The next Reagan, Obama, or both?

posted at 4:47 pm on December 1, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
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The GOP looks to its future after two successive defeats in national elections, and once again tries to find the next Ronald Reagan.  The Washington Post suggests that Republicans could also find its Barack Obama in Bobby Jindal, the Louisiana governor who has already been pegged for future national stardom:

Jindal supporters regularly evoke the Reagan parallel, fueled by a confidence that their hero’s brand of social and fiscal conservatism, coupled with his sunny folksiness on the stump, can rekindle the Reagan flame. But all the comparisons end there. In 1981, Reagan entered the presidency at age 69, in the model of a leader the party traditionally favored then, older and seasoned. Just an elementary school kid when Reagan stepped into the Oval Office, Jindal is boyish-looking and six years younger than John F. Kennedy was when he became the nation’s youngest elected president.

Jindal is his own invention, in the mold of an Obama. Born in Louisiana as Piyush Jindal to highly educated immigrants from India, he decided as a young child to nickname himself “Bobby,” after his favorite character on the TV show “The Brady Bunch.” Raised as a Hindu, he converted to Catholicism while in college and later wrote a lengthy, intimate story that provided a window on his religious evolution, in a manner that fairly calls to mind Obama’s books about his own grappling with issues of self-identity. Success at Brown University and later at Oxford University during his Rhodes years led to high-profile attention in the power corridors of Louisiana and Washington.

The Louisiana governor at the time, Murphy J. “Mike” Foster Jr., turned to a 25-year-old Jindal to shore up Louisiana’s Medicaid program, which had fallen badly into debt. By the time Jindal finished, he had shut down some state hospitals and had the program running a surplus. “He had to close a hospital in my district, but he didn’t hesitate doing what he had to do,” remembers former Louisiana state senator Tony Perkins, now the leader of the Family Research Council. “He always knows what he wants to get done.”

The record is still evolving, like the rest of him. But social conservatives like what they have heard about the public and private Jindal: his steadfast opposition to abortion without exceptions; his disapproval of embryonic stem cell research; his and his wife Supriya’s decision in 1997 to enter into a Louisiana covenant marriage that prohibits no-fault divorce in the state; and his decision in June to sign into law the Louisiana Science Education Act, a bill heartily supported by creationists that permits public school teachers to educate students about both the theory of “scientific design” and criticisms of Darwinian evolutionary concepts.

Jindal spent time in Iowa, ostensibly to study flood-recovery efforts along the Mississippi River.  Most people assume that Jindal has already started to connect to Iowa voters in advance of the 2012 primaries.  Jindal says that the only election on his radar is his 2011 race for re-election as governor, but politicians don’t end up in Iowa by accident.

I think it’s a mistake for Republicans to start focusing on 2012.  The national candidates will develop on their own over the next three years or so, probably from the ranks of the governors rather than the Senate.  Jindal will be among that group, as will Sarah Palin, Mark Sanford, Tim Pawlenty, and even Haley Barbour.  The GOP needs to focus more on 2010 right now, finding good candidates for House and Senate races in order to take advantage of the normal mid-term buyer’s remorse voters usually have after presidential elections.  They also need to work on building a stronger national coalition based on shared core principles and credibility based on performance.

Michael Leahy gives Jindal friendly treatment in this Post profile.  I hope Jindal is smart enough to know that won’t last once he starts running for President.

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