'Is the RNC Getting the Message Yet?'
By JB Williams (04/09/08)
The RNC is not the GOP. It’s only a collective national action committee for the state Republican parties, a fund raising and steering committee. Yet for far too long, the RNC has assumed increasing power over the political process to the detriment of the party. Voter complacency and apathy towards the political process has left control of the party in the hands of a few centrist party elites and conservative voters have lost faith in their own party as a result.
2008 marks yet another election cycle wherein the conservative base of the party was unable to advance a single solid conservative candidate in a system front-loaded with early primaries in liberal leaning districts. By the time core Republicans got a chance to vote for a nominee, they had no one left to vote for.
The default nominee was opposed by almost 70 percent of the party faithful in the primaries. The message from conservatives was loud and clear - they wanted someone more conservative than John McCain. But that message was fragmented and divided between at least eight other candidates, leaving the door wide open for a centrist candidate like McCain to claim the nomination by default.
The Message in the Money
John McCain had his best fund-raising month to-date when he raised a reported $11 million in February 2008 as the party nominee. But each of his Democrat opponents out-raised him more than 3 to 1 during the same period. Hillary Clinton raised a reported $35 million and Barack Obama raised an astonishing $55 million in February.
Overall, McCain has raised only $60 million throughout his entire campaign, while Clinton has raised more than $160 million and Obama has raised more than $200 million. The money message is clear.
Republicans are not sending financial support to the McCain campaign, nor are they sending it to the Republican National Committee for congressional races. Without that money, the Republican Party is poised for a November loss of cataclysmic proportions. If this trend continues, the RNC is going to need more than simple reform to remain an influential committee after November.
Is McCain Listening?
Until now, I was not convinced that anyone at RNC headquarters was listening at all. John McCain is still trying to convince conservatives that he is conservative enough for them, while remaining liberal enough for his primary campaign supporters. This is a tough sell, as he is beginning to figure out.
Until now, McCain actually believed that he could win in November with only the liberals who supported him during the primary race. He forgot that those liberals, who voted for him during the primaries, would not provide the funding he needs to be competitive in the fall. For any Republican to win in November, they will need the funding that must come from the Republican Party faithful. So far, that money isn’t flowing, and unless and until McCain starts listening to his party faithful in a very real way, it isn’t going to. He might get the “lesser evil” vote, but there is no “lesser evil” money to run on.
Is the RNC Listening?
Surprisingly, it seems that at least a few at RNC headquarters are beginning to take note of the message being sent by conservatives who have stopped sending their money to the RNC.
An April 4, 2008 column in Congressional Quarterly titled “Republicans Advance Plan To Ease Primary ‘Front-Loading,’ is an indication that some at the RNC see a need for change. Concerned about the level of dissent among the party base and the current failure to close the gap between the party elite and the disgruntled party faithful via useless rhetoric, the looming November disaster is sending chills down the spines of at least some who seem to be getting the message.
The party must change how nominations are run in order to allow the conservative base of the party to have a say in nominations, or the party base is willing to let the RNC sink into extinction.
The column opens with “A rule-making panel of the Republican National Committee (RNC) has approved a plan that would dramatically restructure the presidential nomination process.”
While they might not have the right plan yet, and any plan will face certain opposition, the fact that there is a plan at all signals a white flag of sorts. With an unfunded presidential nominee opposed by the party base and RNC fund raising running far behind that of the DNC, the national committee is searching for answers and sooner or later, they will have to stumble into the right answer. Even a blind squirrel will find the nut sooner or later.
Necessity is the Mother of Invention
When all the tricks that used to work don’t work anymore, it’s time for some new tricks.
For years, the RNC was able to continue its march to the left by selling the “lesser evil” concept, forcing unwilling party members to support left-leaning Republicans just because they were “less evil” than their completely leftist opponents across the aisle.
But what happens once the party faithful decide to let the party elite bask in their own boiling oil bath for a change? What happens when the party faithful won’t buy the “lesser evil” arguments anymore? What if conservatives are actually going to let the RNC and their moderate “lesser loser” nominee get run over by a very well funded Democrat locomotive willing to take no prisoners this November?
While it’s true that conservatives are not well served by allowing the likes of Clinton or Obama to win in November, it is also true that the RNC can not afford a loss to two such unqualified candidates which should be easily defeated by any real Republican candidate. That kind of leadership, no party needs. No national committee could survive such a catastrophic loss.
So Who has Whom in Check here?
It’s not checkmate yet, but who has whom in check?
The RNC thought it had conservatives over a barrel whereby they would be forced to support yet another “compassionate conservative” as a “lesser evil” to allowing open socialists like Clinton or Obama to win. But conservatives have checked the RNC by simply cutting off funding to the RNC nominee, making it all but impossible for that nominee to compete in the general election.
If conservatives proceed to cut off all funding to the RNC, even for congressional races, the RNC will soon find itself in full checkmate without a viable escape route…
Conservatives can and should continue to send support to individual congressional candidates whom they will need to block the leftward agenda of the next four years, no matter who sits in the Oval Office. Focusing all conservative resources on individual conservative candidates, especially in the Senate, is an end-run around the presidential election. While Washington insiders bite their nails over who will be president, conservative voters can take control of congress which can greatly control the next president’s agenda.
Conservatives Next Move
Conservatives seem to be taking a three pronged approach to reclaiming their political party.
1. Holding McCain and RNC elites accountable for their insistence upon shifting the party left by refusing to fund that effort.
2. Making an end-run around the RNC establishment by direct funding “conservative” congressional candidates instead of the general fund of the party itself. He with the gold makes the rules.
Despite forcing a less than desirable nominee upon the base, the RNC is about to find itself in checkmate. Without the money to advance the moderate RNC agenda, conservatives can once again exert influence over party policy.
That brings us to the third prong in the movement to move the Republican Party back towards fundamental American principles and values.
3. As RNC leadership begins to scramble for the financial support they will need to avoid complete defeat in November, those holding the purse strings will find the power they thought they had lost years ago and this time, its not congress but conservative voters who hold the purse strings. Now is the time for conservatives to directly engage in the inner office decision making within the RNC. The money comes with strings attached…
While conservatives entertain the idea of staying home in protest or jumping to a third party alternative, they are not likely to do either. They hold the key to recapturing control of their party, the money.
As the RNC remains starved for cash headed towards November, conservatives committed to real change won’t waste time, money or energy on third party options that won’t work, nor will they sit it out on the sidelines as their country is tossed into the socialist abyss by Clinton or Obama.
Conservatives will do that which makes them conservatives, they will conserve.
The fact that they can not do everything all at once will not stop them from doing all that they can do. And with money in hand and a cash strapped RNC, there is plenty they can do! The plan to reform the Republican nomination process is an opening to lots of change within party leadership and direction. Conservatives must be smart enough to capitalize on the opening they created and exploit every opportunity to shift their party back to the right.
They must be and they are…
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