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Guns Guns Guns
Guest
During much of the latter half of the 20th Century, the Republican Party's popular appeal was based upon what was sometimes referred to as the three legs of a stool: low taxes, strong national defense and traditional values.
But those traditional GOP strengths have largely been eroded by the ratcheting up of the welfare state, demographic trends, evolving social and moral views, the machinations of the Left and - not to be underestimated - foolish policy decisions by Republicans themselves.
Let's look at each leg separately:
Low Taxes:
In 2010, 45% of income-earning households paid no Federal income tax. During the peak of the lower-tax movement, during the Reagan years, that percentage was far lower. People who pay no taxes are quite happy to see others pay more. We can blame George W Bush for much of this, because he fell for the Democrats' gambit to remove many households from the tax rolls as part of his tax reduction legislation.
Strong National Defense:
The end of the Cold War, though it was an historic Republican accomplishment, weakened the second leg of the stool. George W Bush, in my view, further weakened it by involving the country in two unpopular wars that have dragged on far too long with far too little visible benefit. Democrats used to be the party of quagmires; now Republicans have demonstrated that propensity, too. The Bush administration further undermined the GOP's national defense reputation by refusing to secure our borders and by trying to engage in politically-correct forms of "defense" such as sugar-coating the true nature of our enemies and imposing unpopular airport screening measures instead of using common-sense profiling.
Traditional Values:
Many Americans have abandoned traditional values for the siren call of hedonism. Illegitimacy is no longer a shame, it's a choice of lifestyle. For these people, the GOP appeal to traditional values is not only unattractive, it's repugnant. Younger voters, in particular, are turned off by a culture war based upon restriction of abortion and stigmatization of gay people. The GOP increasingly looks to be on the losing side.
So, if the three pillars of historic Republican electoral success no longer stand, how should the GOP define itself going forward? What are the issues upon which a robust Republican Party can rebuild itself?
