What Ever Happened to Moderate Republicans?
from The American Prospect
With the hard right dominating their party, the neo-Eisenhower-Fordniks have formed two groups to recenter the Republicans. But even in their old habitats -- Wall Street and the media -- they're struggling to be noticed.
Thomas F. Schaller | December 6, 2007
When Minnesota's Jim Ramstad was first elected to Congress in 1990, the Republican Party was approaching a critical juncture. President George H. W. Bush, a mainline Protestant and former abortion-rights supporter who had just appointed moderate David Souter to the Supreme Court, was riding strong popular approval in the wake of the Gulf War. But the Souter appointment, coupled with Bush's broken pledge to not raise taxes, awakened a conservative movement that had become powerful enough to make or break Republican presidents. Bush tried to appease conservatives with his 1991 selection of Clarence Thomas for the high court, but it was too little too late: He had become an apostate. Ramstad, the moderate rookie, held on to his seat in 1992. Bush did not.
Over the next dozen years, Ramstad would witness the sometimes rapid, occasionally stalled, but always rightward shift of his party. The maverick's image he nurtured with frequent votes against his party was cemented when, after being returned to minority status for a ninth term, Ramstad joined 16 other House Republicans earlier this year to oppose President George W. Bush's Iraq War escalation. So you might expect national Republicans would be rejoicing with the news that the 61-year-old Ramstad decided not to seek re-election in 2008. "It's no secret that Jim Ramstad was ostracized within the Republican Party, in Washington, that's become so extreme and polarized," said Larry Jacobs, of the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute, upon learning of Ramstad's decision.
(Continued here.)
With the hard right dominating their party, the neo-Eisenhower-Fordniks have formed two groups to recenter the Republicans. But even in their old habitats -- Wall Street and the media -- they're struggling to be noticed.
Thomas F. Schaller | December 6, 2007
When Minnesota's Jim Ramstad was first elected to Congress in 1990, the Republican Party was approaching a critical juncture. President George H. W. Bush, a mainline Protestant and former abortion-rights supporter who had just appointed moderate David Souter to the Supreme Court, was riding strong popular approval in the wake of the Gulf War. But the Souter appointment, coupled with Bush's broken pledge to not raise taxes, awakened a conservative movement that had become powerful enough to make or break Republican presidents. Bush tried to appease conservatives with his 1991 selection of Clarence Thomas for the high court, but it was too little too late: He had become an apostate. Ramstad, the moderate rookie, held on to his seat in 1992. Bush did not.
Over the next dozen years, Ramstad would witness the sometimes rapid, occasionally stalled, but always rightward shift of his party. The maverick's image he nurtured with frequent votes against his party was cemented when, after being returned to minority status for a ninth term, Ramstad joined 16 other House Republicans earlier this year to oppose President George W. Bush's Iraq War escalation. So you might expect national Republicans would be rejoicing with the news that the 61-year-old Ramstad decided not to seek re-election in 2008. "It's no secret that Jim Ramstad was ostracized within the Republican Party, in Washington, that's become so extreme and polarized," said Larry Jacobs, of the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute, upon learning of Ramstad's decision.
(Continued here.)
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