There was another bad sign this morning for the legions of change: Obama has named a penultimate Washington insider to his first Cabinet post: Tom Daschle will be leading Obama’s crusade to change health care.

 

Now, as far as I know, former Speaker Daschle is a nice, decent fellow – who served in Congress 26 years. Which doesn’t sound like he’s the fellow to change Washington. Since leaving the Senate, Daschle hasn’t worked as a lobbyist – but he worked for a Washington law firm full of lobbyists and Mrs. Daschle is a lobbyist whose law firm, the press reports, represents “numerous health care clients.”

 

Change is sounding more and more like politics as usual.

 

 

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To most people – like Bill Clinton losing his party’s control of Congress in 1994 – one election is usually enough of a wake-up message. But Republicans are hard-headed – if madness is repeating the same mistake over and over with the same result we qualify. We shrugged off 2006, so history repeated itself in 2008.

 

But, now, Obama has given us the message loud and clear and we have embarked on a journey of political soul-searching – of sorts. Because no one is anxious to confess committing any real sins. So, instead, we’re having two debates about issues that have almost nothing to do with why we lost.

 

In Ring #1, the two wings of the Republican Party are squaring off, arguing, and pointing fingers, each blaming the other for our defeat.

 

The Conservatives, pounding their chests, are declaring to win in 2010 we have to get back to the conservative principles (we abandoned) and if that means a few purges, fine. The Moderates (who are even more self-righteous) are saying we ought to jettison divisive social issues like gay marriage and abortion and enter the Modern Age.

 

Now, make no mistake: Neither of these arguments is about winning the next election. This is a fight where both sides are using our defeat in 2008 to advance their political agenda inside the party. McCain didn’t lose (and Bush’s popularity didn’t collapse) because the American people said to themselves, Why, they’re not conservative at all. And neither Obama nor McCain hardly mentioned gay marriage or abortion during the election.

 

In Ring #2 are the political technocrats in the party, the faceless managers and pulse-takers who are absorbed in the technical minutia of political campaigns. They argue our defeat was the result of a legion of tactical blunders: Obama raised more money. Obama was an Internet whiz. Obama this, Obama that, and Obama the other. In other words, when it came to running campaigns, Obama outclevered us, so the solution is simple: Next time we dazzle him with a wealth of newfound political knowledge – and win.

 

But the phrase that keeps running through my mind is ‘two wars and an economic meltdown’ – as in seven years after 9/11 we’re still fighting two wars and how did we miss avoiding an economic train wreck that has left everyone from Wachovia to General Motors gasping for air? I’d like to meet the political genius who’s clever enough to explain that away and win the subsequent election.

 

Here’s the debate Republicans need to have: How was it possible for the Republican Party to embrace policies that led to two unending wars and an economic meltdown? Once we have figured that out then maybe we can risk worrying about politics.

 

 

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When folks lose elections they go into paroxysms of contrition – usually confessing to the wrong sins.

 

And when they win, there’s a parallel temptation – they attribute victory to virtues that had little to do with their success.

 

Now, mi amigo Gary surely has a point when he says Republicans are in danger of becoming the party of angry white men – or, maybe, I should suggest post-election of depressed defeated old white men.

 

But he and I disagree on the reasons for our demise.

 

Gary’s suggestion (which has a wonderful poetic symmetry) is Republicans were foisted on their own petard – the Southern Strategy; that the Democrats’ long, dry march standing up for Civil Rights, more government, the environment, tolerance, and immigrants has finally paid off and a thousand flowers have bloomed.

 

Alright. Let’s take George Bush, two wars dragging on seven years and an economic meltdown that’s left everyone from Wachovia to General Motors staggering, out of the equation – and where does tolerance get Democrats in terms of votes?

 

The election wasn’t the triumph of all embracing Democratic pluralism – it was voters turning thumbs down on what they saw as a failed presidency that had dumped them in a mess.

 

Obama didn’t run a gazillion ads about tolerance or the environment – he ran a gazillion ads of John McCain saying, I voted with President Bush 90% of the time. And North Carolina voted for Obama. That didn’t leave much doubt in my mind what the election was really about.

 

 

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Here’s one way to look at the 2008 election: The Old White Guys who were running things got fired.

 

There’s George Bush, the MBA Presidency and all his OWGs running the war and the economy.

 

There’s Mike Easley. Bev Perdue spent the final weeks of her campaign promising “change orders” on day one to put as much distance as possible between herself and Easley.

 

Bev herself had to diversify her transition team after critics said it was too heavily OWG.

 

Then there are the OWGs from the business world – formerly known as Masters of the Universe – being hauled before Congress and publicly humiliated for wrecking the financial system and the automobile industry.

 

Look at the coalition that elected Obama: He won nearly all African-Americans, two-thirds of Hispanic voters, voters under 30 by 2-1 and more than half of women.  In other words, a coalition of non-whites, non-old and non-males.

 

This is bad news for businessmen who have pretty much had their way in Washington since Ronald Reagan took office in 1980.

 

Being OWGs, they won’t get it. They probably think that – when it comes to politics – they can still drive Cadillac SUVs in a Prius world.

 

Now, I’m probably considered an OWG myself. But I’m actually a member of the smallest minority in America: a middle-aged, affluent, golf-playing, Southern white male who is also a liberal Democrat.

 

There are five of us at North Ridge. I know them all. We play golf together.

 

 

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Barack Obama is going to fill his Cabinet with a “Team of Rivals?” Like Lincoln. This is going to be one big mistake.

 

Let me get this right: Obama is going to appoint people who disagree with his policies (which they will promptly torpedo) and, when they do, he can’t fire them because he’s established that inclusion (filling his government with people who disagree with him) is a bedrock principle of good government? Because it worked for Lincoln?

 

I guess the theory is Lincoln won the Civil War by filling his Cabinet with rivals. But Lincoln also ended up telling his Cabinet when it came to making decisions only one vote mattered – his. And his Team of Rivals didn’t do too well making progress winning the war until Ulysses Grant won so many victories it was hard not to make him General-in-Chief of all the armies. After that it was mostly a matter of keeping the “Team of Rivals” out of Grant’s hair long enough for him to take Richmond.

 

Of course all this Obama-as-Lincoln hyperbole and homage to inclusiveness may just be so much political window dressing – but just in case it’s not, a fine place for Obama to practice inclusiveness would be by appointing one of his rivals (say, a pro-life Republican or Democrat) to the Supreme Court.

 

I’ll bet Democrats aren’t that inclusive.

 

 

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Bev Perdue’s gone back to being Miss Positive, setting up the Endowment for Positive Gubernatorial Campaigns – a $50 million trust fund – to pay for her next campaign for governor.

 

But there’s one catch: To get his share of her fund Perdue’s Republican opponent must pledge not to criticize her: No negative ads. Now that won’t mean much if it’s the same oath Perdue took last April before the Democratic Primary, which allowed her to keep running negative ads right up to Election Day.

 

But, on the other hand, this time ‘Dumpling’ may be serious. After all, it’s hard to imagine a better way for her to get reelected in four years than tempting her opponent (with foundation money) not to say one critical word about her record. For instance, ask yourself: If Liddy Dole had offered to fund Kay Hagan’s campaign out of an endowment in exchange for Hagan pledging not to run negative ads – would Hagan be heading for the Senate today? Would Barack Obama have won North Carolina?

 

This is pure political posturing: With Democrats controlling the governorship, lieutenant governorship, eight of thirteen congressional seats, eight of ten council of state seats, and both Houses in the Legislature, they want Republicans to pledge not to criticize them next election – which is the biggest incumbent protection scheme in North Carolina history.

 

 

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Richard Nixon and Strom Thurmond ginned up the Southern Strategy in 1968. For 40 years, Dixie gave the Republicans an almost insurmountable edge in the Electoral College. The GOP won seven of the next 10 presidential elections.

 

Now Republicans are trapped by their history.

 

The only counties where Republicans gained in 2008 were in Appalachia and the Deep South. Look at an electoral map, and you see the red states – what Sarah Palin might call “the real America” – shrinking.

 

Obama swept the Northeast, the Midwest and the West Coast. He made inroads into the South – North Carolina, Virginia and Florida. He won states in the Mountain West.

 

Republicans are in danger of becoming the party of angry white men. They lost Hispanics 2-1. They lost young voters. They lost women. They lost better-educated voters in a society that is becoming better-educated.

 

The issues that made the Southern Strategy work now work against Republicans: opposition to civil rights, an anti-government ideology and intolerance for anybody who is different.

 

The Republicans derided environmentalists, and the country went green.

 

They defended business, and the economic crisis made business unpopular.

 

They demonized immigrants, and the immigrants and their children may never forgive them. Wait until Latinos become the majority in Texas.

 

They dismissed young voters, and a new cohort of Democratic-leaning young voters is now excited about politics. And they’ll be voting for decades.

 

Jack Betts put it well in his column about how Nixon and Jesse Helms campaigned in 1972:

 

“Nixon and Helms were whipping up fervor for law and order and traditional values and inciting the crowd against long hairs, liberals, criminals -- anyone who could be demonized into an ‘us versus them’ formula that would marginalize Democrats and elect Republicans.”

 

In politics, so often, success breeds failure. You keep doing the things that used to work, until suddenly they stop working. Then you’re trapped.

 

 

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John Drescher’s column in the N&O Saturday – “The fair sex? Not in politics” – was on the money. His money shot: “…based on the recent campaigns, it's hard to claim that women are more ethical and fair than men.”

 

He cited Liddy Dole’s “godless” ad – “the national cheap shot of the year.” He mentioned Kay Hagan’s victory-speech swipes at Dole and Bev Perdue’s last-minute ad attacking Pat McCrory on illegal immigration.

 

Had that ad not been so late and limited to radio, Perdue might have been pilloried in the media like Dole.

 

When it comes to going negative, Drescher argued, female politicians are no better than men.

 

There is another aspect to the story.

 

Used to be, the myth was that you couldn’t attack a woman candidate the same way you can attack a man. That’s one reason Erskine Bowles shied away from attacking Dole in 2002.

 

That myth was destroyed this year. And Dole was the most notable victim. A big reason she lost was the DSCC-funded attack on her – the “rocking chair” ads that have been so highly praised for their effectiveness.

 

Just to show that chivalry really is dead, those ads essentially attacked Dole for being old!

 

“Status quo Bev” Perdue can also tell you that women are no longer off-limits for negative ads.

 

Another giant leap forward for women in politics.

 

 

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Last week I had dinner with Paul the theologian and Willie, who is a rosary-thumping Catholic and, for a moment, I thought the Reformation and the Seven Years War were about to start all over again.

 

Oddly, what started the conflagration was Willie saying he’d just read Pat Buchanan’s new book; then he leaned across the table toward Paul and asked, “You like Winston Churchill, don’t you?”

 

Paul said he did and in the next breath Willie said, “Well, you know Churchill was a war criminal?”

 

Now, like a lot of Baptists, Paul believes sin is bone-deep. He shrugged, “Well, I reckon Churchill had plenty of opportunities – but I wouldn’t want to look too closely at whatever Pat’s calling war crimes because back then we were walking the same road and our hands may not be clean either.”

 

Willie shot back, “But we never firebombed Dresden.”

 

“We firebombed just about everywhere else. Like Hamburg.”

 

That didn’t phase Willie. He explained firebombing Dresden was a war crime (and pure meanness to boot) because there was nothing there but shops that made porcelain cups and refugees fleeing from the Red Army – while Hamburg was packed full of factories that made tanks and rifles.

 

Paul thought that over. “So if I’m flying over Hamburg in a B-17 and drop a bomb on a factory but hit a convent instead and kill fifty nuns in your view that’s not a sin?”

 

Back in his wayward youth Willie decided to become a monk; he spent a couple of years in an Italian monastery training to be a Jesuit, changed his mind, came home, got one degree from the University of Virginia and another from the University of Michigan and settled into an academic life.

 

“That’s right,” he said. “Bombing Hamburg is not a sin. Because your intent was to hit the factory – not the convent.”

 

Paul considered that bit of Jesuit logic. “So to commit a sin I’ve got to intend to commit it – up front?”

 

“Yep.”

 

“I don’t recall the part in the Ten Commandments where it says, ‘Thou shalt not intend to commit murder.’”

 

Willie put down his fork. “Look. Imagine this. You’re driving down the highway at midnight and someone runs out in front of your car and you kill them – that’s not a sin. Because you didn’t intend to.”

 

“Well, it sounds to me like you Jesuits just created a loophole that eliminates 99% of all sins.”

 

A week later we had dinner again and this time Paul dropped a newspaper on the table in front of Willie and said, “Read that. About Rashaan Ali’s trial.”

 

The headline read, “Two guilty of killing Wake girl,” and the story said a gentleman named Rashaan Ali, leading what sounds like a gang, broke into an apartment on Green Street to collect drug money and in the ensuing melee a thirteen-year-old girl, who was sitting innocently on the sofa, was shot.

 

“Alright, Paul said, “Ali didn’t intend to kill the girl – but do you want to argue that murder was an accident and not a sin?”

 

Now the Catholic Church has been studying sin for about fifteen centuries longer than the Baptists and for the last five hundred years the Jesuits have been the Catholic equivalent of the Marines – they’ve established colleges and universities to study, analyze and categorize sins and they’ve written untold tomes about every kind of sin, covering every doctrine; on top of that they’ve got razor-keen minds that would put the cleverest trial lawyer to shame. Paul was face to face with all that knowledge but didn’t know it.

 

Willie studied the headline. Leaned a little closer to the girl’s picture. Looked up.

 

 

“Well,” he said, “In a case like this you have to consider the encompassing secondary effect. Since Ali’s initial intent was evil – to consummate a drug deal – and his overall act was evil, even if he didn’t mean to kill the child he was pursuing an evil goal, which his second evil act flowed from (which is how evil works), so he’s guilty of a sin and, besides,” Willie grinned, “We Jesuits would hang him for trespassing.”

 

 

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Back in Jesse Helms’ campaign in 1990  when we made the ‘infamous White Hands’ ad one of the handful of people sitting in the studio was Alex Castellanos; lately Alex has been spending time on CNN and the other night he was asked how the Republican Party could save itself politically – after Barack Obama routed McCain and retired 26 Republican Senators and Congressmen.

 

About five decades ago, after Fidel Castro took over Cuba, Alex’s family crossed the Florida Straits and eventually settled in North Carolina. After Alex spent four years as a Morehead Scholar at Chapel Hill back in the 1970s, he worked with Ronald Reagan’s first campaign here in North Carolina. Not long after he started work, Tom Ellis, who was running the campaign, decided he wanted Reagan to do a thirty-minute TV program but Reagan’s national headquarters said absolutely not – so Mr. Ellis went out and dug up this old grainy black and white film Reagan had done for Barry Goldwater about communism and announced by God, he was going to put that on TV.

 

When I played the film for the campaign staff there was an audible gasp – not because of anything the film said but because it looked (with those flickering black and white images) like it had been made around 1921. Everyone in the room said don’t air it – except Alex, who said he didn’t care if it was black and white, that message about communism suited him just fine.

 

I think what Alex was trying to explain on CNN – it was hard to follow because this Obama pundit sitting beside him kept interrupting – sounded like he thought the way for the Republican Party to save itself was to get back to standing up for principles like individual liberty and I can tell you Alex believes that to the roots of his Cuban soul.

 

But when it comes to proscribing cures for the Republican maladies these days, he’s got plenty of competition.

 

Five candidates are running for Republican National Chairman and every one of them has his or her own cure and so does every pundit, political consultant and Republican talking head. They’re saying:

 

‘We abandoned Republican principles.’

 

‘McCain ran a poor campaign.’

 

‘McCain got overwhelmed by a hostile media.’

 

‘Obama raised $600 million.’

 

‘Republicans have to jettison divisive social issues – like abortion and gay rights.’

 

‘It was Sarah Palin’s fault.’

 

‘It wasn’t Sarah Palin’s fault.’

 

The problem with these answers is they’re all politics, politics, politics. While the root of the Republican dilemma isn’t politics. We lost the election because of our record the last eight years and, in all likelihood, no amount of clever, brilliant, stellar politics would have changed that. The litmus test was governing – not clever politics. So the real question we need to ask is why did we govern so badly?

 

Once we have the answer to that question we can worry about politics.

 

 

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