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The GOP's Shifting Foundation
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Party
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| Contributor | Brandonius Maximus |
| Last Edited | Brandonius Maximus Jun 03, 2006 11:16am |
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| Category | Analysis |
| News Date | Saturday, June 3, 2006 05:15:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | For years, the foundation of the Republican Party was built upon eight pillars of equal importance. Those pillars were (in no particular order): cutting taxes, reducing the size of government, balancing the budget and being fiscally responsible, creating a strong national defense, opposing communism, emphasizing free enterprise, getting tough on crime and emphasizing social issues.
Over the last 20 years or so, however, the size and number of those pillars have been reduced so that today, the GOP foundation is teetering rather precariously on just two pillars: social conservatism and tax cutting. The inherent wobbliness of this foundation and the increasing tensions between the tax cutters and the social conservatives will shape the look of the Republican Party for the next decade.
If you look back 30 or 40 years, there was certainly some tension between the eight pillars. And, from time to time, some of those priorities were given greater weight than others. Still, a very delicate balance was generally maintained and the party stood solid. Granted, the GOP was more successful in winning presidential elections in those days, winning four out of five between 1968 and 1988. At the same time, Democrats held the House for 40 consecutive years and the Senate for 34 out of 40 years.
However, in 1980 Ronald Reagan began putting greater emphasis on some of these priorities, while reducing the emphasis on others. Reagan's focus was on cutting taxes, building a stronger national defense and fighting, indeed virtually eradicating, communism. Reducing the size of government and balancing the federal budget were merely given lip service. While you could have a weeklong symposium to determine how much of the 1980 election results were attributed to Jimmy Carter's weaknesses or Reagan's strengths, suffice it to say that the Californian found a recipe that worked exceedingly well for himself.
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