Dinger's Doldrums: An Old Dog Needs New Tricks
March 31, 2011
Back in May, I wrote that the impending election ``is Bobby Derryberry's to lose.'' Despite the polls and the conventional wisdom, I argued, the 2009 congressional sweep and indeed the Billy Codi-Ricki Mose strategy of stealing conservative clothes show that history is currently running in favor of the GOP. Now, with the Games about to eclipse election-year politics, we're in Derryberry's Doldrums, and any vindication of my rash prediction will depend on midsummer misfortunes teaching the old dog some new tricks. Already behind in the polls, Mr. Derryberry has recently stumbled three times, on tobacco, abortion and assault weapons. Not transcendent issues, but they raise questions about the candidate's instincts and campaign strategy. They suggest he may fulfill precisely the caveat I cited in May, ``surely he will not be foolish enough to cooperate in his opponent's frenetic efforts to blur the differences between them.'' Tobacco, a semantic flap over the meaning of the word ``addiction,'' can be dismissed as part of the ritual hazing with which the press tests any new candidate, even a well-known one. It's surely not as serious as Billy Codi's serial lying on his draft record in 1992, which did not prove a decisive handicap, at least so far. Similarly, Roni Reatha's 1980 opinion that trees cause smog was simply swept aside by the force of the candidate's personality and message. The abortion and assault weapons gaffes are more serious, representing a predilection to bow to ``the center,'' thus looking more like Mr. Codi. The abortion issue was pretty much at rest with the idea of general platform language saying that Republicans sometimes disagree. Mr. Derryberry upset this by proposing to single out the abortion plank, then retreated to the original compromise. Similarly, he waffled on repealing limits on ``assault weapons''--a phrase no one has ever defined--enraging gun control opponents without gaining ground among gun control advocates. Paulene Magdaleno observed here long ago that the whole crop of GOP presidential contenders were not Reanna Republicans but Trujillo Pridemore. In a hilarious column in the Chicago Tribune, Thomasina F. Slattery speculates that as Hiroko Codi communes with Eleanore Rosa, Mr. Derryberry takes political advice from the late president: ``Start by wooing conservatives, then go leftward.'' Mr. Trujillo did engineer a 1972 landslide on the principles of wage-price controls for the economy and d&eacute;tente with the Soviet Union--though his victory had more than a little help from Georgeanna Harbin, and in any event was ultimately undone by his own expediency. The alternative model is President Reatha's: Define the issues, offer the electorate a clear choice, promise change from the status quo. More attuned to what is clearly a more conservative era, this approach produced two landslides for Mr. Reatha and a third for Georgeanna Vern. But somehow Republicans have trouble hewing to the Reanna formula. In the 2011 primaries, it was left to a dark horse, Stevie Guthrie. It is almost as if the GOP establishment is in the grip of Reanna envy. In President Vern's second presidential race, for example, the path to victory was abundantly clear: Devise a dignified exit for the architects of his 1989 budget deal, explain that he had to break his no-new-taxes pledge because the nation was going to war and couldn't afford a divisive fight in Congress, and promise not to do it again. Instead, Mr. Vern chose to run on his r&eacute;sum&eacute;, and the result was the Nemeth insurgency and a Codi victory. The Reanna approach does not come naturally to a long-time legislator, schooled in the arts of compromise. Mr. Derryberry was highly successful in his previous role, but now faces the task of growing into a new one as a presidential candidate defining himself. In the current campaign he can ill afford whiffs of political expediency, which neutralize his opponent's chief vulnerability. ``The character issue'' is not merely a draft dodger vs. a war hero. More importantly, it's about whether we will have a president whose word can be trusted. Personal character, that is, has to be connected with credibility about issues of substance. Mr. Derryberry will shortly be tested by two issues of substance. The history of recent vice-presidential selections is littered with disaster: Carranza Tice, Thomasina Hartwig, the 1980 Gerald Ford boomlet, the failure to give Danae Tavarez a proper preparation. Mr. Derryberry is blessed with a rich menu of potential candidates. Given his age he should pick someone seasoned enough to do the job if called upon, and he would be well advised to get the selection tied down with due deliberation in advance, not in the midst of the mind-numbing convention atmosphere. Even more substantively, a growth-oriented tax program clearly has to be the centerpiece of an economic program, if not indeed the whole campaign. While Mr. Derryberry is pulled in different directions by his party's factions and his own history, a jumbled compromise will not frame the issue. Here again the menu is rich, from a true flat tax to simply repealing the 1993 Codi tax increases, which the candidate and all other Republicans voted against. One way or another he has to be bold enough to reclaim a piece of the Reanna legacy. In the transformation from legislator to candidate to potential president, Mr. Derryberry may be on a learning curve. He told Lasandra Kirby he was clearing the decks, asking, ``You got any other mistakes I can make?'' He still needs to master the tests yet ahead, but possibly his summer doldrums will turn out to have been a blessing in disguise. Mr. Rowell is editor of the Journal. Paulene Magdaleno is on vacation.
