by DemFromCT
Something's in the water. From the LA Times to the OC Register to 60 Minutes, you can't avoid the stories of a GOP in trouble, mostly over Iraq. This is Dick Polman in the Philly Inquirer, nicely summing up the situation:
By launching a war of choice for dubious reasons, and without the
requisite resources to win the peace, he has been the chief architect
of his own political demise. Simply put, most Americans have gotten fed
up with his empty assurances: "It's slowly but surely making progress"
(July 2003); "We're making steady progress" (September 2004); "Iraq has
made incredible political progress" (September 2005); "Iraqis are
making inspiring progress" (October 2005); "There's progress" (January
2006).
So it's no surprise to discover that, in the latest NBC-Wall Street
Journal poll, Bush's war stewardship is viewed favorably by a mere 27
percent of the citizenry.
In a British-style parliamentary system, he would be gone by now. But
even a politically weakened American commander in chief can still play
a strong hand - which is why, at least for now, the congressional
Democrats are doomed to fail in their current bid to legislate an end
to the war.
Public sentiment is irrelevant; all that matters, in this hardball
political moment, is the stubborn stance of the Decider and the math on
Capitol Hill. Bush will veto any spending bill that contains a pullout
timetable, and the Democrats lack the votes to override him. Later this
spring, they'll probably wind up giving him the war money he wants,
absent any pullout timetable, in part because they don't want to be
tarred as being "against the troops," particularly on the eve of an
election year. (Indeed, a CBS News poll reported this month that only 9
percent of Americans favor cutting off all the war money.) So, looking
down the road, it's a cinch bet that our soldiers will still be dying
on the day Bush fobs off the disaster on his successor.
But the Democrats are prodding Bush anyway and will continue to do so, because they have the wind at their backs.
They know they'll lose the current skirmish, but so what?
Okay, okay, mainstream and not surprising (but on the mark). So who did this one?
General Petraeus is a wonderfully commanding figure. But if the
enemy is in the nature of a disease, he cannot win against it. Students
of politics ask then the derivative question: How can the Republican
Party, headed by a president determined on a war he can't see an end
to, attract the support of a majority of the voters? General Petraeus,
in his Pentagon briefing on April 26, reported persuasively that there
has been progress, but cautioned, "I want to be very clear that there
is vastly more work to be done across the board and in many areas, and
again I note that we are really just getting started with the new
effort."
The general makes it a point to steer away from the political
implications of the struggle, but this cannot be done in the wider
arena. There are grounds for wondering whether the Republican Party
will survive this dilemma.
Yep, that'd be Bill Buckley, asking if Republicans can survive Iraq (the answer, Bill, is no). Hey, what about about this one?
"So," said Hagel, "when I hear people say, 'Well, if we leave them
to that, it will be chaos.' What do you think is going on now? Scaring
the American people into this blind alley is so dangerous."
These judgments come from someone credited with rebuilding
Nebraska's Republican Party who has a lifetime American Conservative
Union record of 85.2 percent. Hagel represents millions of Republicans
who are repelled by the Democratic personal assault on President Bush
but deeply unhappy about his course in Iraq.
Ah, that'd be Robert Novak. You see, when the Democrats voted to end the war in Congress, it changed everything. It opened the floodgates and allowed everyone who isn't a dead ender (the 33% of the population who think Iraq will be judged a success) to be honest about where things stand. Whether it's on the left or the right or the center, George Bush has the support of only the GOP, and that only because they don't know how not to support him (see Novak's comments about backing him because Dems don't). But what's lost in all of this is that the Bush dead enders do not matter. They cannot win national elections on 33% support. And they cannot win future elections when the third of swing voters in the electorate agree with Democrats and disagree with Republicans on the issues - virtually all the issues. Making the dead enders happy is the job of the Republican primary candidates, but it's not the job of those who want to be elected next time around.
That's the making of a realignment election. And the way this is going, that's what's shaping up in 2008. George Bush's legacy may well be not just the ruin of Iraq, but the ruin of the GOP, as Buckley suggests. From the LA Times:
When voters five years ago were asked which party they identified with,
neither Democrats nor Republicans held an advantage. Now 50% of voters
say they are aligned with the Democrats, and 35% with Republicans,
according to a survey released last month by the nonpartisan Pew
Research Center for the People & the Press.
And in New Hampshire, nonpartisan pollster Dick Bennett said the
atmosphere was so sour that he was having a tough time getting
Republicans to participate in surveys. The war, high gas prices and
unhappiness with the Bush administration have dampened their interest
sharing opinions, he said.
A few years ago, "they would make arguments in favor of the president,
and they don't anymore," Bennett said. "They don't defend the president
on anything."
Now, the GOP can claim W will be soon history. Again, the LA Times:
"No question, the president's gone through a rough patch. But the
central figure for the Republicans next year is not going to be George
Bush," said Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, chairman of the National Republican
Congressional Committee.
Don't you believe it. America will not be forgiving this President any time soon, and the GOP knows it. How utterly conventional of us to say so, but the fact is, it's the truth. So,while the Dems will certainly need to do everything right to win, Bush has given the GOP every reason to lose.