The Orderlies Need To Claim Gingrich As Their Own

Last week I suggested that Newt Gingrich’s greatest competitive advantage is that he can appeal to both wings of the Republican Party:  the Crazies and the Orderlies.  Following up on that, I have to admit that I find the break down in the latest Gallup poll kind of fascinating for what it might reveal about the Republican Party’s future:

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The conventional wisdom is that back in the 1960s and even into the 70s the GOP was the party of fiscal prudence and even (for Northeastern Republicans) of civil rights legislation.  But Pat Buchanan sold Richard Nixon on pursuing a “Southern Strategy” designed to break the country in half and capture the biggest half for the Republicans, and the party began making its political appeal almost strictly on a race/cultural issues basis.  The rise of the Religious Right in the 1970s helped foment this change, and the GOP started running on the (i) God, Gays and Guns  (ii) “family values/abortion” and (iii) “the good Christian” platform.

 

Gingrich: Appealing to Both the Orderlies and the Crazies

Well, now that we’re getting closer to the actual votes being cast more pundits and polls are making more noise about specific candidates, trying to predict exactly the way in which the chips are going to fall.  On one level, this seems kind of pointless; we’ll know precisely how the chips fall when they do, and that is going to start happening in only a month.

On the other hand, it is always fun to get your bets out early – and publicly – so you will be on record if you turn out to have been right.  Over at The Plum Line, Jonathan Bernstein has an article up titled “Forget Newt’s Surge, Romney is Still the Favorite.”  Bernstein’s argument essentially boils down to the fact Romney’s unfavorables – in a poll commissioned by the Post – are low enough that they don’t support a “stop Romney” movement, which he argues make the presumptive front-runner the front-runner still.

I don’t quite understand this reasoning.  Maybe Romney doesn’t inspire such revulsion among Republican voters that they will all decide to actively vote against him, but that same poll shows Romney’s  favorables are fairly low as well.  They don’t have to vote against Romney so long as there is someone else in the race they’d rather vote for.  And that person certainly looks to be New Gingrich right now.

A new Gallup poll finds that only Romney and Gingrich are viewed as “acceptable” candidates by a majority of Republican voters . . . but Gingrich is far more acceptable, crushing Romney 62% to 54%. 

But the real good news for Newt comes in Gallup’s break down of its respondents (Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents) according to whether they identify themselves as “Conservative,” “Moderate/Liberal” (there are such creatures among the GOP?), a “Tea Part Supporter,” and “Not a Tea Party Supporter”:

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Among the party’s base – Conservatives and Tea Party Supporters – Gingrich once again crushes Romney:  68-55, and 82-58.  Conversely, Romney edges past Gingrich with the Moderate/Liberal Voters and those who do not support the Tea Party, but only just barely, by 3 points and 4 points, respectively.

This goes to the heart of what I wrote last week, when I predicted Newt would end up the Republican nominee:  Gingrich appeals to both the Crazies and the Orderlies in the Republican Party, and that gives him a both (i) a wider universe of possible voters than Romney could ever hope for, and (ii) a greater depth of commitment from those voters (because it’s the Crazies that are the committed) than Romney can hope to achieve.

Bachmann: Perfect for Low-Information Voters

Under President Obama's watch, we've seen some fairly radical changes in the Middle East just this year alone. When the Egyptian people rose up against Hosni Mubarak - Egypt's human-rights abusing dictator and, until recently, our man in Egypt - and demanded a more democratic government, Obama refused to support our erstwhile ally, things ran their course, and now the Egyptian people have Mubarak in the dock and are trying to figure their own way forward. No American troops present at all, no loss of American lives, and a step toward greater democratic freedoms in a major, important country in the Middle East has been achieved. Good.

When the Libyan people rose up against Qaddafi earlier this year, Obama did put U.S. military power behind a series of air strikes to prevent Qaddafi from essentially slaughtering his own citizens, but even then that power was led and controlled by NATO. Once more, no American toops present, no loss of American lives, and now the Libyan people have driven Qaddafi from power. Once more, a step toward greater democratic freedom in an important country in the Middle East (well, not geographically, but culturally) has been achieved. Good.

In the midst of the Syrian uprising against its government, President Obama has - so far, at least - refused to get the U.S. involved. Just as with Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, this is a matter for the Syrian people to work through themselves; America should not be in the business of installing governments we like over people who aren't, y'know, us.

And speaking of Tunisia, once again we see a people taking steps on their own to achieve greater democratic freedom, once again pushing out an aging despot, and once again doing so without the U.S. throwing its military might around to decide events for them. Good, right?

One thing you can say about the Arab Spring: regardless of how it ultimately turns out (and history teaches that any sudden change in government can be a tricky thing to negotiate), events this summer have reflected the will of the people involved and not been the forced result of U.S. intervention. Yay!