Conservatives must learn from the shutdown

Speaker Boehner: ‘’We just didn’t win’’

16 days overdue, thus ends an American take on Monty Python. Without the satire.

The White House has preserved ObamaCare, Democrats have won clean resolutions and the GOP has been humbled into a very public and very bloody retreat.

For Republicans, there are only two positives.

First, with this deal, the Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, has probably saved the GOP from being vanquished in next year’s Mid-Terms. Second, McConnell has challenged the President to live up to his word and engage in serious negotiations (my take on 'serious') before next January. In short, McConnell has given CPR to a party drowning in emotion.

For leading the GOP off its Maginot Line, McConnell deserves the gratitude of all conservatives.

Unfortunately, he won’t get it. 

Instead, the very opposite is likely to occur. Conservative firebrands will rage against his ‘betrayal of conservative values’. McConnell’s primary challenger, Matt Bevin, can expect his campaign coffers to brim. After all, for a loud but vocal conservative minority, compromise is treason. A capital crime. 

This insipid absolutism can’t continue. It’s time for us, the majority of conservatives; the ‘quiet conservatives’, to bring reason back to Republican politics.

For a start, we need to recognize what we’re up against - that there are those in our movement who see ‘purity’ as their defining cause. That for these conservatives, politics isn’t about asserting an agenda, it’s about purging the ‘ideologically impure’. We need to recognize that these partisans see themselves as the modern incarnations of John Stark’s heroic toast, - ‘’Live free or die; death is not the worst of evils.’’ That for these men and women, political death is preferable to compromise.

Next, we need to point out the fallacy of their argument.

Let’s cut the faux patriotism, ObamaCare is not the British Army and this isn’t the Revolutionary War. In their struggle, Stark and his comrades were fighting for an ideal that was both pure and possible – freedom and independence.

Neither was true with regards to the GOP strategy on ObamaCare. As I argued earlier this week, demanding that Obama sacrifice his landmark law was always implausible. Democrats control the Senate and the Executive. The Judiciary has rendered its decision- the law conforms with the Constitution. The polls were also clear- Americans might dislike ObamaCare, but they disliked the GOP’s brinkmanship even more. On top of it all, Obama had a post-Syria necessity to project clear leadership.

Unsurprisingly, the news coverage has reflected this understanding. Instead of focusing on the absurd incompetence of the ObamaCare rollout, the media set up camp on a different story – one centered in a Republican celebration of rudderless obstructionism. A political opposition marching in perfect step with Democratic propaganda. A modern tea party… without the tea.

For conservatives, this strategic delusion speaks to our burgeoning fetish - self-immolation at the shrine of partisan resistance.

Over the last two weeks, the House GOP has rendered itself the governing equivalent of a skydiving team without parachutes- for two minutes, soaring ecstasy as the jumpers sail through the clouds. Until terminal velocity meets certain gravity. Then truth renders its judgment – the illusion of omnipotence at an awful price. Self-destruction is the nemesis of political reason.

If we’re serious about preventing an American welfare state, we conservatives need to get serious.

We need to grasp the virtuous truth- that Political leadership demands both courage and rationality. That in a democracy, believing alone isn’t enough. In the end as with all arguments, political success requires presenting a case, persuading voters and pursuing change.

The alternative is what we’ve seen today. A gleeful Democratic party, a preaching President and a Republican brand that’s bobbing in the sewer.

Please watch video below for my thoughts on broader issues involved.

Immigration Reform, Intelligence, DoD, Hijackings.

A few thoughts this morning...

1) House Republicans are making an awful mistake on immigration reform. I get and respect that many members of the Republican caucus oppose the Senate's immigration bill. That's fair enough. But to simply offer intransigent opposition without response would be terrible mistake. It would play to Democratic caricatures of the GOP as a party that has no interest in governing. It would reinforce negative perceptions of the GOP in the eyes of Hispanic Americans. Most of all, it would represent a stunning neglect of the ultimate responsibility of elected officials to govern. There can be no doubt that America's immigration system is broken. It deserves and requires resolution. Yet, I fear that in much the same way as was the case with health care reform, by ceding the debate, Republicans will also effectively cede control over the contours of immigration reform. This will lead to the worst possible outcome - open borders, unfettered amnesty and a tremendous political defeat for the GOP brand. House Republicans need to listen to conservatives like Paul Ryan.

2) Members of Congress are complaining that the Intelligence Community regularly obfuscate their reports to the intelligence oversight committees. This is nothing new (see The Deep State). Yet, it's open airing speaks to a dysfunction at the heart of the US Government. Many intelligence professionals simply do not believe that politicians can be trusted to make objective decisions on the merits of particular intelligence operations. As a result, they do their utmost to sell those programs in uncontroversial ways. Don't get me wrong, misleading Congress is absolutely unacceptable and where it occurs, it must now stop. Nevertheless, Congress bears responsibility for its shifting rhetoric on the constitution of appropriate intelligence activities.

3) I share Chuck Hagel's concern over the looming impact of the sequester on the US Military. Unfortunately, until Democrats accept the inevitability of major entitlement reform, the prospects of an appropriate defense resolution are very low. It's stunning to me that liberals still refuse to engage in meaningful dialogue over entitlements. The numbers speak for themselves. In the interim however, it's crucial that Hagel resists efforts by President Obama to play politics with the sequester (a preference for which Obama has previously shown significant sympathy). For one example, it makes no sense that USN/USAF fighter squadrons are seeing degraded readiness. We should be closing bases before degrading our power projection capabilities.

4) A new book on air hijackings has been released. The author covers the 'epidemic' in hijackings that afflicted the world in the 1960s/70s. Of course, things have since changed. The threat of suicide hijackings and the rise in politically motivated attacks (especially by Palestinian affiliated terrorist organizations) forced western governments to develop highly trained counter-terrorism capabilities. For example, the United States lead agency for plane focused hostage rescues is ACE (aka Delta Force). Combined with greatly improved airport security efforts, the ability to respond to and effectively resolve hijackings has meant that air travel is now substantially safer.