Ford, Reagan, and the sour '70s

Two Republicans look back and ahead Fellow Coloradan Steve Mueller (SRMueller1@msn.com) took friendly exception to my year-end email reminding Republicans that the late Gerald Ford, rocklike as he was in the political crucible of 1974, still compares unfavorably to the man who challenged him in 1976 (and Nixon in 1968), Ronald Reagan. Here's our exchange of views - JA

Andrews: Let's face it: America could have done better with its leaders in the 1970s. President Gerald Ford, rest his soul, was a good and honorable man who rose to the unsought challenge of cleaning up Richard Nixon's presidential mess. Indeed he was in some ways heroic at that hour. But as we eulogize Ford, don't forget the "road not taken" by Republicans who twice missed a chance to nominate Ronald Reagan -- instead of Nixon in 1968, then instead of Ford in 1976.

Could Reagan, if nominated, have won the White House? No one can know. But Nixon, Agnew, Ford, Rockefeller, Dole, Carter, and Mondale were not inevitable. Our country (and the free world) could have done better. That is we can know, because in 1980 we did do better. An honest reading and evaluation of the past, including its "what ifs," is essential to doing better in the future, it seems to me.

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Mueller: I'd like to respond to your comment below about supporting Reagan in 1976. I was very active in Republican politics back then, and even though it was 30 years ago, I remember it like yesterday. I was a two-term State Chairman of the College Republicans, and spent about 60 hours a week working for the party for a couple of years. I ran as a Ford delegate at both the State convention and the 2nd Congressional District Convention, but Natalie Meyer organized a better campaign for Reagan in Colorado than we had for President Ford.. and Reagan won in Colorado, with the exception of Gordon Allot and John Love being elected as Ford delegates.

It was beyond my belief that certain folks in the Republican Party turned their backs on a sitting Republican president -- President Ford -- and failed to go to the polls on election day. That sort of adherence to "principle" gave us Jimmy Carter, when we could have easily had four more years of President Ford... if only they had gone to the polls. The right wing of the party, which I support and embrace, was just plain stupid in 1976 after the convention in Kansas City... and it cost the Party and the Country. Don't be blaming those who supported Ford -- your blame is completely misdirected.

Secondly, a careful post-election analysis showed that even considering the conservatives staying at home, the outcome of the election ultimately hinged on a NY State Supreme Court decision that did NOT allow John Anderson to appear on the ballot in New York. In other states, Anderson pulled enough votes from the Democrats to give the Republicans a slight majority... and the vote in NY was so close that this would surely have been the case. At the time, NY's 30 electoral votes would have provided Ford enough to shift the election to our favor instead of Carter's. (If you have any doubts about this, call Rove... he did the analysis!)

One of the main reasons I was so excited about your efforts at Judicial Term Limits was because of the NY case cited above. I know there are many other reasons why they are a good idea, but having liberals embedded in the judiciary can impact more things than most people realize.

Finally, I will indeed be mourning on Tuesday January 2 during our National Day of Mourning for President Ford. I met him several times, I worked hard for him and the Party, I respected him, and I will miss him.

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Andrews: Steve, thanks for the vivid bit of history. I was far less involved that year. But you are reading too much into my "could have done better" remark. There is no word of blame in what I wrote, if you want to look at it again. My point was simply that the deserved tributes to Jerry Ford shouldn't float in a vacuum of disregard for what other paths the GOP and the nation might have followed in those years.

I gave my best as a staffer for Nixon and Agnew, but objectively it's not very hard to wish that Reagan's gifts and beliefs, not Nixon's, had been at the helm from 1969 on. That in turn would have unfolded a scenario where Ford never moved to the executive branch at all. You get the idea.

It was risky for me to verbalize this whole line of reasoning in the days just after an honored ex-President's passing. Your rebuke, even if based on a misunderstanding, is fair and I accept it.

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Mueller: I do agree with you that the tributes to President Ford shouldn't float in a vacuum of disregard for the other potential paths the GOP and the nation might have taken. I wanted to enlighten you (in case this comes up on the radio) that you seemed to be overlooking the most obvious one -- that the Reaganites had gone to the polls to support the party in 1976, and we could have had a Republican president instead of Jimmy Carter. I can name several activists from the time who told me that they voted for Anderson, because they just couldn't vote for Ford... who was our party's nominee, but not perceived as conservative enough by some. (Unjustifiably, they thought it was an ok strategy since they weren't voting for a Democrat.)

I've NEVER voted against (or failed to cast a vote for) a Republican whom I've known to be a good and honorable person, and I have a difficult time understanding or respecting my fellow Republicans who don't support our general election nominees, particularly from the old days when we enjoyed a stronger caucus system. (There is less scrutiny of our candidates as the system moves away from caucuses, so there is a greater likelihood of some questionable candidates moving forward.)

These thoughts still haunt me as I think about this year's HD38 race, and I saw a bunch of supposed Republicans publicly endorsing Joe Rice - who I'm sure is a decent person, but won't be adhering to a Republican philosophy during his tenure at the legislature. (I just wish all the Republicans would all adhere to the philosophy to which they purportedly subscribe.)

There is a lot of work to do to turn around the tide that swept the Democrats into office this year. I'm pretty sure that seeking a higher level of philosophical purity is a better idea than being fuzzy about our values, so using the passing of President Ford as a catalyst for a discussion might be worthwhile. We certainly need to identify and mobilize those people that support Republican values, and many need to be reminded what those values are. Good luck, John!

Two cheers for newest State Rep

Matt Dunn will serve out the final month of a legislative term for Rep. Joe Stengel (R-Littleton), who quit early to avoid the lobbying restrictions that take effect soon under Amendment 41. The past year has been a political roller coaster for Dunn, a former Lincoln Fellow of the Claremont Institute who helped me establish the institute's Denver office and my radio show. The rookie candidate tied for first at the Republican assembly convened to nominate Stengel's would-be successor, then won his August primary before losing the November election to Democrat Joe Rice. The local GOP organization honored him with interim duties to fill the vacancy until Rice takes over on the legislature's opening day, Jan. 20. Note: the Rocky Mountain News story of Matt's Dec. 28 swearing-in erred in suggesting he and I aren't acquainted -- we're old friends. It was another new member present that day, Steve King, whose nonrecognition I was referring to.

All eyes on Congress

Will Perlmutter & Lamborn measure up? (Andrews in Denver Post, Dec. 3) Meet Diana DeGette, Mark Udall, John Salazar, and Ed Perlmutter, majority Democrats in Colorado’s congressional delegation. Meet Tom Tancredo, Marilyn Musgrave, and Doug Lamborn, minority Republicans in the delegation.

Last month these seven Coloradans were elected to represent the other five million of us in Washington. Next month they will swear an oath to the Constitution and join the most important legislative body on earth, trustees for the nation’s liberty, security, and prosperity – and for all mankind’s hope of freedom. We need the best each can give.

It’s odd, when you think about it: sending a handful of our fellow citizens off to the Atlantic seaboard to make laws for you and me here in the Rockies, to impose taxes on us and determine what the state gets back (only 79 cents on the dollar at present, chew on that). Yet as I argued here on Nov. 5, representative government in this continental republic has worked about as well as the Founders hoped.

It must work even better in coming years, however, if America is to avoid the historical pattern of great nations declining from softness at home and weakness abroad after a couple of centuries on the rise. Such is the challenge confronting Congress when Speaker Pelosi bangs the gavel in January.

Assembling at Washington in 2007, our House members won’t face the hazards of their predecessors at Philadelphia in 1777 – who risked a British noose – but the stakes are huge nonetheless. With party control shifting, the President beleaguered, the war going badly and our enemies emboldened, the world will be watching.

So should we. In the spirit of the season, I’m making a list and checking it twice, with a particular eye on the two freshmen, Ed Perlmutter of Wheat Ridge and Doug Lamborn of Colorado Springs. I have respect for both from serving with them in the state Senate, and high expectations as they head east. Here’s my open letter to each:

************ Dear Ed: In Congress, please stay as you were in our judiciary committee days, a thoughtful man of conscience as well as a solid Democrat. Don’t go too party-line or too liberal back there. A draft, higher energy prices, and bugging out of Iraq aren’t votes Colorado wants you to cast. (Tell me you weren’t for Murtha as majority leader.)

You won’t likely desert your caucus as Nighthorse Campbell did, but do buck them sometimes, Ken Salazar-style. As for the budget, our state was getting $1 of spending for every $1 of federal taxes before my party took the House in 1994. Work on that, will you? – Your fellow May 1 birthday guy, John.

************ Dear Doug: Bravo for a gritty win despite treachery from Congressman Hefley and some other Republicans. Forward now with magnanimity; legislating well is the best revenge. Remember your bill that named the Ronald Reagan Highway, and fight as the Gipper did for the undiluted conservative agenda, economic and social issues alike.

Major in national security and the Islamist threat, befitting our military-heavy state and the nation’s peril in World War III. Champion missile defense; someone must. Keep pressure on the Dems, ally with the Republican Study Committee and Mike Pence (tell me you voted for him over Boehner), and stand with Tancredo and Musgrave. Colorado needs all three of you full strength. – Your brother in the battle of ideas, John.

************ Mail matters, a member quickly learns in the state legislature (where all of our congressional delegation once served) and on Capitol Hill. Your communication to their offices can help swing crucial votes. Write Santa for Christmas if you like – but for a happier new year, drop a line also to Diana, Mark, John, Ed, Tom, Marilyn, and Doug.

Liberal zillionaires buying Colorado politics

NATIONAL REVIEW, December 4, 2006The Color Purple How liberal millionaires are buying Colorado’s politics By John J. Miller

When Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave votes on abortion, she votes pro-life — always. The National Right to Life Committee has given the Colorado Republican a top rating during her two terms in the House, and in truth her pro-life record stretches back even farther, to her days in the state legislature. “I’m 100 percent pro-life,” she says.

So it came as a bit of a surprise when a group calling itself Coloradans for Life launched an expensive ad war against Musgrave this fall. One radio spot even claimed that she had “turned her back on the unborn.” The charge was provocative; it was also utter nonsense. “This is a cynical political ploy to trick pro-life citizens into casting a vote against their conscience,” warned Colorado Right to Life president Brian Rohrbough in a statement.

Despite its name and rhetoric, Coloradans for Life sought to exploit the pro-life movement rather than advance it. Although several Republicans faced challenges this year from at least nominally pro-life Democrats, Musgrave did not: Her opponent, Angie Paccione, supports abortion rights. Yet Coloradans for Life targeted Musgrave and spent enormous sums against her. In late October, the Fort Collins Coloradoan estimated that the organization would devote at least $2.3 million to defeating Musgrave — more than Paccione’s entire campaign budget. “It’s just amazing to me,” says Musgrave. “Why can’t these people stand up and fight fair?”

On Election Day, Musgrave overcame the wave that drowned so many of her colleagues and cost the GOP its majority: She nipped Paccione by 3.5 points. Many of her fellow Colorado Republicans weren’t so lucky. For the second election in a row, Democrats made major gains in the state: They won the governorship, prevailed in a GOP-held congressional district, and picked up seats in the state legislature.

National trends certainly had something to do with it. At the heart of this accomplishment, however, lies a well-funded plot to transform Colorado from Republican red to Democratic blue. The creative use of extra-party organizations such as Coloradans for Life to shade the state purple is a strategy that the Left may decide to imitate elsewhere.

Just four years ago, Republicans were riding high in the Rockies: Gov. Bill Owens was reelected by a huge margin, both senators were Republican, and so were five of the seven members of Colorado’s House delegation. The GOP also controlled the state legislature.

Today, the situation is rather different. Not only is Colorado’s governor-elect Bill Ritter a Democrat, but so are one of its senators (Ken Salazar) and four of its seven incoming House members. Democrats also hold majorities in both chambers of the state legislature. “They’re on a roll,” says John Andrews, the former Republican head of the state senate.

There are plenty of explanations for this sea change. Demography is one of them: A growing Hispanic population leans Democratic, and a small wave of Californians has moved into Colorado and imported the west coast’s liberal politics.

Some will describe Colorado’s political reversal as the result of Western libertarians’ rejecting social conservatism. Yet that interpretation has its limits. This November, voters approved a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage and rejected a referendum that would have created domestic partnerships for gays.

Many conservatives blame the GOP’s woes on its complacency. “Republicans are getting the comeuppance they deserve,” says Jon Caldara of the Independence Institute, a think tank based in Golden, Colo. When Republicans controlled the state government, they made progress in several areas — tax cuts, charter schools, public-school accountability — but they also presided over the weakening of an amendment to the state constitution that had checked the growth of government.

A large number of Republicans believe that their hard times ultimately come down to a single factor: money. “We haven’t seen anything like this before,” says Katy Atkinson, a longtime GOP consultant. “The money factor is absolutely enormous.” The problem began in 2002, when the voters approved a new campaign-finance law that gave unions a big edge in raising and distributing funds. It continued two years later, as wealthy liberals poured resources into “527” groups, unregulated campaign organizations named after a section of the tax code.

Only Florida and Ohio saw more 527 spending in 2004 than Colorado did, according to one estimate. The Rocky Mountain News calculated that Democrats raised $4 million for friendly 527s, compared with $2.9 million raised by Republicans, but GOP operatives believe the difference was much larger. “We think that they outspent us by three to one or four to one,” says Alan Philp of the Trailhead Group, a Republican 527 that was created to fight back. “It’s hard to know for sure because the law doesn’t require much transparency.” The only certainty is that Colorado’s political mechanics are totally different from just a few years ago.

Three millionaire liberals are working the state’s electoral levers. “They’re trying to buy the political structure of the state,” says Governor Owens. “Everywhere we look, we see their money and their resources.” The ringleader is Tim Gill, the founder of Quark, a software firm; over the last decade, he has donated tens of millions to gay and lesbian causes.

His political activism dates back to 1992, when Colorado voters amended the state constitution to restrict certain gay-rights laws. “Nothing can compare to the psychological trauma of realizing that more than half the people in your state believe that you don’t deserve equal rights,” he once told the Chronicle of Philanthropy. Gill’s allies are heiress Pat Stryker and dotcom entrepreneur Jared Polis. “If you were to put a gun to the head of most Democrats, they couldn’t tell you who their state chairman is,” says one Colorado insider. “But they all know about these millionaires — each is like a mini–George Soros for Colorado.”

Two years ago, Ray Martinez learned firsthand what their money can do. He was a former police sergeant and a popular three-term mayor of Fort Collins. When a state senator retired in his district, he threw his hat in the ring. “We thought he would win easily,” says Owens. The district is home to about one-third more registered Republicans than Democrats. But then Colorado’s liberal millionaires swooped in, bankrolling slash-and-burn ads about Martinez. Many of them aired in Denver’s pricey TV market — an extravagance previously unheard of in state-senate races. “You know how you hear about elections that are bought? That’s what happened to me — my opponent’s election was bought,” says Martinez. “My campaign cost about $350,000, and the other side spent as much as $1.7 million against me.”

One commercial accused Martinez of bilking taxpayers through his mayoral expense account. Another savaged his views on abortion, with images suggesting that he likes to peek into bedroom windows. “That was such character assassination,” he says. “I’m pro-life. I was raised in an orphanage, adopted, and only recently did I discover that my birth mother was a rape victim and that I’ve got brothers and sisters. And they’re trying to portray me as a perverted Peeping Tom.” At one point during the race, Martinez enjoyed a double-digit lead in the polls. This soon vanished, and he lost. “Their lies worked,” he says.

This year, state representative Matt Knoedler, a Republican, came in for similar treatment when he challenged Democratic state senator Betty Boyd. Their race was billed as one of the most important in Colorado: “Control of the chamber probably hinges on the matchup,” wrote the Denver Post.

A 527 called Clear Peak Colorado — funded by six-figure donations from Gill and Stryker — came out swinging, in ads that accused Knoedler of weakness on immigration. “This is a complete lie,” complained Knoedler on his website. His supposed sin was to oppose a watered-down version of a bill to prevent illegal aliens from receiving certain public services. In fact, he backed a tougher version; he had also served on the staff of Congressman Tom Tancredo, a prominent supporter of immigration restriction. But the ad worked, and Knoedler lost the election by nearly 13 points.

The mini-Soroses of Colorado aren’t merely dabbling in elections — they’re building a permanent infrastructure. “We are finally realizing that how we win is by creating an environment of fear and respect,” boasted Gill adviser Ted Trimpa — described by one politico as “the Karl Rove of Colorado” — to the Bay Area Reporter, a gay newspaper in San Francisco, earlier this year.

They’ve established several websites, including ColoradoPols.com, that have started to shape political coverage in the state. “I can’t tell you how often reporters would call 36 hours after something appeared there,” says Owens. They’ve also founded Colorado Media Matters, an offshoot of David Brock’s national group of left-wing watchdogs. It currently employs about a dozen people. “That’s more media critics than there are in the rest of the Colorado media combined,” says David Kopel of the Independence Institute. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a liberal group that tries to publicize GOP scandals both real and fake, has a Colorado field office as well. Gill would even like to influence the GOP: He hired former Owens staffer and conservative-movement veteran Sean Duffy to work on the domestic-partnership referendum, and convinced Patrick Guerriero to resign as head of the Log Cabin Republicans in order to run the Gill Action Fund.

Given their incredible success over the last two election cycles, Colorado’s liberals are no doubt already looking forward to 2008. GOP senator Wayne Allard may retire. Even if he doesn’t, the battle for his seat will be one of the hardest-fought Senate contests in the country. Denver is a leading candidate to host the Democratic convention that year, and there will be a major push to deliver Colorado’s electoral votes to the party’s nominee.

Potentially more important is Gill’s determination to export the Colorado model. “If I can make a difference in Colorado, you can make a difference in your home state,” he said earlier this year in Miami, at a meeting of financial heavyweights in the gay-rights movement, according to the Rocky Mountain News. To liberals, that may sound like a hope. Conservatives should hear it as a threat.

More on the ten essentials

By Dave Crater (crater@wilberforcecenter.org) Editor's Note: Andrews' "Ten Conservative Essentials for the Republican Comeback" are here given a different twist as to priority, interpretation, and in one case (No. 6, Disunity), inversion. Coming from such a credible quarter as the Wilberforce Center for Colorado Conservatism, the disputation is welcome to me. Bring on more! - JA

1. Piety. Must be first on any conservative list. Liberalism is the state as God. Libertarianism is the individual as God. Conservatism is God as God. The United States would not have been founded except for Christian faith, and it will not be preserved except by Christian faith. The continuing decay of true faith among Republican Party elites, who tend to be more concerned with what is thought of them in Denver, Washington, and New York than what is thought of them in Wray, Fruita, Ft. Morgan, and the Colorado River valley, is a major reason for their inability to inspire the grassroots.

2. Principle. Human nature is a constant. Moral truth is a constant. Prudence is the apprehension and experience of the unchanging truth of human nature and the cosmos. It does not adjust to the times. It interprets and judges the times.

3. Courage. Indeed, send us! If we believe zeal guarantees minority status, we will not be ferocious on behalf of the good. We will not ever truly know the good, which by its nature inspires zeal. And backbone. Otherwise known as courage. Courage is steadfastness in the face of moral confusion and personal hostility. Political courage is steadfastness in the face of the moral confusion and personal hostility generated by liberalism and by empty Republican pragmatism. Political courage means calling compromise and bad faith what it is.

4. Humility. Desire not to sit and eat and talk with the great. Desire to sit and eat and talk with the humble. Relinquish dreams of personal greatness. Recover dreams of spiritual, social, economic, and political greatness. Be not so proud that you fear empty souls who happen to be powerful. Be humble enough that you fear God and love your neighbor. And be humble enough to be unwilling to cover Republican misdeeds simply because they are done by Republicans, with whom rest your hopes for future political advancement.

5. Gratitude. I have nothing I was not given. Selfishness is wanting more beyond the abundance I already have. Contentment is knowing life itself is a gift, and that I have been blessed even if none but my family and friends ever know my name.

6. Disunity. Unless we are willing to distance ourselves from falsehood, calculation, self-promotion, and self-service, and those in our political culture who engage in them, and instead be true to those who favor truth, self-sacrifice, courage, and the service of future generations, neither conservatism nor the Republican Party can revive. One need not be popular to govern, and one certainly need not be popular to govern rightly. If Winston Churchill can lose an election, we will not save our electoral jobs through, as he called it, “easy and fickle froth and chatter” generated by our attempt to be popular. “Unity” in modern political parlance is a synonym for popularity and the avoidance of controversy. No more evil has been done in our generation than that perpetrated in the name of unity.

7. Vigilance. Enemies and evil are real indeed, including those in our own ranks.

8. Integrity. Integrity is more than just telling the truth. Integrity is believing in something substantial, and saying and doing what is consistent with what I believe, both in public and in private. A liberal can have this kind of integrity, and often does. Michael Moore has more of this kind of integrity than many Republican leaders, who strangely and strikingly lack the ability to see even a week into the political future.

9. Unity. Once we have recovered the willingness to be disunified, and a sense of our responsibility to confront enemies in our midst and regain our integrity, we can again hope for real unity. Unity is not buying dinner for a Democrat, or securing a “seat at the table” with a vacuous Republican official, or signing a shallow consensus document. Unity is the natural bond between and among those who know what is true and are willing to sacrifice to bear witness to that truth.

10. Optimism. If steps 1 through 9 are followed, there is reason for real optimism. Optimism for optimism’s sake is worse than meaningless; it is dangerous. Optimism grounded in a recovery of spiritual, social, economic, and political truth, and unity therein, is optimism worth campaigning on.