The Premature New Republican

In the wake of last month's election trouncing many people, including me, have taken it upon themselves to analyze the tumultuous situation in which the Republican party finds itself. Have they lost the demographics war? Are they still viable politically? Can they come back?

In two posts since the election I have warned against a premature Republican death knell and lauded - or at least hoped for - a new kind of Republican. I'm not a doomsday prophet, and I want a resurgent and contributing Republican party, not one that fizzles into obscurity.

So while I remain optimistic that the Republican party can and will find itself, it's now time for me to come to grips with reality. The Republican party can change, and it must, and I believe it will, but it's going to be a slow, painful process. This was highlighted just this week by uncertainty among House Republicans about whether or not they will back a compromise on the deficit that a majority of Americans support.

House Republicans, sadly, do not worry about the majority of Americans. They, like many politicians, care more about their constituents, or rather, more about the people whose votes they need to keep their jobs. One would think that among those constituents it would be possible to find quite a view of those Americans who want compromise, but alas, due to gerrymandering, that isn't often the case. It's hard to criticize Republicans for gerrymandering without condemning Democrats for doing the same, but the state and local elections broke the Republicans' way in 2010 and so even though Democrats took over 50% of the national popular vote in House Elections, they control only 46% of the seats. So while they can't be blamed too much for gerrymandering, House Republicans can be blamed for setting their own job security over the good of the nation.

This isn't anything truly new, most recently Republicans were seen placing their dogma over the good of the nation, but many of them seem to be coming around on letting go of dogma and pursuing the pragmatic. But enough for a compromise? We'll have to wait and see. There are still plenty out there who shun compromise and solutions. Said Congressman Ted Poe of Texas, "I don't see any scenario where raising tax rates, in any combination of compromise, will solve our problem." Said the rest of the nation to Ted Poe, get it together, man.

Individual Republicans may feel comfortable in their gerrymandered districts for now, but those districts will be gerrymandered again in the future, and the majority of Americans know that a balancing the budget is going to take compromise and dialogue, not "holding the line," against the opposition. There was never any intellectual merit to that idea, and it failed as a political tool as well. Republicans lost seats on "holding the line." As more Americans come to see what many already know, even those gerrymandered districts won't seem as safe.

It's time for the Republican party to become a national party with positive ideas, not a group of deadbeats clinging to outdated dogma and horrifically antiquated views on social morality. Sitting in an ivory tower - or a hand-crafted Congressional District in Texas for that matter - doesn't make you right, and it doesn't allow you to hold the nation hostage so you can continue to pursue dogmatic purity. America needs fixing, and the American people spoke last month. Come on board, or eventually the American people will speak again and find someone who wants to make the nation better.