Rove: The GOP needs more Rand Pauls and fewer Christine O’Donnells

It’s not like Rove is wrong here in theory.

The problem, as always, is in execution.

The problem with political parties and political operatives is that they want to follow what they perceive as the easiest route to victory.

That means candidates without firm positions, who are “moderate” (even if from a deep red district/state), and who always work well with the party.

Given a choice between a very smart, very charismatic and very conservative candidate (again, even in a deep red district/state) and a “moderate”, go-along, get along candidate – the operatives and party will always prefer the latter as a safer bet and easier to control once in office.

So, people like Rove won’t always turn their nose up at a Rand Paul or Marco Rubio – but such candidates will never be their first choice.

This will always be the tension between the grass roots and the party establishment. Both in terms of candidates and in terms of policy. The establishment wants to follow the easiest path that makes the fewest waves to seek election/re-election. The grass-roots (conservatives) want to push conservative candidates and policy – which is always something of an uphill battle because of the culture and media.

It is helpful for the establishment to help vet conservative candidates to try and keep candidates like Akin from winning the primary, but they often go too far, fighting against perfectly reasonable candidates the base wants and/or pushing a moderate candidate where a solid conservative can win.

On the flip side, the base (conservatives) sometimes rally behind terrible candidates because of that candidates conservative message/credentials, without taking into account that candidate’s ability to win in the general election (O’Donnell, Angle).

but, hindsight is also 20/20. It is easy to say that the candidate was terrible, but perhaps the outcome would have been different in some of those elections if the establishment did not abandon the candidates.

Part of the problem we at the grass-roots level has is the perception that the establishment is very, very quick (almost eager) to pull the plug on our favored candidates at the first slight gaffe, which only works to stoke our anger at them.

It also doesn’t help that the GOP does such a terrible job fighting for conservative policy and/or opposing liberal policy. Which reinforces to those of us in the base that we need candidates wholly independent of the establishment.

there is a 2-way street here. Those in the “establishment” (by which I mean most of the incumbents and the operatives who work for the GOP and/or various campaigns or PACs) need to understand that it is a two way street.

yes, we in the base need more discipline in picking candidates sometimes. But, we are not going to trust the establishment in this regard until they show we are actually playing on the same team. “Electability” above all else is not worth anything. Conservatism that cannot be elected may be just as bad.

Monkeytoe on February 18, 2013 at 3:02 PM

Romney was no RINO, no matter how much people hyperventilate about what he wasn’t able to prevent a super-super majority Democrat legislature from doing to liberal Massachusetts.

Count to 10 on February 18, 2013 at 3:08 PM

The reality is that neither you nor I or anyone else who doesn’t personally know Romney knows what the man really believes. He has taken different positions and there is enough evidence out there to argue either way.

I don’t think anyone can argue (despite the DNC/Media claims) that Romney did not run on conservatism. He ran on the idea of being “competent” as a manager. He did not run on conservative principals. Yes, he gave a nod to conservative principals and threw out some policy ideas, etc. with some conservative stuff. But he did not run against big gov’t. He did not run on the idea of conservatism.

I agree that he did not lose because he is or was perceived as a “RINO”. He lost because he ran a lousy campaign with a lousy GOTV effort. Whether or not part of the lousy campaign was not pushing a conservative message we can’t know.

But, I said from the start, the problem with Romney always was that he was not running to win the election. He ran an entire campaign premised on the idea that if he just did not make a mistake, Obama would lose. He never was trying to win. He was trying to not make that one big gaffe. He thought that was all he had to do. He was wrong.

Monkeytoe on February 18, 2013 at 3:41 PM

Are you saying that the Voters in Ohio and Nevada like big government and higher taxes, but the Voters in Kentucky don’t?
In addition many Voters don’t want intrusive Government and other Voters do?

bluefox on February 18, 2013 at 4:35 PM

Yes. See, CA and NY versus TX, for example. Some states/districts are more liberal than others. whoda thunk it?

Monkeytoe on February 18, 2013 at 5:02 PM