Republicans in Decline

Many would describe the low popularity of Republicans to be the inevitable result of pragmatic concerns. The war in Iraq has made Republicans look incompetent and uncritical of their own plans. Reiterating the decades-old offer of lowering taxes has made them captive to the cliche. Even their tough line on immigration seems to reinforce the old stereotype of Republicans as racist and incompassionate.

The pragmatic concerns are too simplistic, however. What we are currently seeing is likely a philosophical backlash against Republicans--not for their conservatism, but for their nursing of the stale beer of modernism. Older voters still desire the meaty steak of principle, while the younger generations are clamboring more and more for the sizzle of rhetoric. The rise of this mysterious philosophical movement called "postmodernism" must be dealt with by the Republican Party. While postmodernism is hard to define, a core characteristic is found in its rebuttal of modernism. It lacks some of the optimism in human ingenuity and it sees truth as a means for power. It also has forsaken the abstract principles for concepts that touch people and imbue their lives with meaning.

Enter: Republicans. The Iraq War is very unpopular, likely because it smacks of an antiquated idealism. Diverting his course from the original realist argumentation, President Bush began to speak of bringing democracy to an evil tyranny. Even supporters don't buy that as a legitimate argument for war in Iraq. We are over there because Saddam Hussein left his WMD program to our imagination, which can run away with itself because of past wars and genocides brought about by the Hussein regime.

Our approach to immigration seems great in principle, as does personal savings accounts for social security, but until we can define these issues in personal terms, we'll continue to lose the battle for hearts and minds. More and more of the electorate is coming to hate abstractions. Insetad, they want people who can relate to them on a personal level, captivating their dreams for a better tomorrow rather than their aspirations for a "higher" principle.

This does not mean compromising on principle, but realizing that politics=principle + people. There are two horizons of understanding: the objective principle and the subjective interpretation. It is integral for the Republican Party to understand that they can't rely simply on knowing their principles, but knowing their people as well so that they can effectively communicate those principles. The times are changing, and unless Republicans learn to deal with that reality very soon, they will learn again what it is like to spend half of a century in the political minority.