I have long thought that Senator Rob Portman (R-OH) will be one of the most vulnerable Republicans up for reelection in 2016. But he’s also one of the most viable general election candidates for president that the GOP could potentially field that year. I’m not happy to learn that he has presidential ambitions.
I can list a half dozen compelling reasons why Sen. Portman would have difficulty winning the nomination, but the list wouldn’t be any more compelling than similar lists I could have made about John McCain and Mitt Romney’s chances. The truth is, the Republican primary voters have a history of pragmatism when it comes to their nominations. In the end, they value perceived electability very highly. Since Ronald Reagan left office, I think only the younger Bush was ever truly loved by the party base. Poppy, Dole, McCain, and Romney all had significant opposition from the party faithful. So, history tells me that Sen. Portman could overcome his support for gay marriage, his ties to the Bush family, his role as OMB director during a time of staggering deficit spending, and his role in pushing through free trade agreements that cost many Americans their jobs.
Still, I question whether or not the old sureties are still operational. The contemporary Republican base is significantly more radical and more agitated than in the past. Pragmatism, compromise, and moderation are all dirty words to them. They no longer love the Bush family or shrug at deficit spending, and the evangelicals are incensed about the advance of gay marriage. They seem to be increasingly hostile to both the Washington Establishment and the interests of business groups like the Chamber of Commerce. I just have a feeling that in 2016, the party faithful will looking for the second coming of Barry Goldwater rather than a centrist whose main asset is electability. In the end, Dole, McCain, and Romney were not elected, and that has caused the base to conclude that “electability” is a scam and a sell-out.
It could be that Portman is the most dangerous possible candidate, but so was Jon Huntsman last time around. Either way, I’m going to keep my eyes on Portman, because I think he would be a strong challenger.
Portman? In today’s GOP? Give me a break. He’ll get as far as Fred Thompson did.
In 2016, it is Cruz or high water.
I’m trying to think if there’s an argument for anyone other’n Cruz, and as of right now, I’m coming up short.
Portman is an empty suit. If he were nominated, it would be for precisely the same reasons (and with the same profile of support) as Mitt Romney. It is entirely conceivable that the primary process will leave a void to be filled at the convention by an Establishment dark horse, and Portman is among those possibilities for such a role who have not yet publicly self-destructed.
A lot of this talk, though, is about “putting Ohio in play”, a notion that is for many reasons absurd and distasteful.
The Inner Party and the Outer Party don’t see these things the same way.
Romney got the nomination because the radicals were too stupid to coalesce behind one candidate and split the primary vote too much.
I doubt they have learned their lesson for 2016, but if they do come to some agreement to get behind a Cruz and fight among themselves, someone rational would have no chance of the nomination.
Exactly.
Poppy, Dole, McCain, and Romney all had significant opposition from the party faithful.
Poppy and Dole are pretty irrelevant to the 2014 GOP. With Poppy the Fairness Doctrine was still warm in its grave and hate radio hadn’t begun yet. No 1988 GOP presidential candidate would have a prayer of winning the 2016 GOP nomination – way too liberal for the current base. With Dole the GOP was in transition and, as with Mondale in 1984, the party elders worked the gears to give the old party loyalist one last spot in the sunshine against an unbeatable incumbent.
McCain and Romney were both about the failure of the party base to unite around one of the many choices of crazy that were available. Combine that with the winner-takes-all nature of the GOP primaries – even if the winner has a bare plurality – and the system works in the interests of the party leadership.
Using that recent history as a guide I would not be at all surprised if in 2016 we are again treated to one rational-sounding white male Republican, who the base can’t stand, against 5 or 6 genuine wingnuts with the rational-sounding guy winning. The problem is which rational-sounding guy will it be? They seem to be struggling to find one. Christie? Nope, he’s already imploded. Portman or Walker? I kinda think you’re going to get into a Fred Thompson situation when they are forced to talk to the national TV media on a daily basis.
In the end I still am betting on Jeb Bush – he’s the one least inflicted with foot-in-mouth disease AND he’s got backing from both old and new GOP money. Unlike 1998, when Rove was working the strategy of inevitability to build momentum for GWB, Jeb is wisely sitting on the sidelines letting the various hopefuls knock each other out (when they aren’t shooting themselves in the foot), so that come late 2015 he’ll seem like a fresh alternative instead of another Bush retread.
Agree, but if the GOP clowns are allowed to run amok for too long, the party will be too damaged for Jeb! to save it from itself. Although his chances of winning will be better if Clinton is the DEM nominee.
Dunno. Clinton v Bush might have voters think “what was my life like when Clinton was President, and what was it like when Bush was President”. No contest if that’s what happens. Understand I’m not saying that all the good OR the ill that happened was due to either President, but I think that’s how most of the public thinks.
In fact, much of the Clinton prosperity was due to it coinciding with the explosion of personal computing and the internet. Much of the recession that followed was due to Bush not alleviating the tech wreck, which I feel Gore would have done just because the Telecoms were big donors to his campaign(s).
In 2000, what gave GWB a chance was that many voters thought it was GHWB that was running and recalled the BushI years as pretty good.
If voters ever knew and understood all the policies promulgated by Presidents from Reagan on, they wouldn’t want to have anything to do with any of them or their families again.
Bush 1 years were pretty stinko for me.
Truth. GWB was polling very well 1997 and 1998 based on the sole fact that he shared his name with daddy.
GHWB was in a sense a victim of bad timing. By accident or intent (we’ll probably never know for sure) he let Hussein think it would be okay to annex Kuwait, then GHWB masterfully built an international coalition and won a war that most Americans thought was spectacular fun. (And this was pre-9/11 America, when getting approval for that bit of fun from Congress was a real nail-biter.) His approval ratings were over 90% with only a year and a half until the election.
Unfortunately, for GHWB, the whole process crapped out the economy pretty badly and gave Clinton a chance to win on economic issues alone. The natural recovery was already underway in November 1992, but it was too late.
Since that recession was so short by the late 1990s most people had forgotten it, especially since the boom times that followed were much longer. So, folks forgot about his economic foiables and remember the positives about GHWB.
And, quite ironically, one of the reasons people liked the memory of GHWB was that he came from that time before all the intense partisan ship that Gingrich brought in. Ironic because of course Rove/Bush would make Gingrich look conciliatory by comparison.
We can hope.
At this point I believe the GOPs hopes for winning future presidential elections rest entirely on one thing: keeping their 5-4 majority on the SCOTUS. If the SCOTUS can keep: a) allowing the state GOPs to make it harder for Democrats to vote, or to have their votes counted; b) make it easier for elections to be bought; and c) disabling or destroying Democratic social programs that tend to win voter loyalty; then they can cling to power.
If magically the SCOTUS majority were to shift to the Dems the game would be up. Plan B probably would be to destroy the world economy and blame it on the Dems.
Too bland and gray. Also would have to give up his Senate seat to run for POTUS.
More likely, they’d look to Kasich for the not crazy sounding, compromise candidate. Assuming his holds onto his lead and wins re-election. (Note at this point in 2006, the great white GOP hope, had a slightly larger lead in his Senatorial re-election bid than Kasich has.
At the woo-woo level, not a plus to hold the party convention in the same state as that of the nominee.
Yes, if you scratch it out on paper and try to do a rational evaluation, Portman would have the potential to be a viable candidate. One which could actually make the 2016 race into something bordering on competitive. But then there is the reality of what has been going on, and will continue to go on, in the Republican Party. And all those many unpredictable variables simply throw the rational evaluation so far out that it becomes nothing more than a theoretical mind exercise.
It is still an open question as to when the level of “Peak Wingnut” will be reached. By no measure are we yet there. If one looks at the trend, however, your observation that the party base will demand another Goldwater-esque candidate is probably the more likely scenario we will have in 2016. The outcome this November will nudge everything in a particular direction. It will either give the wingnuts confirmation in their minds that the country is with them, and their momentum will only increase. Or it will convince them that they need to fight harder still, because the results did not go their way. Either way, I just cannot see a Portman rising out of all this violent Sturm und Drang going on in the GOP. If he does, the base will simply explode in rage.
As a long-term strategic move, the Goldwater nomination paid huge dividends. They were going to lose that year regardless of who was nominated. The party loyals weren’t going anywhere, but they needed new blood, future party loyals. Goldwater gave them that.
The McGovern nomination could have been similarly advantageous to the Democratic Party had the old base not freaked out and dismissed/denigrated the new blood. A rift that wasn’t healed by 1976 when Carter sneaked through and all factions had to “suck it up.”
Dole, McCain and Romney were bad nominations in elections that the GOP was going to lose. Had Rove/GWB not been working the extreme refs by early 1998, his “compassionate conservative” schtick that appealed to moderates wouldn’t have been enough for the extremes. Weirdly enough, the GOP 2010 gains possibly owed much to Palin at the bottom of the 2008 ticket.
Going extreme (or the perception of extreme) when an incumbent isn’t running is a bad move.
Goldwater’s bid was a bit before my time. I was in kindergarten at the time, being indoctrinated into all those socialist ideals of sharing, and working and playing well with others.
But I have one very distinct political memory from my teenage years. At the time I was just really learning a little bit about the political history of the 60’s. And I remember my dad saying, “I can’t imagine how much better things would have been in this country if Barry Goldwater had been elected President. We wouldn’t have had all those troubles”. I didn’t have a clue what he meant at the time. But looking back, and putting all this in the context of my now fervently Tea Party dad, I understand perfectly what he was talking about.
And this isn’t also true among Democratic primary voters?
Problem is that the perception of electability is manufactured. A clear-eyed, sober assessment during the primaries of the eventual nominees that went on to lose the general election would indicate that the loss had been foretold. Particularly in those years when the opposition candidate was known early on.
Portman’s political gravestone reads: “GWB’s Budget Director, 2006 – 2007.”
IMO there’s no coming back from that in national politics. Not only will he be pummeled in the GOTP primaries but he’d be as tainted as Jeb before the national electorate (without the extenuating circumstance of blood ties).
The truth is, the Republican primary voters have a history of pragmatism when it comes to their nominations. In the end, they value perceived electability very highly.
Look at all the clown car opposition McCain got in 2008. And Willard got in ’12. The problem was too many grifters saw a gravy train and split the non-establishment vote.
How does Cruz not position himself as Chief Clown, though? Can any other clown really compete?
Scott Walker could compete. He can talk about beating the liberals’ recall scheme, and how The Man is trying to take him down. Executive experience is an asset. Plus he’s in the pocket of Big Koch. A dullard with terrible hair — and IMHO hair matters — but that’s the guy I think has the strongest chance to separate from the pack.
I don’t see it–just based on image alone. Cruz looks the part a little. Walker’s just asking for a wedgie.
Gohmert
Huntsman wasn’t a dangerous candidate, and Portman won’t be either. A dangerous candidate will be a candidate who the wingnuts recognize as one of their own without that candidate needing to constantly prove their worthiness by saying crazy things throughout the primary (and maybe even the general). That was what made Ronald Reagan and G. W. Bush dangerous, and it’s where McCain and Romney were seriously lacking.
Anyone running for the Republican nomination has to tack so far to the right to survive the primaries that they will lose the General Election. A moderate (At least by Republican standards) like Portman would have to repudiate everything that may have led him to appeal to non-Republican-base voters. Neither Huntsman nor Romney lost any time in turning their backs on their former selves. Past isn’t always prelude, but it in this political climate it’s a pretty sure bet.
Rob Portman probably has the same or less chance as Jon Huntsman had.
Sure, Portman isn’t a Mormon, but he supports marriage for those people?
Zero chance.
Rob Port man
Jon Hunt(s) man
Shit, even their names are really similar in makeup.
Portman? Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…