Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Bush Will Win The Nomination

In 2008, John McCain won the Republican nomination handily. I was shocked. How could this be? “The base” hates McCain because he opposes everything they stand for and he’s disloyal; indeed, he’s one of the few to whom the label RINO actually applies. Even worse, he’s unstable. Yet, he won. How? Well, I spent a good deal of time trying to figure that out. What I learned was shocking, and it tells me that Bush has already won our nomination.

Let’s start with McCain. How did he do it? Well, there were many “conventional wisdom” possibilities. Chief among these was the idea that the party simply prefers old guys “whose turn it is.” But conventional wisdom is almost always wrong. It tends to mistake correlation for causation. In fact, even worse, what it often tags as THE “cause” is more typically actually caused by the truth the conventional wisdom has missed.

This is like the misleading “running yards” indicator in the NFL. It has been observed that teams that run for more yards win more games in the NFL. Hence conventional wisdom says that having a solid running game causes teams to win. The reality, however, is that the teams with the most running yards tend to get those running yards in the fourth quarter at a point where they are way ahead and simply want to eat up the clock. Thus, in reality, being a winning team causes teams to run more, which gives them higher running averages. Ergo, the conventional wisdom is entirely backwards: winning causes teams to get more running yards, running yards do not cause wins.

This was the case with the “next old guy in line” theory. These guys (McCain, Dole, etc.) didn’t win because the party felt they were owed the nomination because of their seniority, they won because their experience taught them what they needed to do to win, something the young guys hadn’t learned yet. Thus, the conventional wisdom took a correlation (their seniority) and wrongly called it the “cause” of their victory, even though the real cause was something completely different but which correlated to their experience.

So how did McCain win? McCain won the nomination in 2005 and 2006. He did it by going to every single state in the union and campaigning for every Republican he could find at the local, state and national levels. He gave money and advice. He gave endorsements. He held fundraisers. He even donated to guys who were unopposed. And in so doing, he won the loyalty of the overwhelming majority of the most important, most connected, and most respected Republicans in every single state.

When the primaries began, these people returned the favor. They endorsed him... much to the shock of conservatives everywhere: “Why are these real conservatives endorsing HIM?!!” Many also helped organize his campaign in their states or even ran the campaign for him. This meant they used their own networks/contacts to help him. They even fundraised for him. The result was that his campaign became a juggernaut in state after state. And while talk radio toyed in 2007 and 2008 with choosing which “real” conservative they would back, they totally failed to notice what McCain had done and that he was jumping to insurmountable leads everywhere. They didn’t realize the race was over before it even began, it was just a matter of waiting for the votes to confirm it.

There was one more key aspect to his victory too, which I never realized until the recent talk radio civil war: the “base” that hates McCain and which make it “impossible” for guys like him to win are only about 20% of the party. Another 20% could be considered swing conservatives, who vacillate between wanting to win and making ideological statements. And the other 60% of GOP voters are much more moderate and prefer competence and a strong resume to ideological purity. That means the idea that the base will reject moderates as talk radio claims is simply wrong.

Enter Jeb Bush. For the record, I hate dynasties (it’s un-American) and I loath the idea of voting for another Bush. His family has all but destroyed conservatism twice now. G.W. stopped the Reagan revolution cold by ceding the moral high ground to the left by repeatedly characterizing Reaganism as something cold, uncaring, harsh, destructive and in need of being replaced by something kinder and gentler. He also never once defended Reagan against a campaign of slanders from the left. Moreover, he blurred Reagan’s common sense, middle class-ism with the New World Order of international governance, and he called that conservatism. The end result was the total halting of the Reagan revolution and the handing to the Democrats of a chance to become the permanent majority party. Only Hillarycare saved our butts.

W was a million times worse. He was sold to us as “don’t worry, he’s not like his old man... conservatives have nothing to fear... he’s one of you!” But right away, his administration reeked of corruption and robber baronism, which he falsely claimed was “pro-business conservatism.” His economic policy was disastrous Keynesian crap, which he falsely claimed was “free market conservatism.” He did stunningly liberal things, like create new Medicare benefits, which he called conservatism with a heart... again suggesting that conservatism is somehow immoral, cold and harsh. He totally embraced nation building, got caught lying to get us into a war with Iraq -- which let the left equate conservatism with war mongering. Add to that torture and his attempt to strip the Gitmo detainees of guaranteed human rights. He won the war itself (at first) but proved utterly incompetent in managing the peace, which resulted in thousands of lives and trillions of dollars lost. Katrina incompetence. The financial crisis. Wall Street bailout. Etc.

Each of these things destroyed Bush’s reputation with the public, especially as he never fought back, no matter how bad the political damage. Even worse, because he hid behind conservatism like a cloak or shield, conservatism became tarred with his sins even though he never once acted like a conservative. Consequently, by the time he limped away from office, conservatism was all but dead in America. The only thing that saved conservatism was Obamacare. Without Obama’s horrible presidency, the US would have become center-left akin to Germany or modern Britain.

So along comes Jeb. Jeb was an OK governor of Florida, though he proved not to be very conservative. Since leaving office, he has continuously criticized the GOP and conservatism. Yet, we are told not to worry because this Bush isn’t like the prior two. All I can think is, “Fool me twice, shame on me... fool me three times, WTF is my problem?”

In any event though, none of that matters. The race is over and Bush has won. Consider this...

The right is disorganized. Ted Cruz, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, Ben Carson and a number of lesser figures all want to be the talk radio champion. Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Scott Walker, and a few others are trying to win both the talk radio right and the more moderate mainstream right. This means that fringe 20% and the swing 20% are scattered among many potential candidates. The moderates are not.

Running against this collection of dwarves was Chris Christie. Unlike the others, Christie positioned himself as a moderate who could attract moderate and even Democratic votes. This makes him appeal to the 60% of moderates and some of the 20% of swing conservatives. Only, Christie is too bombastic, and has too many flaws. Bush does not. By entering the race, Bush automatically wipes out Christie and takes that 60%-80% support.

Further, so far, the dwarves have only played around with the idea of running. They’ve given speeches at various gatherings. They’ve tried to stake out some issue(s) that they think will set them apart, and they’ve pandered to the talk radio hosts. A few have sought out donors, but nothing on a grand scale. In fact, there seems to be this idea that they should do nothing until after the 2014 mid-term elections. Only Rick Perry and Rand Paul seem to be doing more.

Bush, by comparison, has spent the past few years following McCain’s lead. He has quietly helped leading Republicans everywhere he could. He spent his time distancing himself from the nasty conduct of the fringe right in recent years, and he’s sold himself to party insiders as Christie without the flaws. He’s also built a massive donor base – something Rush ignorantly pooh-poohed the other day. In fact, Rush bizarrely warped these people into the enemy of conservatism by describing Bush’s appeal to them as being his ability to “win the party nomination without owing anything to the tea party. Their wildest dream is to render the tea party conservatives an irrelevant factor.”

The result of this is that Bush has essentially sealed up the “moderate” vote which Romney proved was around 60% of GOP primary voters. He’s also got enough promises of endorsements and the such to make sure this support remains firm throughout. He’s collected enough money and promises of money to be able to stay in the race until the end no matter how things start – this means he can survive the early primaries, which are geared toward the fringe, until he can sweep states like New York and California. And he’s done all of this without talk radio realizing what he’s done, which means they will be fighting the wrong battle, i.e. they think the battle has yet to begin when in reality the end game is playing out now.

Thoughts?

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

No thoughts other than ",,,Well, crap." on my end. Considering I've already seen quite a bit of grumbling at the thought of a Jeb/Hillary matchup for 2016 I'm wondering how low the turnout's going to be that year it does turn out that way. It's all very discouraging and makes me wonder if things are going to get any better at this rate.

- Daniel

Anthony said...

I was of the 'They won because it was their turn' school of thought prior to this article, but I now see that I was wrong. Still hope Andrew's wrong, but I examined this from a couple angles and can't see a flaw (which doesn't mean there isn't one, its early and I haven't had any caffeine yet).

The' Bush crippled conservatism, then Obama crippled liberalism' argument is in line with my belief that in recent years power has been a poisoned chalice for both parties.

Because Obama will have been the last president and because Republicans have learned to pick candidates who don't enthusiastically shoot themselves (and the party) in the foot, I think the Republicans will have the advantage even if the prospect of Yet Another Bush fails to excite.

Clinton vs Bush II would be a godsend for comedians.

Writer X said...

Jeb Bush makes McCain look like an exciting candidate. I hope you're wrong. But you rarely are. :)

LL said...

I think that you misread the tea leaves on this one.

AndrewPrice said...

Daniel, As I hope everyone knows, I am absolutely not happy about this. But this strikes me as how things will turn out. And yeah, it looks like a Bush v. Clinton match up. How that will turn out... I have no idea.

AndrewPrice said...

Writer X, Thanks!

LOL! Sadly, that's true about Bush v. McCain!

I hope I'm wrong too, I really do. I cringe at the thought of another Bush (or worse...another Clinton).

AndrewPrice said...

LL, I hope so, but everything I'm seeing says that Bush has this wrapped up unless something really unusual happens.

AndrewPrice said...

Anthony, That's what I thought for years too until the 2008 primary. I just couldn't explain why so many solid conservatives would support McCain so eagerly. Then I started seeing interviews with these people how glowingly they spoke about what McCain had done for them in their own races in 2006 and how they felt they owed him. That's when it all started to come together for me and that's when I realized the "next old guy up" theory wasn't right.

And then Romney's race in 2011-2012 and the size of the "anybody-but-Romney" crowd showed me the rest, i.e. that "the base" wasn't what I had thought they were, and that they were much more practical and less ideological than I believed.

Realizing the above, it's been interesting (and distressing) watching the news the last couple years as I watched Bush do all the groundwork like McCain had done and line up donors and big wig support, while the conservative world keeps saying, "It's too early to focus on 2016."

In terms of Bush in the White House, I hate to say this, but of all the Bushes, he is probably the most skilled politician. He's also not ideologically driven. So his presidency should be fairly successful and will ultimately improve the GOP's image with the public. He might even do a couple of good things.

That said, I doubt we will see anything creative or particularly conservative out of him. I don't see him shrinking the government, cutting the budget, reforming the economy or tax code along more conservative lines, or even reversing much of what Obama has done. And I fear he will happily add more entitlements if given the chance.

Kit said...

Andrew,

It's times like these that I wish the Tea Party had not wasted themselves in fruitless and insane purity crusades.

How wasn't he conservative as governor?

tryanmax said...

Jeb is already distancing himself from George Jr. with comments where he ties himself to his father and grandfather, who he says served the country honorably, but when he gets to his brother, all he says is, "well...I love my brother."

Obviously, there is some sibling ribbing going on, but at the same time, the remark is designed to set tongues wagging. It's being hailed as an "off script" moment, which I highly doubt. It's a calculated non-remark that says "whatever you don't like about my brother, I'm not that."

tryanmax said...

Also, the conservative movement's Achilles heel is the abiding belief that politics is dirty. That is to say, politics absolutely is dirty, but conservatives are clean-freaks. This leaves them suspicious of successful conservatives and essentially waiting for a miracle.

And one other thing: I think it's past time to stop conflating "Tea Party" with "conservatism."

AndrewPrice said...

Kit, You and me both. They had the chance to be the 80% and to reshape the party, but they chose instead to infight and pursue an insane, scattered agenda, which made them toxic.

AndrewPrice said...

tryanmax, I think you're right. It sounds like a very calculated comment to get him some separation from his brother.

I think the obsession with purity and the conflation of "conservative" with
"macho" has been the real problem. It's brought a snarling condescension to conservative rhetoric that turns off vast numbers of people, and it encourages a mindset that necessarily pushes toward extremism.

Good point. For the most part, there is little conservatism left in the Tea Party.

AndrewPrice said...

As an aside, Tea Party Nation has decided that they are going to primary all those evil Republicans who somethingsomething to send a message to the party that the Tea Party has finally had enough. Huzzah!

I guess the Tea Party Nation staff suffers from amnesia.

Kit said...

The Tea Party Nation founder predicted that in 2016 the GOP will go the way of the Whigs.

LINK

BevfromNYC said...

The TP'ers can and should put up or shut up to form their own party. Speaking as a former memo, they blew their chance in before 2012 when they started fielding the wackadoodle candidates who couldn't win if they were the ONLY candidates running. We can only wish that they WILL try and they will go the way of the "Independent Party" of H. Ross Perot.

The Tea Party Patriots et al. are now just preaching to an echo chamber and just think that they have any power. And for some reason, they think that there can actually be party purity. But they are now more of the "inmates running an asylum"...their own asylum where no one who deviates from their psychotically random platform shall be condemned...

AndrewPrice said...

Kit, Yeah, he said that too. Talk about delusional. I suspect this is just more fundraising speak though.

BevfromNYC said...

Oh, btw, you will shortly be able to travel to Cuba for vacation as Obama announced that he is unilaterally (without Congressional approval) "normalizing" relations with Fidel and Raul. This should be no surprise, but it sure would be nice if Obama would inform and consult with Congress once in a while before he enacts sweeping foreign policy changes. BUt then again, I expect that he will do a lot in the next week or so that he feels he will not be able to do with a Republican Congress. But it sure would be nice if he would try...

AndrewPrice said...

Bev, I think it's more cynical than that. The Tea Party leaders are simply milking their followers.

To keep their followers giving, they try to maintain the illusion that they have the real power to affect some sort of change. Hence, the threats to primary GOP candidates and to leave the party and thereby destroy it. BUT, their prior efforts to primary incumbents finally forced the GOP establishment to figure out how to neuter the tactic and to destroy the remnants of the Tea Party within the GOP in the process. And they will never leave because (1) they know this is a fake threat as few voters will leave with them and (2) if they leave, then they lose their relevance.

So basically, this is a cynical attempt to make their low-information followers believe that the Tea Party groups are still a threat to the establishment GOP, so that they open their wallets "for the cause."

AndrewPrice said...

Bev, I think the decision is a long time coming and will usher the Castros onto the ash heap of history.... but yeah, he needs to consult Congress.

ScottDS said...

[raises hand] Florida resident here!

I was in high school when Jeb was governor and admittedly didn't pay much attention. But if he runs, we may be forced to revisit one particular controversial and unpleasant chapter in Florida history. Two words: Terri Schiavo.

I didn't feel it was his place to get involved and I still don't. Yes, it was a trying time for many people and both sides were passionate and felt they were in the right... but the idea of a politician becoming involved in such a personal matter never sat well in this house.

BevfromNYC said...

"...I think it's more cynical than that..."

Are you insinuating that I am not cynical enough??? ;-)

Tennessee Jed said...

don't know if you are correct or not, Andrew. The fact that Hillary and Jeb are being crowned already for coronations is sad. It says quite a bit about the state of the American electorate as much as anything. I have learned things happen in politics that can be game changers. Hell, we wer all wrong about Romney. We thought it was all going hiw way. Still, I like Anthony's point. People are very dis-satisfied with the economy, so being in power has not been a big help. Still, I am afraid Hillary will win this. I will say Jeb would be better than Billary on many levels.

Kit said...

Well, in 2007 everyone thought it would be Giuliani vs. Hillary.

Also, the People magazine issue w/ Hillary on the cover was the magazine's worst-selling issue of the year.

Critch said...

Many years ago in a fit of beer drinking and solving the world's problems at the NCO Club a group of us came up with idea of overthrowing Castro by simply giving Marine and Sailor in Gitmo $5000.00, opening the gate and tell them that there's run, cigars, beer and wimmins in Havana...the Castro brothers could not have stood against the Yankee dollar...but no one was listening....Jeb doesn't do anything for me...I like Kasich of Ohio...

AndrewPrice said...

Scott, That issue will hurt him with normal people.

AndrewPrice said...

Bev, Yep! LOL!

Kit, Magazines like People offer the simplest, conventional-wisdom thinking.

Jed, I guess we'll see. In terms of crowning people, I think the issue is more one of who has done the work they need to do to line up what they need. It's the same way football games are won or lost long before the first snap through preparation and planning.

AndrewPrice said...

Critch, Kasick is making himself a star as Ohio turns around economically. I would totally prefer him to Bush. But I don't think he will run.

ScottDS said...

Scott, That issue will hurt him with normal people.

Aww, that's the nicest thing anyone's ever said about me. :-)

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