Conservative pundits have been taking great comfort in the Republican victories in the fall’s elections. Syndicated columnist David Limbaugh echoes a theme advanced regularly on the radio by his brother Rush: “Conservatism works when it’s tried and liberalism fails when it’s exposed.”
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Robert L. Bartley, editor of the Wall Street Journal, agrees: “As for the Democrats, the big story is that voters have in a big way repudiated the McCauliffe-Carville-Clinton smash-mouth politics.”
R. Emmett Tyrrell says the same: “These Democrats have lost the electorate’s trust. They tried to make ‘corporate ethics’ an issue, but the electorate understood that the party of Clinton has no claim on ethics.” So does Donald Lambro: “Democrats are still sorting through what happened in last week’s elections. That’s simple: What happened is that American politics continued its inexorable, post-Reagan movement to the right.”
Cal Thomas also: “Democrats are without leadership, without issues of their own (other than exposing Republicans) and now without power to stop a carefully crafted Bush agenda…. If Republicans don’t overreach as they did following the 1994 election, and if they patiently explain to the public what they are trying to do and why it will benefit the country, those GOP coattails could lead to a political dynasty that will finally lay to rest the Democratic Party of Franklin Roosevelt.”
Well, maybe, but I think they should keep their powder dry. This is still the country that elected Bill Clinton, twice. It amazes me to this day when I meet blue collar-types who voted for Clinton — when I discover that they disagree with him on major issues such as welfare, the United Nations role in the world, racial quotas and immigration. The problem is that these folks did not know what Clinton’s policies were on these issues. I’m serious. They voted for him because they responded to the image of the man portrayed on television, because they bought the line that he cared about the “little guy” and that he was being persecuted for his sexual misbehavior by Republicans who were just as guilty of such things.
I don’t know where I heard the line, probably from someone like James Carville or one of his Republican counterparts: “The candidate matters and the campaign matters.” What they mean is that it is not sufficient to be right on the issues. Enough voters to make a difference do not think about the issues. They simply don’t. They vote in reaction to things they see and hear in the final weeks of an election campaign. That is why political parties spend so much money on billboards and lawn signs and why politicians are willing to stand for hours in the rain to shake commuters’ hands at the train station or eat ethnic food in front of the cameras until it comes out their ears. The recent Mary Landrieu victory in Louisiana shows us that. In spite of President Bush’s popularity and efforts on her opponent’s behalf, Landrieu won.
So I am not yet ready to consign the Democrats to the graveyard. I can envision them running a successful political campaign, centering on issues that appeal to racial minorities and government provided low-cost medical care for seniors — if they get another candidate with Clinton’s charisma. (Come on: Let’s admit it. When the guy strode to the podium to give a speech, he looked as if he had been sent from central casting.) Don’t forget: We are not far from the day that the baby boomers will be senior citizens. They will be a demanding voting bloc, unless I miss my guess.
That said, permit me to join in the gloating. Because even if Bill Clinton did get elected twice and the Democrats make a comeback in future elections, the tide has been turned on the major issues championed by the conservative movement. We should not overlook the right’s victories.
For example, I can remember a time not that long ago when the consensus among the smart people was that Alger Hiss was framed by Whittaker Chambers, that Mao Tse-tung and Fidel Castro were providing a successful model for economic development in the Third World and that the United States had much to learn from the Soviet Union. Remember the academics and journalists who would appear on the talk shows arguing for a “politics of convergence” with the Soviets? Outside of the university leftists with a bunker mentality, no one takes these notions seriously anymore.
Equally discredited is the notion of busing for racial balance and racial quotas in hiring and university admissions. The idea that pornography has no effect on those who view it has also lost its credibility: Feminists, anti-smoking zealots and racial activists now eagerly support censorship to discourage behaviors that they find unacceptable. The same fate has befallen the old cliches about academic freedom: The “free speech” champions, who once did not want Marxist professors denied the opportunity to teach in American universities, are now eagerly enforcing politically correct speech codes in those same institutions.
And have you noticed that racial profiling is now okay too, as long as it is being done to get at the right villains? Few people mind border guards and airport security guards getting suspicious about young Arabic-looking men. What they object to is the time taken to frisk little old ladies with blue hair. The enemies of racial profiling will still make a stink when the process is used in a way they think improper. (And no one would deny anyone the right to make that case. Unreasonable profiling is unreasonable.) But the effort to intercept potential terrorists through profiling has demonstrated what should have been common sense all along: Law enforcement authorities need to be given a free hand to use legitimate hunches about potential lawbreakers based on existing profiles of criminal behavior.
One last thing: Have you heard many refrains of “make love, not war” and “all we are saying is give peace a chance” in reference to war with Iraq? Oh, okay: There is some of it, from the Susan Sarandons and Ed Asners and their counterparts in the clergy and academic world. But these are no longer mainstream sentiments. Opposition to war with Iraq nowadays comes more from those who make tough-minded calculations about the national interest and economic realities. Among the population as a whole, there is general agreement that there are villains in the world and that we need a strong American military to check them in the world arena.
I would argue that conservative ideas have achieved an acceptance that few conservatives would have predicted before the Reagan years, when many of them were in agreement with Whittaker Chambers, who wrote to William F. Buckley that he — Chambers — had crossed over from the winning to the losing side in history when he left the Communist Party.
