My thoughts on the GOP after reading Rick Perlstein’s “Before The Storm.”
The Tea Party has shaken up politics in 2010 in much the same way as the Goldwater Revolution re-oriented the Republican Party in 1964.
It is a movement that gets under people’s skin. The mainstream press doesn’t understand its appeal. Critics believe it’s a fringe element. They label it as extremist, categorize it as a right wing insurgency, and claim it consists of fear mongers. Sympathizers call it a silent majority that is fed up with Washington politics as usual and worried about the expansive size of government in the age of Obama.
It has a polarizing leader. Sarah Palin has become the face of this group over the last year. She has generated momentum on the Right since she became John McCain’s vice presidential running mate in 2008. She drives liberals crazy. She makes the press roll their eyes. She is a perfect heir to Barry Goldwater.
Goldwater won the GOP presidential nomination in 1964. Conservatives, for the first time, wrestled control of the party platform from the Eastern Establishment that had nominated men like Wendall Wilkie, Dwight Eisenhower, and Richard Nixon over the previous quarter-century. Robert Novak, the young syndicated columnist, captured the struggle that took place during the presidential primary season between Goldwater and moderates like Nelson Rockefeller, William Scranton, and George Romney in The Agony of the GOP, 1964.
Conservatives were euphoric; the rest of the country was aghast. They thought he was a nut. Many pointed to his San Francisco speech when he proudly proclaimed: “extremism in defense of liberty is no vice.” President Lyndon Johnson tapped into this sentiment with his “Daisy” commercial which suggested that a nuclear holocaust would occur if Goldwater was nominated.
The Republican nominee wasn’t concerned with his critics. He wanted to spread conservatism and spent his campaign spreading this message to Americans. Goldwater wanted to roll back Leviathan. He wasn’t concerned about exercising power or making the federal government more efficient. The Arizona senator wanted to reduce the size of government. Doing that would expand human freedom and maximize individual liberty….
In foreign policy, he scoffed at containment: the mainstream foreign policy of the day. This strategy sought to coexist with the Soviet Union. Goldwater claimed that the communists were at war with the United States. They must seek victory, not détente.
This message resonated with millions of young Americans. Many college students picked up Goldwater’s treatise The Conscience of a Conservative. Organizations like the Young American’s Foundation (YAF) tapped into this youth movement and mobilized popular support. Periodicals like National Review and Human Events spread the conservative message.
This energy paid off in 1964. National Review founder William F. Buckley, Jr. aptly asked: Did you ever see a dream walking? Goldwater was more than a politician. He personified an idea. Though Johnson trounced Goldwater in the November election, winning 44 states and 61% of the popular vote, the conservative wing reshaped the Republican Party. Illinois activist Phyllis Schlafy captured this sentiment in her pro-Goldwater manifesto A Choice Not An Echo.
Like Goldwater, Sarah Palin represents something larger than herself. She has her finger on the pulse of American conservatives. Her magnetism lights up the room. She uses language that relates with Middle America and resonates with her audience. And last year, she tapped into the Tea Party when many Republicans were skeptical of the movement.
This movement emerged in the spring of 2009, shortly after Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. This stimulus came just months after the Bush administration bailed out Wall Street in October 2008 with the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act. This bailout culture extended to the auto and mortgage industries.
Many Americans opposed this federal overreach and the huge spending spree that took place in the last months of the Bush administration and throughout the Obama presidency. The Tea Party sprang up in response to this anti-Washington sentiment. It proposed to stop deficit spending, balance the budget, repeal health care reform, oppose green energy legislation, and cut taxes.
Republican leaders were wary of this movement when it first started. While conservative in many regards, the Tea Party also lashed out at the policies of the Bush administration. Sarah Palin was one of the first mainstream leaders to embrace the movement. After resigning as governor of Alaska in July 2009, she became the movement’s de-facto leader.
The Tea Party energized the conservative base last summer. It became a national phenomenon during August town hall meetings when congressional officials came home to discuss the health care bill with their constituents. Last November, movement supporters threw their support behind an unknown candidate in Massachusetts. The Tea Party shook up American politics when Republican Scott Brown defeated state attorney general Martha Coakley in the special election that replaced the late Ted Kennedy.
Brown had no business winning. Republicans don’t win statewide elections in Massachusetts. They certainly don’t win the election that replaced the liberal lion. In a debate, a moderator asked the Republican how he’d feel when he sat in the Kennedy seat. Brown spoke for the Tea Party when he proudly proclaimed: “It’s not the Kennedy seat, it’s the people’s seat.”
This week the Tea Party made national news again. This time, they did so in Alaska. Sarah Palin threw her support behind unknown candidate Joe Miller in his primary challenge against incumbent Lisa Murkowski. No one in the national media had the race on their radar. Everyone assumed that Murkowski would win the nomination easily and cruise to re-election in November. But Miller came out of nowhere and finished Tuesday’s primary fight slightly ahead of Murkowsi. Though the race is still too close to call as hundreds of absentee ballots remain uncounted, critics have already labeled this a Tea Party victory. If she loses, Murkowski will join Bob Bennett of Utah as a GOP incumbent who went down to a Tea Party challenger.
Incumbents don’t lose primary battles in politics unless they’re involved in some unethical behavior. But 2010 is no ordinary year. This is a Tea Party year. The people want Washington to listen and have shown their willingness to kick out incumbents who appear out of touch with their constituents.
Republicans are on pace for a banner year. Many expect them to regain the House. Some optimists believe they can retake the Senate. They must win twelve of fourteen elections to do so. Unlikely, yes? But this seems plausible as Democratic stalwarts like Barbara Boxer and Russ Feingold are in tough re-election fights. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is also in a nasty campaign against Sharron Angle, a Tea Party favorite.
You can throw out conventional wisdom in politics this year. Anything is possible in 2010. One thing’s for sure: Sarah Palin has reemerged as a political sage and a Tea Party leader directing a movement which has struck a chord with the Republican electorate.
A reflection on “Witness” and the Sam Tanenhaus biography “Whittaker Chambers.”
Whittaker Chambers woke America from its stupor.
He shed light on the communist menace during a hearing in front of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in August 1948. Chambers, a former member of the Communist underground, identified Alger Hiss as a communist. He also claimed that communists had infiltrated the U.S. government and were engaged in espionage for the Soviet Union. These revelations created an uproar. They also started the trial of the century.
Hiss was a member of the establishment. He made his mark during Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal.” Hiss began as a lawyer in the Agricultural Adjustment Agency, spent time in the Justice Department, and then worked for the State Department. He rose through the ranks during World War II and became the assistant secretary of state. In 1945, he served as an advisor to FDR at the Yalta Conference, which laid the groundwork for reconstructing post-war Europe. He helped launch the United Nations, serving as secretary-general of that organization’s charter conference. After the war, he left government service to become president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Hiss asked if HUAC would allow him to respond to Chambers’ allegations. He appeared before the committee two days later and denied the charge. Hiss claimed he had never been a member of the Communist Party nor had he participated in espionage against the U.S. government.
But Hiss wasn’t through. After appearing before Congress, he came out and spoke with the press. He dared his accuser to make a public allegation. When Chambers repeated the charge on a Meet the Press appearance, Hiss sued Chambers for libel.
Overnight, the country divided into two camps: those who believed Alger Hiss and those who supported Whittaker Chambers.
The professional, elite class sided with Alger Hiss. They knew him from his days at Harvard or through his work in government. Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter was a character witness on his behalf. State Secretary Dean Acheson was a friend. President Truman claimed the Hiss Case was a red herring championed by Republicans for political purposes during the election year.
Few stood up for Chambers.
In fact, many people thought he was unbalanced. Several of his colleagues at Time magazine, where he served as a senior editor, thought he was unhinged. They opposed his strident anti-communism and deplored the direction he took the magazine’s foreign news when he oversaw that department during the 1940s. They saw him as a Red Baiter who inserted his opinion into the news coverage.
These critics pointed to his influential piece, “Ghosts on the Roof” as an indication of his dogmatic views. Chambers wrote a “political fairy tale” in which he imagined an interaction between Czar Nicholas II and Joseph Stalin. The czar, who abdicated shortly before the 1917 Russian Revolution, applauded the Soviet dictator’s action and vision. This fictional Nicholas compared Stalin to Peter the Great and claimed that he (Stalin) had made Russia powerful once again.
Time reporters went nuts after the article was published. They bashed Chambers’ editorial bias. John Hershey, a Time correspondent, reflected this opinion when he said that Chambers had an apocalyptic world view and his article was riddled with “unjustified implications” that might launch a third world war.
Critics thought Chambers’ used the Hiss Case to further his anti-communist crusade. They argued that his testimony was a figment of his imagination, similar to “Ghosts on the Roof.” They just could not believe that Hiss was a member of the communist conspiracy.
Americans didn’t want to believe the charges either. They couldn’t fathom the communist infiltration that Chambers described. Could a former assistant secretary of state really be a communist?
This environment created a perfect storm. Instead of public attention focusing on Alger Hiss, the trial turned into a battle over the truth of Whittaker Chambers’ testimony. This drama continued to build as the trial dragged on.
The Hiss case was one of the first Washington spectacles that played out on television. Americans saw the two men appear before HUAC. Television showed the differences between the two men.
Hiss looked like a man of honor. He was tall, good looking, and wore elegant clothing. He appeared polished and seemed to be a man in control. Colleagues spoke highly of his work. A life spent working towards the greater good made him the good guy.
Chambers, on the other hand, looked guilty as hell. He was short, fat, and paid no attention to his appearance. His testimony revealed a communist past and several years spent undermining the U.S. government. His journalistic record showed he had an axe to grind, and had used his platform to wage war against communism.
The Hiss legal team used these public perceptions to make the case about Whittaker Chambers. They wanted to destroy his character and believed, by running his name through the mud, they could discredit his testimony.
The trial revealed much of Chambers’ past. His troubled upbringing became a focus. Psychiatrists tried to portray him as a lunatic. His father was a bi-sexual who had abandoned his family. His brother committed suicide. As a young man, Chambers had a homosexual encounter. The Hiss team claimed that he had spent considerable time under psychiatric care. These charges painted the portrait of a disturbed individual.
Chambers denied this last charge. But, he also recognized what was going on. He understood he had a cross to bear. He felt alone and at war with a mighty foe.
But Chambers refused to quit. He kept fighting day after day. The on-going court battle forced him to resign from Time. Though his settlement with the employer gave him enough money to get by, Chambers was also without the distraction of work. The trial became his life. He knew nothing else.
As the case continued, Chambers provided evidence known as the pumpkin papers (microfilm documentation) that convinced the jury that Chambers’ had told the truth. A jury convicted Hiss of perjury and sent him to prison in January 1950.
Chambers’ victory was a triumph of the will. In seemed like the biblical account of Job. Chambers suffered greatly. His reputation was in tatters. He had lost his job. Most men would wonder: is this all worth it?
This thought dominated Chambers’ thinking during the trial. Several years later as he sat down to write his autobiography Witness, he asked himself: “should a man destroy himself and accept damnation in order to fight for his beliefs?
Chambers believed he should. He wrote that a witness had a mission to speak out for his beliefs and must accept all the consequences that came from performing this duty. His witness required him to speak out against the communist threat.
Communism was a menace to Americans because it threatened to change the world. This ideology sought to displace man from God. In fact, it promised that man could become god-like.
Chambers saw communism as the incarnation of evil. It threatened to enslave men. Alger Hiss, and devoted Communists like him, wanted to impose this tyrannical vision on the United States. This was anathema to Chambers, who said he would rather die a free man than live under communism. His witness required him to act. In doing so, he sacrificed his livelihood and reputation so others could learn about the horrors that came with this twisted ideology.
His tribulations were not in vain. Winning the Hiss Case sparked the anti-communist crusade. This also helped the United States roll back Soviet aggression. It also gave others an example of the courage and determination needed for freedom to triumph over despotism.
Libertarians are the odd ducks in American politics. They have no natural home. Conservatives agree with them on economics. Liberals agree with them on social issues. But where do they belong long term? They have a long standing alliance with conservatives. But after the Bush years, many libertarians wonder if they should continue that partnership. With anti-Washington hysteria sweeping through the country, where do libertarians go from here?
The Right still offers the best chance to see a libertarian ideal realized. That ideal, which values individual freedom and seeks to constrain the government’s role in human life, has strong appeal in the age of Obama. Libertarians have an opportunity to set the national agenda. To do so, they must continue their long term alliance with conservatives and help elect a Republican majority of Congress. Then they can help form a national platform.
The last two years have been unsettling for Americans. Economic uncertainty has dominated this period. Democrats pursued a Keynesian economic approach to jump start the economy. Washington spent $862 billion in stimulus to create demand and help launch a recovery. That approach did little to create jobs. Unemployment has remained at 9% over the last two years. Democrats appear incapable of fixing the problem. Polling suggests that the electorate has turned its back on this government and will support a conservative alternative.
A message of small government and fiscal responsibility has resonated with Americans. Libertarians have championed that creed for decades. Come November, Republicans will have a chance to govern that way. But many fear that Republicans will abandon the libertarian creed once they control Capitol Hill.
These fears are warranted. Republicans controlled the presidency and Congress from 2000-2006. They went on a spending binge and became champions of earmarks during this period, exploding the deficit and making Democrats look like the party of fiscal sanity. They also expanded federal influence in K-12 education with No Child Left Behind. They cracked down on civil liberties after 9/11 when Congress passed the Patriot Act and created the Department of Homeland Security. Republicans encouraged the use of torture to obtain information needed to win the war on terror. Enemy combatants were held at Guantanamo Bay and denied habeas corpus rights.
On social issues, Republicans wanted to use government to impose their values on all Americans. They bashed gay marriage and supported a constitutional amendment which defined marriage as a heterosexual union. The GOP continued limiting a woman’s right to choose. The party opposed stem cell research. They opposed comprehensive reform and championed a nativist, anti-immigrant platform. In short, Republicans became big government, anti-freedom bashers. This record left libertarians aghast.
Conservatives overwhelmingly supported the Bush agenda. This loyalty became more pronounced as liberals bashed the Iraqi War. A tribal mentality sprung up in response to liberal attacks. Many on the Right lashed out at all opposition to the president. This herd like instinct stifled internal opposition and blamed critics as RINO (Republicans in Name Only) and wanted to banish them from the conservative movement.
Libertarians felt like a scorned lover throughout the Bush years. They felt their alliance with conservatives, which dated back to the 1964 Goldwater Revolution, was over. Many believed conservatives no longer practiced what they preached. Republicans were more interested in maintaining a congressional majority than advancing a limited government agenda. In addition, conservative Republicans wanted to use Washington to support a social agenda that was anathema to many libertarians.
This caused libertarians to throw up their hands. They felt alienated and betrayed. Conservatives were just like liberals: big spenders who used Washington to impose their agenda on individuals.
And so, they sat on the sidelines in 2008. Many believed John McCain would serve as Bush’s successor and continue his big government policies. Many could not tell a difference between Republicans and Democrats.
Democratic rule magnified the party differences in 2009. The government used Washington to fix all problems. There was a federal solution to health care, to jump-start the floundering automotive industry, to clean up Wall Street, and to save the environment. After two years of liberal rule, most Americans acknowledge Washington has spent a lot of money but hasn’t fixed anything. Most Americans oppose the Democrats’ overreach.
Republicans will benefit from this in November. The libertarian creed will usher them into office. Now the libertarians have an opportunity to shape a national agenda.
Their ideas have gained traction. Many in the Tea Party want to roll back federal control. This movement has become a grass-roots revolt against politics as usual. They want to drain the swamp in Washington of high spending appropriators. Libertarian rhetoric has caught on. Polling throughout 2010 has shown that Americans oppose he big government solutions that both George Bush and Barack Obama offered.
Americans recognize that Washington cannot solve all the problems facing the country. Many now believe the 18th century maxim: “the government is best which governs least.”
Reducing government is not a liberal idea today. The last two years has shown that liberal want to expand the role of government at every turn. Most notably, the Democrats want to expand government’s role in the economy. Government can create jobs. It can boost employment. It can jump start America and get the country back on track. Liberals claim this is a temporary fix brought about by the financial meltdown of September 2008.
This message is intolerable to libertarians. They understand that this will lead on the road to serfdom. They value economic freedom. They point to the late economist, Milton Friedman’s claim that economic freedom and political freedom go hand in hand. If you negate one, you negate the other. They also fear liberals’ promise because they understand another warning from Friedman: “nothing is [as] temporary as a government” solution.
Libertarians also remain skeptical of government promises during a time of crisis. They point to the warning of Austrian economist, Friedrich Hayek. ‘Emergencies’ Hayek said “have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.”
And so, libertarians should remain in a coalition with conservatives to form a Republican majority. A libertarian message, not a conservative one, has resonated with the people. Once in power, the libertarians must hold Republicans accountable for these campaign promises.
Libertarians have a unique opportunity. They can set the debate. Their ideas will shape the national agenda.
