The New York Times’ Charles Blow says that the Republican Party needs to look to the past to compete in the future:
While the ideals of fiscal conservatism like lowering taxes and smaller government are timeless tenets, strict social conservatism is troglodytic because it desperately clings to outmoded mores and rigid restrictions.
It forces the right to fight the wrong battles. Instead of reaching out to young people and minorities, it gets hung up on keeping Chuck and Larry from getting married.
In 1980, the Republican Party platform spoke at length to blacks and Hispanics, promising to stand “shoulder to shoulder with black Americans” in the fight against racism and to “pursue policies that will help to make opportunities of American life a reality for Hispanics.” That year, Ronald Reagan captured 14 percent of the black vote, becoming the last Republican to do so. He also doubled the Hispanic support that Gerald Ford had enjoyed in the previous election.
The 1980 platform went on to make a specific pitch to the nation’s youth, committing itself to broadening “the involvement of young people in all phases of the political process.” Reagan won 44 percent of the youngest voters in 1980, and that support grew to 61 percent when he was re-elected in 1984. No Republican has seen this level of support from that demographic since.
(…)
To be modern, you have to go back. Return to fiscal conservatism and ease up on social conservatism. Obsess more about controlling spending and less about controlling other people’s bodies.
Sounds like a recipe for success to me.
