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This time four years ago, with a battered George W. Bush limping his way down the home stretch of his two–term presidency, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were engaged in a fiercely contested battle for the Democratic nomination. By the end of January, the two candidates were incredibly close in both pledged delegates for the convention and the popular vote. Already, the race had gone through some wild swings, with Obama surging to a upset victory in Iowa, before Clinton reasserted herself in New Hampshire, famously breaking down to tears at a campaign stop before pulling of a win. In Nevada, Clinton’s momentum continued, despite union support for Obama. And in South Carolina, the race issue finally reared its head, when Bill Clinton made an apparent attempt to marginalize Obama’s win there, comparing it to former black candidate Jesse Jackson’s ultimately meaningless victory there in 1988. Through all of it, the candidates questioned each others ability to lead, and each others ability to bring change to America. Given the weakness of the Republican position, thanks to W., it was clear that the Democrats were likely to win the White House, and this made the primary race arguably more important for the country than the general election itself.
With such high stakes, there were bound to be a few moments of real attack politics. Clinton released an ad claiming that Obama lacked the fortitude to answer the ‘3 A.M. Phone call’ of crisis, and she also tried to tie Obama to infamous Chicago slumlord Tony Resko. Conversely, Obama went after Clinton’s money, and her ties to Big Corporate. However, while there were some unseemly moments in what was a very long, very tight campaign, it never quite degenerated to the point where Obama was handicapped by the damage done as he went on to face John McCain.
This time around, with Obama in the Oval Office, the Republicans are engaged in a primary process that has also rushed to some rapid extremes. Conservative Rick Santorum won in Iowa, before front–runner Mitt Romney reasserted himself in New Hampshire, without the tears. And, an angry Newt Gingrich was briefly resurrected in South Carolina. Unlike the Democratic campaign of 2008, that while ugly, managed to only flirt with disaster, the Republican version of 2012 has quickly devolved into a hideous, almost unwatchable affair of juvenile name-calling, negative ads that are so fraught with errors that they have to be quickly pulled from the air, and an astoundingly whole abdication of discussion of any actual issues. Just consider what had become the major factors in the campaign as it rolled into Florida. Mitt Romney’s tax return, Newt Gingrich’s racial coding through his deriding of food stamps, his request of his wife for an open marriage, an excruciating exploration of both candidates investment, lobbying, or lack thereof on behalf of government mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and a brutal exchange about just how much the other one hates immigrants. Newt tried to raise the debate, but all he could come up with was an idea to build a colony on the moon. Which was fitting, given that the whole thing has seemed like it’s taken place on another planet.
The sheer ugliness of this campaign, one in which where both candidates have attempted to destroy the character of the other, is doing great damage to the party. When Gingrich calls Romney a liar, he creates a campaign ad for Obama. When Romney and his cohorts rip Newt for being erratic and desperate, he does the same. Interestingly, for a brief time, the collapse of civility helped Gingrich, as he rode a wave of negativity to his victory in South Carolina. This may have proved to be a pyrrhic one however, as the party simply cannot afford this style of campaigning to go on too long. While both of them are clearly to blame for letting the discourse degenerate so spectacularly, Romney is the only one who appears to the party itself to be still viable as a national candidate. Given that the party has so many long–held concerns about Gingrich, the vicious negativity of the primary season has made it all the more necessary to lift Romney up, somehow get him above the fray, and leave Newt and his messianic complex behind.
Accordingly, the establishment has fallen quickly into line behind Romney, knowing that if this process continues into the late spring or early summer, they may not have anyone who can hope to even keep an election with Obama remotely close. For now, Gingrich may well keep going, given his long–held disdain for much of the Republican establishment. Once his defeat becomes clear, Gingrich may just hold on, simply out of spite. There is every reason to believe him when he says he’ll keep going. The man seems willing to drag an entire wing of American politics down with him, and this is what has so many Republicans shaking. For those of us watching, it is just another example of a political party lost in space. V
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