Republicans are going to win and it is the worst thing that
can happen to them.
Although polls show Michelle Nunn and Jason Carter
continue to keep David Perdue and Nathan Deal within their grasp, as happens
with most elections in Georgia, after a brief high water mark for Democrats,
the trends are shifting towards the Republicans. The fundamentals are still too
strong. Every statewide office is held by a Republican. The state voted for
Romney by a considerable margin (although considerably less than other
Republican strongholds). And in the case of Deal, the force of incumbency is
the strongest variable in the physics of politics.
Although the Republican’s losing an incumbent Governor would
sting, it will be the inevitable victory of David Perdue which will ultimately
cause the Republican Party both in this state and nationally to continue to
coast on the belief that their ideas, and not structural factors, are the
reason they just keep on winning.
I get called a liberal quite a bit and there’s a simple
reason. I live in Georgia.
I believe most gun laws are feel-good salves which have
little effect in the real world. If I were ever elected to an office, despite that
time seven years ago when I called them thugs , I would probably get an A on the NRA's scorecard. But because I acknowledge the
word “regulate” appears in the Second Amendment and because I admit that a gun
law being stupid doesn’t make it unconstitutional, I get called a liberal. You
see in Georgia and states where words like “true” and “principled” are used not
just as descriptors but as badges against heresy, to acknowledge any nuanced
interpretation of our “fundamental rights” is to acknowledge you are nothing
more than a dirty gun grabber.
I think government should be as small as possible and we
should tax ourselves as little as possible. But because I add the word “possible”
to those declarations, I’m called a liberal. A “true” (there it is again)
conservative would simply say, “government should be small” and “we should tax
ourselves little”. If you even hint that taxes are not painfully high or that
after 30 years of the experiment, supply side economics may not work, you are a
liberal. That all data shows effective tax rates are at historic lows and that
in Kansas, the governor is empirically proving that tax cuts do not pay for
themselves, matters not one whit. Unless you bow at the altar of taxes should
always be reduced, you are not only a liberal. You’re a socialist.
To see the effects of this twisted view of reality, look no
further than Ted Cruz. No doubt turning the ground for a Presidential run, he
recently said Republicans would lose again if they nominate another candidate
in the mold of John McCain or Mitt Romney. And in the funhouse in which Cruz
lives, these candidates did not lose because they are reasonable men forced to
wear the clown outfit of “true conservatism” in front of an electorate who
easily saw the fakeness of it all. No, in Cruz’s distorted world, they lost
because they didn’t run hard enough to the right. Only true believers find
redemption and salvation and the glory of winning.
If you live in deep red Texas or in Georgia, the reasoning
is seductive. It works for us here, why would it not work everywhere? But much
like believing I’m a liberal, it ignores all to the contrary. The rest of the
country is not Texas or Georgia and the evidence shows it.
The Republicans have managed a majority in a Presidential
election once since 1988. In Senatorial elections, statewide races and
therefore immune to the weird demographics of gerrymandering, instead of a wave
in 2014, the Republican’s likely outcome is a slight swell that manages to get
past rocks named Nunn in Georgia and Orman in Kansas. And the Governors.
Republican Governors were once the pride of the party and the Republican
Governor’s Association one of its most powerful brokers. Now, Republican
Governors, even those in friendly places like Georgia, are fighting for their
lives.
Of course Republicans dominate the House of Representatives
for reasons that go well beyond party purity. No finer example of this is the
inevitable election of Jody Hice in Georgia’s 10th District. A
district that includes a portion of liberal Athens is going to send someone to
Capitol Hill who believes the First Amendment does not apply to certain
religions, women should submit to men and everything started going to hell in a
hand basket when we took Bibles out of school.
And here is where we get to the nut of the thing. You do not
hear those “liberty” criers criticizing Hice’s malleable view of the 1st
Amendment. Certainly not in the manner they attack other Republicans
who only say we should discuss the meaning of the 2nd Amendment. And
it is because Republicans in deep red states, like Georgia, have only seen
success in continuing to narrow the path. They don’t see Jody Hice and his ilk
as outliers. They see them as the mainstream.
And when Deal and Perdue are elected and the Reverend Jody
goes to Washington, Republicans will recline again in the comfort that people
like me are liberals, fundamentals like demographics will never change and as
long as you are “true” and “principled”, the righteous will always emerge from
battle covered in glory.
Two years from now when traditional Republicans tire of
being called liberals, when the demographics needle ticks a few more points out
of their favor, when they will defend twice as many seats as Democrats in the
Senate and face another electoral thrashing in a Presidential race, maybe, just
maybe, the few Republicans left will stand up and say, you know what boys and
girls, this ain’t really working.
Until that moment comes, the path will continue to narrow
and more will fall by the wayside.
