Purity versus diversity
The Republican collision between ideologues and pragmatists
Purity versus diversity
Dick Polman, Inquirer National Political Columnist
On paper, the 23rd congressional district in upstate New York, way up near the Canadian border, is solid Republican territory - so solid, in fact, that this particular hunting and fishing region hasn't elected a Democratic congressman since the era immediately preceding the invention of the telephone. That would be circa 1869.
So one might reasonably assume that on Nov. 3, in a special election to fill the recently vacated House seat, that the Republican party's official nominee will win handily and life will go on as normal. Dede Scozzafava is a member of the state legislature with roots in the district, a seasoned pol endorsed by Republicans as disparate as moderate Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich - therefore, case closed.
But no. Never underestimate the contemporary Republican propensity for circular firing squads.
The GOP's conservative wing, incensed that Scozzafava harbors tolerant views about abortion and gay marriage, appears determined to bring her down in the name of ideological purity. Big-name conservatives - Sarah Palin, Rick Santorum, Dick Armey, Michele Bachmann, and many more - have defected to a rookie third-party candidate, an accountant named Doug Hoffman, who is running on New York's Conservative Party line. With eight days left on the campaign calendar, every poll reports that this fundamental Republican fissure is splitting the non-Democratic vote and making it highly likely that the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, will capture the seat that he normally would never win.
Yeah, this is just one House seat, and the outcome of this race won't change the House power balance one way or the other. But this intramural GOP skirmish - between the purists and the pragmatists, between the grassroots and the party establishment, between the conservative ideologues and those in the party who embrace the notion of "big tent" diversity - is a harbinger of more to come.
We'll see it next summer in the Florida Senate Republican primary, which will pit moderate Charlie Crist (the current governor) against arch-conservative hero Mario Rubio; and we'll surely see it in the next presidential race, particularly if grassroots conservatives flock to a Palin candidacy while pragmatists opt for somebody who can actually win.
It's the old conundrum about going with your heart or voting with your head, and this is what we're seeing right now in upstate New York. The New York Republican establishment, and the GOP campaign committees in Washington, have this wild and crazy notion that a party can return to power only if it diversifies, only if it broadens the ideological spectrum and makes room for politicians who think differently on the issues. After all, that's how the Democrats returned to power on Capitol Hill - by recruiting anti-abortion, pro-gun, fiscally conservative candidates who fit their states and districts.
Hence, the New York GOP's choice of Scozzafava - for a congressional district that gave 52 percent of its '08 presidential vote to Barack Obama. Her formula for winning seemed commonsensical: pull in loyal Republicans, swing voters, conservative Democrats, and labor union folks (she has a good relationship with unions in the district).
But the Republican right favors purity over victory. Mary Matalin, the Republican strategist/talking head, says that Scozzafava's positions are "freedom-squashing." Anti-abortion leader Marjorie Dannenfelser calls the GOP nominee "a radical ultraleftist." (If Scozzafava is indeed a radical ultraleftist, how come the National Rifle Association has seen fit to endorse her?) Palin writes on her Facebook page that Scozzafava represents "politics as usual." The Club for Growth, a purist group that relishes attacking moderate Republicans, is peppering the district with TV ads that urge conservative voters to defect to Hoffman (who is running third in the polls).
The infighting is so bad that it has degenerated into comedic farce. A reporter for the right-wing Weekly Standard magazine has been dogging Scozzafava on the campaign trail, demanding that she explain her reluctance to embrace all manner of conservative orthodoxy - and things got so heated last week that a Scozzafava aide called the cops, claiming that the reporter was harassing the candidate. (A stupid move by the Scozzafava campaign.) Minutes later, the reporter was sitting in his car working on his laptop, when a cop rolled up, asked for his ID, and said (as the reporter later recalled), "You scared the candidate a little bit." The conservative press promptly jumped on this incident to demand last Thursday that Scozzafava quit the race (Redstate.com wrote: "She has become a liar, filing a false police report because a journalist dared ask a question she did not like").
But the bottom line is that the right-wing revolt is likely to cost the GOP an easy House seat and throw it to the Democrat. Newt Gingrich seems to understand the problem; as he wrote the other day, in a warning to conservatives, "if you seek to be a perfect minority, you'll remain a minority...There are times when you have to put together a coalition that has disagreement within it." And as ex-Bush speechwriter David Frum noted the other day, the right's intolerance for big-tent Republicanism "is not a formula for a national party. It's a formula for a more coherent, better mobilized, but perpetually minority party."
How did this House seat become vacant, anyway? Because President Obama tapped the long-serving Republican, John McHugh, to serve as Secretary of the Army. The Obama political team is undoubtedly pleased with the GOP's current intramurals - just as Republican moderates decidely are not.
And down in Florida, where ideology and pragmatism are already in collision, where Senate GOP hopeful Charlie Crist is already under severe attack from the right, state Republican chairman (and Crist booster) Jim Greer reportedly pleads, "Lord, save me from the purists."
Fat chance.
CD75 -- you are totally hilarious. Obama can't get his agenda passed? Jeez! The Congress is set to pass a health reform bill that is MORE liberal than Obama had said was necessary with public support and here's CD75 saying that they are "the far left fringe" and Obama can't get his agenda passed. That's fine by me. CD75, George, and all the rest can keep ignoring the fact that the GOP is at war with itself and the Democrats will just keep right on getting the people's business done and winning elections.— anonymous- Tomeszko--are you from PA? If not, that might explain your ignorance of the fact that our democratic senator, Bob Casey, opposes abortion. There are many democratic officeholders, and innumerable democratic voters who also oppose abortion. The right's idea that there is a rigid philosophy that they (erroneously) call "liberalism" residing in the democratic party does not square with the facts.— liberal
- CD75 : you have completely missed Poleman's point. Yes, there are left-wing extremist in the Democratic party. But there aren't ONLY left-wing extremists in the party. The fact that there are opposing factions in that party show that there are multiple factions in the party. The concern for Republicans that actually want to become a majority party again is that the party is trending the other way. The Dems picked up a lot of seats with pro-defense, pro-second ammendment, anti-choice (yes, I chose that appelation on purpose) candidates in traditionally conservative or moderate districts.— still_independent
- ***Once left for dead, it now appears likely that the health legislation Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) will introduce sometime this week will include a government run health insurance program. One of the biggest reasons leftists support a government run plan is because they believe government run programs, like Medicare, have lower administrative costs than private plans. First of all, as the Washington Post’s Robert Samuelson notes today, that is simply not true: on a per person basis Medicare actually has higher administrative costs than the private sector. More importantly, the private sector does a much better job rooting out fraud and waste than the government does.*** http://blog.heritage.org/2009/10/26/medicare%e2%80%99s-low-administrative-costs-cost-you-60-billion-a-year/— NEPhilly
- ***...this 60 Minutes story from last night detailing how government run Medicare loses $60 billion in taxpayer in fraud every year: In the story, Steve Kroft asks convicted Medicare fraudster “Tony” about the extent of the government’s anti-fraud efforts: “Didn’t anybody in Medicare check to see if any of these charges were valid?” Kroft asked Tony. “Sometimes they’ll do it. But by the time they did it, it was too late,” Tony said. “We’ve already made $300,000, $400,000, $500,000 on it. And then we will never send ‘em nothing back. And then at 30 days they’ll send an inspector to your office. And by that time…it’s all closed down.” They would pay first and send an auditor later.*** Same Heritage story.— NEPhilly
- Harry Reid just announced that the Senate healthcare bill will contain a public option with a state opt out provision. However, the citizens of that state will still be paying the taxes to support the public option. This is such a mess.— tom - wilmington, de
- Last one:) ***“Look, I’m sure that you’re aware of these problems. But it doesn’t seem like you’re doing a very good job. I don’t mean you personally, but I mean, the government. This is still like a huge problem, and getting worse, right?” Kroft asked. “Well, it really does come down to the size and scope of the Medicare program, and the resources that are dedicated to oversight and anti fraud work. One of our biggest challenges has been that we have a program that pays out over a billion claims a year, over $430 billion, and our oversight budget has been extremely limited,” Brandt (Kim Brandt, Medicare’s director of program integrity) said. About that there is little dispute: Medicare has just three field inspectors in all of South Florida to check up on thousands of questionable medical equipment companies. “Clearly more auditing needs to be done and it needs to be done in real time,” Attorney General Eric Holder said. In other words, Medicare needs to spend much much more on administrative costs if they are going to stop losing $60 billion in taxpayer money every year. And that is before President Obama signs legislation that will put 100 million more Americans into a government run plan.*** Exactly.— NEPhilly
- Gallup poll, October 21, 2009. Should the healthcare plan include a public option, 50% yes and 46% no. Should Congress tackle healthcare in one bill this year or do so gradually over several years, 58% gradually, 38% one bill this year. Do you believe healthcare reform will increase or lower your costs, 49% cost get worse, 22% get better. How about care, will it improve or get worse, 39% worse, 17% better, 40% no change. And people think the public wants this to pass?— tom - wilmington, de
- tom: interesting data about the polling regarding the public option. If the word "choice" is included in the question, the results are remarkedly different (and perhaps this is a reason to discount polling data altogether). The NBC/WSJ (dem and rep pollsters) asked the two questions, each to 1/2 the respondents. Q1: "Would you favor or oppose creating a public health care plan administered by the federal government that would compete directly with private health insurance companies? ". Under 50% supported it. Q2: "In any health care proposal, how important do you feel it is to give people a choice of both a public plan administered by the federal government and a private plan for their health insurance – extremely important, quite important, not that important, or not at all important? " About 70% supported it (extremely or quite important). http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/WSJ-NBC_Poll090922.pdf on page 16— still_independent
Comment removed.- ***The fear of being forced to change insurance coverage can be seen in results from a pair of survey questions. The first question finds that 46% favor the creation of a government-sponsored non-profit health insurance option that people could choose instead of a private health insurance plan. Thirty-seven percent (37%) are opposed. The second question asked about the creation of a public option if it encouraged companies to drop private health insurance coverage for their workers. Given that possibility, support for the public option falls to 29%, and opposition rises to 58%***http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/october_2009/fear_of_losing_private_health_insurance_trumps_public_option— NEPhilly
- STILL: Fox should do a poll that says: do you the public option as described by Limbaugh, Beck and Hannity? 10-0% no is a lock! Then, CD75 can bloviate all over the blog.— Talvenada
- ***If the health care plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats passes, 57% of voters nationwide believe it will raise the cost of health care, and 53% believe the quality of care will get worse. That’s part of the reason that just 45% support the plan. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 51% are opposed to it. Those numbers include 23% who Strongly Favor the plan and 40% who are Strongly Opposed. Just 18% say passage of the congressional plan will reduce costs, while only 23% believe it will lead to better care.*** http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/september_2009/health_care_reform— NEPhilly
- Democratic Party activ-ists have pointed out that Scott Rasmussen was a paid consultant for the 2004 George W. Bush campaign.— Talvenada
- tom - wilmington, de: @12:20 PM the question really is how much "brush" has Obama cleared in those 9 months? i think Bush holds the world record for clearing brush ... at one point, i gotta believe that Texas had to import foreign brush so W. could get his monthly fix for his "brush addiction." but seriously, we all agree that George W. Bush was "all hat and no cattle." - jimy_max— jimy_max
Cited by the Columbia Journalism Review as one of the nation's top political reporters, and lauded by the ABC News political website as "one of the finest political journalists of his generation," Dick Polman is a national political columnist at the Philadelphia Inquirer. He is on the full-time faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, as "writer in residence." Dick has been a frequent guest on C-Span, MSNBC, CNN, NPR and the BBC. He covered the 1992, 1996, 2000, and 2004 presidential campaigns.
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