 THE GOP
Scapegoating the Social Right
A fact-free distraction
RAMESH PONNURU
In 2002 and 2004, Republicans ran hard on social issues and the courts — and scored victories at every level of politics. In 2006 and 2008, they left those issues off the table, and got walloped. It follows, naturally, that the social issues are to blame for the Republican defeats.
At least, that’s the conclusion that a chorus of commentators has reached. They are attempting to persuade Republicans to soften or downplay their party’s social conservatism and hide its social conservatives in order to resume winning elections. About this campaign to sideline the social Right, three things can be said with a fairly high degree of confidence: It is predictable; it will fail; and it is wrong.
The impulse to blame social conservatives arises nearly every time Republicans fail. They were blamed for the elder Bush’s 1992 defeat, as though he would have won if only Pat Robertson had not spoken at the Republican convention. They were blamed for losses in the House in 1998. And now they are being blamed for McCain’s rout.
Republicans’ social conservatism provokes more intense and angry opposition than their positions on other issues do. In some parts of the country — places where political writers tend to congregate, for example — social conservatives are so thin on the ground that it is easy to underestimate how widespread their views are. So it is understandable that many people would leap to the conclusion that Republicans would have more support if they backed off on social issues.
Yet there is no real likelihood that the party is going to abandon or reduce its opposition to abortion in particular or kick aside the social conservatives in general. Social conservatives are, for one thing, too woven into the structure of the party to be ejected. In 2004, the Republican convention showcased pro-choicers such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rudolph Giuliani, George Pataki, and Colin Powell. So far, the only candidates anyone is mentioning for 2012 are Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Bobby Jindal, Mark Sanford, and Tim Pawlenty. All are pro-life.
The Giuliani campaign’s spectacular flameout shows how hard it would be for Republicans to become pro-choice. Unlike previous pro-choice Republican presidential candidates, Giuliani did not run on his pro-choice position, had a record of accomplishment, tried to meet pro-lifers partway, had huge national name recognition, and took orthodox conservative positions on economic issues. He was no Arlen Specter. Yet he still couldn’t make it. The conventional wisdom blames his failure on his “late-state strategy.” But he adopted that strategy for a reason: He could not compete in Iowa or South Carolina or Michigan, largely because of his position on abortion. (Maybe things would have been different if he had taken a pro-choice, anti-Roe position.)
WORSE THAN MISGUIDED
If the pundits’ advice were right, Republicans would be doomed, since they are highly unlikely to take it. Luckily, that advice is misguided. No, actually, it is worse than that: The case that an overemphasis on socially conservative positions has been a major cause of Republican defeats is obviously ridiculous.
In 2006, for example, the Republican senator who went down hardest, Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, lost to a pro-life Democrat — in an election that also saw pro-abortion senator Lincoln Chafee lose. In 2008, meanwhile, one of the most liberal states in the country, California, banned same-sex marriage by referendum, as 29 other states have also done. In both elections, Democrats played down their social liberalism in most competitive races and instead ran on economics and foreign policy.
Nonetheless, some people are still at least going through the motions of blaming the defeats on social conservatives and counseling the party to move left on social issues.
The only change that Commentary contributor Max Boot advocates for Republicans based on the election returns is to be more willing to nominate pro-choice presidential candidates. But it is hard to believe that Republicans would have done better with Giuliani as their nominee. He would have had a huge problem with conservative turnout, and that’s just for starters.
John Avlon, who worked for Giuliani during his mayoralty and presidential candidacy, has argued in several publications that Republicans, to survive, need to become more like Giuliani and, perhaps more to the point, like Avlon. He writes:
Even the editor of the National Review, Rich Lowry, recognizes that Republicans need to reach the center as well as the right to win in our center-right nation.
Republicans will emerge from the wilderness only when they reconnect with independent and centrist voters who are fiscally conservative but socially progressive and strong on national security. That means modernizing by embracing a big-tent philosophy on social issues that can credibly attract libertarians again. It means regaining credibility on fiscal issues with clear contrasts like a balanced budget and flat tax.
Avlon is mistaken in thinking both that all centrists are social liberals and fiscal conservatives and that all people who talk about “the center” have this type of voter in mind. The latter mistake accounts for his recruiting of Lowry to his side of the argument. The notion that “a balanced budget and flat tax” plus abortion rights is a formula for political success, meanwhile, borders on the fantastical — particularly when you bear in mind that keeping both economic promises would require either tax increases on the middle class or massive spending cuts.
Avlon has also cited a 2007 Kaiser Foundation/Washington Post study that suggests that independent voters are closer to the Democrats than the Republicans on abortion and same-sex marriage. But that very same study showed that only 16 percent of independents match the profile of fiscally conservative, socially liberal voters that Avlon wants Republicans to court.
Syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker writes that “the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn’t soon cometh.” (No, I don’t know what “oogedy-boogedy” means either, but I gather it’s bad.) That many people find Evangelical Christianity off-putting is clearly true. Parker reflects that sentiment more than she justifies it, but she does make one attempt to support her thesis. She cites Emory University’s Alan Abramowitz, who argues that “increasing racial diversity, declining marriage rates and changes in religious beliefs” have been “devastating to the Republican party.”
 The ‘oogedy-boogedy’ branch of the GOPRoman Genn
Married white Christians are indeed a declining share of the electorate. Single people also tend to have more socially liberal views than married ones. But they also tend to favor (and depend on) government programs more than married people, so they would presumably lean left even if Republicans ditched the social Right. Meanwhile it is quite clear that Republican positions on social issues are more attractive to black and Hispanic voters than their positions on economics or foreign policy. Indeed, many blacks, Hispanics, and Asians belong to religious traditions that partake of oogedy-boogedyness.
Former New Jersey governor and EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman wrote an anti-social-conservative book with Robert Bostock a few years ago. After the election, they argued in the Washington Post that “social fundamentalists . . . who base their votes on such social issues as abortion, gay rights and stem cell research” have taken the GOP “hostage.” Actually, the Republican presidential nominee’s positions on those issues were mostly in line with public opinion: He favored a ban on abortion with exceptions for rape and incest; opposed same-sex marriage but also opposed a constitutional amendment to ban it; and favored federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research while opposing cloning. On the last two issues, he parted company with most social conservatives. Some hostage.
Whitman and Bostock note, correctly, that Republicans suffered more from moderate defections than from conservative ones — but simply assume that those moderate defections were caused by the social issues. And then they turn to the exit polls, and perform an astonishing sleight of hand.
Nor did the Republican ticket lose because “values voters” stayed home. On the contrary, according to exit polls, such voters made up a larger proportion of the electorate this year than in 2004 — 26 percent, up from 23 percent. Extrapolating from those data, one concludes that McCain actually won more votes from self-identified white evangelical/born-again voters than Bush did four years ago — 1.8 million more. But that was not enough to offset the loss of so many moderates. I looked up the numbers to confirm that Whitman and Bostock were doing what they seemed to be doing: treating “values voters” and white Evangelicals as identical sets. In their analysis, there are no Evangelical moderates. There are also no Catholic social conservatives. Karl Rove has pointed out that more than 4 million people who go to church more than once a week — people who tend to be quite conservative politically — voted in 2004 but not 2008. That’s a more relevant number than the ones Whitman and Bostock cherry-pick.
Even if they played the numbers straight, Whitman and Bostock would not have much of a case. The logic of their position is that if a group of voters has stayed with Republicans during a rout, the party should respond by working to drive them away, too.
DISTRACTION
There is no question that social conservatism repels some voters. But there is no real reason to think that it costs the Republican party more voters than it brings, or even that the party has overemphasized it. It is surely the case that social conservatives could present themselves more attractively. They could pick their spokesmen more wisely, for one thing. At a recent National Review Institute conference in Washington, Maggie Gallagher pointed out that social conservatives have two models of politics: the mass uprising or the secular Messiah who will put everything right. The patient and endless work of politics fits neither model.
People who disagree with social conservatives should, of course, feel free to make their arguments on the issues. But the argument that socially conservative positions are a drag on Republican tickets is dubious, as is the fact-free fervor of those who insist on it. Check that Kathleen Parker quote above: The Evangelicals are “what ails the party.” The implication is not just that they are a bigger problem for Republicans than, say, the voters’ preference for Democrats on health care. It is that the latter issue is insignificant.
David Frum, similarly, has recently written that a “painful change” on abortion and a “less overtly religious” message is “the only hope for a Republican recovery.” This kind of sweeping language ought to be backed up by more evidence than the critics of the social Right have yet produced.
The attempts to blame social conservatism for Republican defeats will not reduce its influence in the party. What they will do is distract attention from the changes the party really does need to make.
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