March 23, 2009
In Defeat, Defiance
As the wrangling grows, the Republicans are in little mood for bipartisan politics
As President Obama was attempting to deflect anger over lavish bonus payments for American International Group executives, George Bush pointedly refrained last week from criticising his successor. “He deserves my silence,” the former President told an audience in Canada. “If he wants my help and I agree with him, I'll give it.”
Mr Bush is at odds with his party. The Republicans have shown none of his magnanimity. Congressional spokesmen have followed the party's almost unanimous vote against Mr Obama's stimulus package with increasingly vituperative attacks on his policies, his appointees, his Cabinet and, though still only indirectly, himself.
Almost since Mr Obama took office, the Republicans have rejected every White House attempt to reach out across party lines. They have shunned offers of a bipartisan consensus to deal with the recession. They have ridiculed the spending package, scorned as wasteful the proposals put forward by Timothy Geithner, the Treasury Secretary, and painted the Obama Administration as a government set on pursuing ultra-liberal, high-tax policies.
Much of this rancour is attributable to the scale of the Republican defeat in November. Like the Conservatives under John Major in 1997, the party knew before the election that the polls and the mood were against it. But it was still unprepared for the abrupt loss of power. In the in-fighting, many Republicans have turned on those within their ranks who they believe are responsible for their defeat. Both John McCain and Sarah Palin have been denounced, by different groups and for different reasons. Senator McCain's opponents are those who were never really reconciled to his candidature: the Christian Right and those wanting a more clear-cut stance on abortion, taxes and foreign policy. Mrs Palin has come under fire from more traditional Republican voters, especially the old East Coast Establishment, which was appalled by her lack of experience, her shrill tone and her courting of the right-wing vote.
Mr McCain, returning to active politics in the Senate, has promised to be the “loyal Opposition”. But his party is far from happy at a concept that finds litle echo in US politics. Mrs Palin has retreated to Alaska, angry at the taunts of her detractors and looking to the Republican Right for support in any future presidential run. Mr Bush, ostracised by his own party in his final year, is all but irrelevant to the debate. Many Republicans find themselves wondering whether his brother Jeb will yet emerge to lead the party, continuing a family tradition that has lasted for a generation. Newt Gingrich, meanwhile, seems to think that his time has come and that the Republicans, a party that likes its leaders to wait their turn, will look to the former Speaker to run in 2012.
The problem for the party is that, while wiser counsels remain silent, extremists are speaking out. It may work in the short term, as Republicans pick up support from the many Americans unsure that the Obama Administration has the answers or the experience. In the long term, this churlishness may prove disastrous. The party of Lincoln has moved far from the statesmanship of the Eisenhower years. It took the British Conservatives a decade to end their feuding. The Republicans too look set to be wrangling in the opposition trenches for years to come.
