that Republicans replace hundreds of billions in previously-agreed-to spending reductions that he signed into law with additional tax increases -- which will likely end up funding more spending.
Yes, I think that ultimately the Business World will whip the GOP into line. When Wall Street sees it's profits shrinking and we're on the precipice of a full blown disaster, they'll do something at the last minute.
SON, just one question there fella, exactly how many Republicans voted for this plan?????????????
Wasn't it your Speaker of the House who publically stated at the time that he "Got 98% of what I wanted"???
LOLOLOLOL! . . . really?!?!?
Hey folks, if nothing else, at least we're getting a heads-up on what they plan on LYING about!
Reinvent??? . . . the hits just keep on coming!!! LOLOL
The Democrats didn't even make up all the losses they had from their 2010 ass whooping......
FYI you world class dummy, Democrats received over 4 million more votes in Congressional races than did your party of angry, old, racist White men. The only reason why we did not retake the House is because the wonderful people in your party Gerrymandered the districts so heavily that they managed to cling to many of their seats.
Your party knows it can't win on the facts or their policies which is why they continually dream up new methods of suppressing the votes of working class people, minorities and the like. That's a pretty sorry commentary on your crowd. Even with all their gamesmanship trying to block people from voting, we handed you clowns a trouncing. Poor Willard, the draft dodging, tax cheat, he's still in a state of shock. LOL
@Ozzie.....The Democrats even got got destroyed on the state governor elections....are you really this naive, or is it some kind of strange act?? The only way democrats win elections is by buying voters with entitlement spending......I'm sure you have your hand out.......
Hey Hopeless -- keep telling yourself everything is fine with Republicans. The Democrats love it.
Democrats = Party of Lazy Leeches
HopeisGone,
Go back to your Fake News Channel and Missinformation talkers and hush up.
Ahhhhhh, just slap some lipstick on that pig and send him back out there!
The GOP as it is now needs to be allowed to die-off.
Personally, I wanted the GOP to live as a viable opposition party, but the more that their 'base' yanks the GOP back from evolving by continually espousing willful ignorance, bigotry, intolerance, fact-denial and naked hatreds of various individuals and entire classes of people (think liberals, women, gays, latinos, the poor-by-no-fault-of their own) and attempting to wrap those hideous positions in the flag while carrying a pious cross of so-called religious righteousness, the more I'm convinced the party is hopelessly incurable.
There is no other way to marginalize the worst of the mouth-breathing, religious fundies and Ayn Rand-ain fanatics who have infected the intellectual body politic of the GOP. Their base is mentally too far gone to deal with rationally since they are intractably stubborn, impervious to facts and reason, while also acting like they have the right of kings to dictate to others how they should live their lives, while hypocritically going-on about how they want 'small' government.
Their base have been nothing but useful tools for the rich and powerful to take control, and now they all realize that their faustian bargain of pandering to this crowd has backfired badly and is causing fake crisis after fake crisis that's holding all of us back from forward progress.
I welcome a final demise of the GOP. The party of tax cuts don't cause debt, trickle-down, supply-side fantasied, pre-emtpive war, hands off the rudders of the controls on commerce illogic, hate-spewing bile on other fellow Americans under the false guides of 'morality' will hopefully collapse soon into electoral irrelevance.
Then maybe the rest of America can move into the 21st century without this useless group of idiot distractions.
Actually, JP, we currently have a bicameral congress--it's called the Democratic Party. We often read about how much President Obama has to "tame" some of his policies to appease one or the other sides of his own party.
JP,
Well said.
The Republicans and their mutant teabaggers should just go away and let some other organization form; as a bunch they are too miserable to be called a "party".
Gold standard ... that's a good one. Let's just go back to barter and drop all this funny money.
It's the messaging, not the message. Just add LOL and a smilecon whenever a Republican says legitimate rape or self deportation ... that should do the trick.
Yes, the GOP is as stale as Rush Limbaugh's doughy armpits, the underside of Mitch McConnell's second neck-fold, and Boehner's scotch-breath.
Get a clue, party of ugly old bigots.
Now there's an OXYMORON! "CONSERVATIVE THINKERS".....HUH?!! No more need be said...
But these "Freedom of Religion" types want to take that thinking right into State governments and the Federal government. They want Christianity to be the official religion of the United States. In other words, they don't give a goddamn what the rest of us want, don't want, think or don't think, or believe or don't believe. Once they achieved that power, they would likely pass a Constitutional amendment requiring all of us to "prove our faith" - or suffer he consequences. There is nothing wrong with religion as long as they keep it to themselves and don't try to force it on the rest of us - but that is not the case. Religious fundamentalists here in the U.S. have been supporting Right Wing causes of all types, including protecting the scumbags who crashed our economy. Typically American "Christians" have been aligning themselves with the GOP, Tea Party, Karl Rove and others and supporting Right Wing politics. They also say their "religion" trumps all U.S. laws and rules. They talk about "Respect for life" while supporting the corruption that cause families to lose their jobs and homes, and businesses to close. Put another way, religious hypocrisy and corruption knows no bounds - kind of like their "boundless" religious beliefs. Sound like Islamic and other extremist religious views?....
Take away the Tax Exempt status of All Faith Based Corporations and
the christian right will shrivel and die.
The only difference between an Islamic Extremist and a Christian Extremest is geography...
they both comprise Rightwingnut Teabagger Principles.
Laz, you think the Christian folks compare to terrorists? LOL. Islamic extremism is just a fancy name for terrorism. You are so in need of a place to hate, you will throw god fearing folks under the bus with Bin Laden? You actually believe anyone will look at that comment and take you seriously? They will think there is something seriously wrong with you. lol. And I have never set foot in a church in my life, but I think you are being hard on folks, some of which vote the same as you do. Go ahead and demean religious people. It will be enough to lose the Democrats some elections.
Evolve or die. Polishing the turd won't cut it.
Great liberal love-fest. Fun reading.
Watching the GOP implode....even more fun.
Gerson and Wehner prescribed a four-step process for the GOP: Republicans, they wrote, must first renew their focus “on the economic concerns of working-and middle-class Americans;” second, “welcome rising immigrant groups;” third, “express and demonstrate a commitment to the common good;” fourth, “engage vital social issues forthrightly but in a manner that is aspirational rather than alienating;” and fifth, “harness their policy views to the findings of science.”
pretty plain and straightforward, folks.....
A good start may be to try to live in an "evidence based' reality.
Evidence based reality!?!
Most of the party thinks the entire Universe is Six Thousand Years OLD!
And that man lived with dinosaurs!
First they need to get acquainted with just plane old REALITY!
"The WORKING MIDDLE CLASS"--------Too bad the GOP/TPers are UNWILLING to SUPPORT the REAL "Americans" because their Paychecks are written by the Uber-Rich !
Complete collapse of the American Economy.
GOP - We Built That!
Hehhehheh.....
And no one can take that away from them!
Oh please, I am tired of seeing,"Low information voters" from dittoheads parroting what the fat one Rush vomits. The only low information people are the ones who listen and watch Rush, Hannity, O'Reilly, and Beck rather than read and look in depth about subjects. To just emote whatever these paid by number talking heads say is a total surrender to laziness and stupidity.
who told you that? Rachel Maddow or Chris Matthews?
I hear sounds of Carole King singing.
It's too late.
You have alienated far too many people. Your pundits are mostly obnoxious. You have been branded as the party of hate...that's a hard one for you to get over and you still block civil unions almost every chance you get. Tell me which rights do you want to deny me and the man I have lived with for 18 years that are granted to my 3 times married brother? huh? which ones?
You have allowed the kooks to speak for you. I am not a taker because I voted for Obama yet you continue to bash those of us that voted for him. Hey! Smart move. It's comical to watch your Keystone Kops imitation. I swear it's like playing Whack- A- Mole with Republican Kooks they pop up all over the country saying such stupid things.
I just read the Gerson and Wehner piece in Commentary. Really a thoughtful interesting piece. Unlike both writers purely partisan hackery in the Washington Post and New York Times, they both show intelligence and insight about the real problems in the Republican Party with its extreme conservative wing. In the battle that is raging, they are center right. Perhaps they are Rinos! LOL!
Not to worry. The partisans, hacks and baggers will shout them down. Reason and intelligence goes to the Republican Party to die, which is very sad.
I think GOP should follow the directions of and get inspiration from:
Rush Limbo, Sean Honey, gallagher (the guy goes on to Fox often, looks like derainged -always a smile on his face), Donaldo Triumph, Carl Rowing and Newt Sandwich.
This will for sure get them a lot more votes in the next election.
I always knew that there were some serious, enlightened thinkers in the Republican Party. What they put forth is logical and reasonable and the Democrats could work with them. The bad news is, they will be shouted down by the loud, obnoxious and ignorant wing of the Republican Party.
Of course 2010 was an aberration but you can't tell the baggers that. To them it was a landmark takeover. Unfortunately what they have done is seriously damage the Republican Party and worst of all, the United States and all Americans. They don't seem to care either and that's a problem. We will be working very hard to correct that problem in 2014.
I sure hope so, but have seen no evidence of any attempt at improvement yet. More of the same so far is what I see. Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, John McCain, Mitch McConnell and Deb Fischer are not helping your cause. Get out of people's personal life. Stop Spending our tax dollars to defend DOMA. Small Government is what you all preach, try practicing it just once and maybe I will give your party some respect.
Thommy
They want the Government of 1776 when there were 2.5 million citizens, not counting slaves and Indians. Now they want all the services but they don't want to pay for them. Government has grown with the population. They hate that. They keep wanting to drag us back to 1776. Sorry, go fish cons.
Make ALL lobbying illegal,tax the churches & the trust funds,all would help,but never be done..
"Stale?" How about rotten? A financial collapse, two wars and two rounds of tax cuts and a prescription drug plan all on the credit card? Never trust the GoP with fiscal matters...