Lessons from the GOP Primary

In the last two weeks of Monday morning quarterbacking going on over the GOP defeat in the general election, one critical component has been overlooked, as it always is, that is the primary season.  After all, if Romney was a flawed candidate, it is worth looking back at why and how he was nominated to avoid making the same mistake again.  

Number one, all of the moderate Republicans who said nominate Mitt Romney because he will win, he is the most electable, etc. owe the party an apology.  Not only did he fail to win, his milquetoast ways delivered a campaign that did little to stir any real national discussion on any substantive issues.  The Democrats abortion-palooza of a convention went unanswered, the unconstitutionality of the HHS mandate drew nary a whisper from the Romney camp, and the beauty of supply-side economics was dumbed down to mean nothing more than lower tax rates for corporations.  

While nobody wants to openly embrace a martyr candidacy, particularly in a year where the incumbent was so disliked, Barry Goldwater’s 1964 campaign was a watershed moment for the Republican party.  While it did not immediately bear fruit as Nixon was a moderate, it ultimately led to the Reagan revolution and a generation of conservatives that if they haven’t seen the White House again has at least captured the U.S. House and most Governorships.  

Goldwater was a bold break from “I Like Ike”.  He ran a campaign of substance, based on ideas, and outlined a genuine choice between the two parties.  Richard Reeves, in his great biography of John F. Kennedy, also notes that had Kennedy not been assassinated, he would have faced a tough re-election fight.  In other words, Goldwater may well have been electable.  

The fundamental mistake Republicans made this time around was the same mistake the Democrats made in 2004.  They had worked themselves into such lather over the incumbent, they could no longer think straight.  They assumed it was enough to be “not Obama” in the same way those Democrats in 2004 assumed being, “not Bush” was enough.   Campaigns are won by attracting voters, that means being for something, not just against someone. 

Republicans, like Democrats in 2004, nominated a white guy from Massachusetts and selected their candidate based on a thin biographical sketch.  John Kerry was supposedly a war hero and Mitt Romney was supposedly a brilliant businessman.  One was swiftboated, the other “Bained” if I can coin a term.  If the candidate is not prepared to or cannot flesh out and defend said biographical sketch, their campaign will be rudderless from day 1.  

To that point, how many Republicans complained that the nominating fight was too nasty?  That the attacks on Romney’s business record were uncalled for and out of bounds?  It turns out they were great preparation for the general election had the Romney campaign bothered to figure out how to counter the blows.   That is another great lesson about primaries; they are actually about an election, not a coronation.

So let’s go back to the beginning to remind ourselves how things played out.  Romney effectively tied Rick Santorum in Iowa.  Not a bad result for a northeasterner who refused to campaign in the state because he was scared he would lose.  Although had he not played prevent defense in Iowa, he likely would have won.  Also, the fact that Santorum, who had no momentum until the last week, was able to attract so many voters should have been a wake-up call to Romney that he was not inevitable.  As we all know it wasn’t.

Romney won New Hampshire handily before getting trounced by Newt Gingrich in South Carolina.  At this point it was becoming painfully obvious that a good chunk of Republicans were looking for any alternative to Romney.  At the time, if you recall, the mantra was that it didn’t matter, after all, they would all come back to Romney in the general election, what choice did they have?  As it turns out, apparently they didn’t all come back as Romney got fewer votes than John McCain.  

As Gingrich’s momentum faded, Romney managed to win Florida and Nevada, seemingly picking up momentum that might finally make him the inevitable nominee.  But Romney was promptly routed by Santorum on February 7^th, losing all 3 states that day, including Colorado.  Ah yes, Colorado, remember Romney needed to win that one on election night?  Lesson learned, if you can’t win it in the primary, don’t expect to carry it in the general election.

To be fair to Romney, from that point on he won the next 5 states that voted up until Super Tuesday.  Of the 10 states that voted on Super Tuesday, Romney won 6 of them.  Granted one of them, Ohio, he won by only 12,000 votes out of over 1 million cast (more struggles in a swing state?).   From that point on, Romney more or less stumbled to the finish line.  In fairness to him, the awarding of proportional delegates defeated the purpose of the delegate system, which was to help conclusively decide a primary where the popular vote might be more fractured.  Romney didn’t have a fair chance to build the feeling of inevitability.

But there is something else.  Romney won 20 of his 38 primaries in states he would not carry in the general election.  This goes back to something I blogged about at the time I believe.  Romney’s primary map looked a lot like Obama’s general election map.  He was winning voters in large, metro areas, and in states that were going to go for Obama in the general election.  He was voted in by moderate Republicans and the base was not energized for the election.  

You only have the slate of candidates you have at the time.  I do not write any of this to suggest that Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, or Ron Paul would have defeated Barack Obama.  But I would suggest that either Santorum or Gingrich might have campaigned on ideas and perhaps employed the kind of political consultants that Romney did not that would avoided some of the more egregious campaign missteps.  

More importantly, what to do in 2016?  The answer seems to be that Republicans need to go back to what they did so well at one time (or maybe just that one time in 1980), picking a candidate based on ideas.  It isn’t about whose turn it is (Bush ’88, Dole ’96, McCain ’08, Romney ’12) those are the campaigns that squandered the dividends of the Reagan revolution.  The Rockafeller Republicans are invited to the party, they can even dance, but it is time to quit letting them pick the music.  

This country is moving in the wrong direction because when Democrats lose, they run farther to the left believing they were not radical enough.  When Republicans lose, they ran further to the middle convinced they were too radical.  The country is now squarely on and moving rapidly down the wrong track.  One or two more election cycles like this one and we won’t even be able to look back and see where we should be.