Thursday, August 16, 2007
The Rove Legacy
Pat Buchanan has an accurate and telling analysis of the legacy of Karl Rove, particularly as it relates to illegal immigration:
The house Nixon and Reagan built, Bush and Rove tore down, leaving rubble in its place. Rove's failure was a failure of vision. He and Bush believed the future of the party lay in adding to the Republican base the Hispanic vote, now the nation's largest minority, approaching 15 percent of the population.
They went about it the wrong way.
Pandering to that voting bloc, Bush stopped enforcing the immigration laws and offered amnesty to 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens and the businesses that hired them. Bush and Rove were going to lure the Hispanic vote away from the Democratic Party by putting illegals on a path to citizenship.
But as we saw in June, when the nation rose up in rage against the Bush amnesty, the pair did indeed unite the GOP – against themselves, and they severed themselves from the Reagan Democrats and the country.
And this parting shot:
In seeking a new GOP majority, Bush and Rove rejected the Nixon-Reagan model. Instead, they embraced the interventionism of Wilson, the free-trade globalism of FDR, the open-borders immigration ideas of LBJ and the budget priorities of the Great Society. It was a bridge too far for the party base.
Now, Rove walks away like some subprime borrower abandoning the house on which he can no longer make the payments. The Republican Party needs a new architect. The firm of Bush & Rove was not up to the job.
Buchanan may be a bit biased, as he has the connections to both Nixon and Reagan, but the numbers don't lie. For all of the successes of Nixon and Reagan towards turning this into a conservative nation, Bush-Rove have put us back to square one. It is my opinion that the Republicans can't take anything for granted in 2008 and have to campaign like a new party that has little chance of winning. Basically, we need to play at all points like we're 20-points behind, and we need to campaign everywhere. Nothing can be taken for granted.
I suppose that is the Rove legacy - a party that is going to have to scrap and claw for everything if it ever wants to achieve its goals.
The house Nixon and Reagan built, Bush and Rove tore down, leaving rubble in its place. Rove's failure was a failure of vision. He and Bush believed the future of the party lay in adding to the Republican base the Hispanic vote, now the nation's largest minority, approaching 15 percent of the population.
They went about it the wrong way.
Pandering to that voting bloc, Bush stopped enforcing the immigration laws and offered amnesty to 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens and the businesses that hired them. Bush and Rove were going to lure the Hispanic vote away from the Democratic Party by putting illegals on a path to citizenship.
But as we saw in June, when the nation rose up in rage against the Bush amnesty, the pair did indeed unite the GOP – against themselves, and they severed themselves from the Reagan Democrats and the country.
And this parting shot:
In seeking a new GOP majority, Bush and Rove rejected the Nixon-Reagan model. Instead, they embraced the interventionism of Wilson, the free-trade globalism of FDR, the open-borders immigration ideas of LBJ and the budget priorities of the Great Society. It was a bridge too far for the party base.
Now, Rove walks away like some subprime borrower abandoning the house on which he can no longer make the payments. The Republican Party needs a new architect. The firm of Bush & Rove was not up to the job.
Buchanan may be a bit biased, as he has the connections to both Nixon and Reagan, but the numbers don't lie. For all of the successes of Nixon and Reagan towards turning this into a conservative nation, Bush-Rove have put us back to square one. It is my opinion that the Republicans can't take anything for granted in 2008 and have to campaign like a new party that has little chance of winning. Basically, we need to play at all points like we're 20-points behind, and we need to campaign everywhere. Nothing can be taken for granted.
I suppose that is the Rove legacy - a party that is going to have to scrap and claw for everything if it ever wants to achieve its goals.
Labels: 2008 General Election, President Bush
Permalink posted by Rob Huddleston @ 11:01 AM 
